B2431 wrote:

From: Kerryn Offord

B2431 wrote:
SNIP
Someone breaks into your house and threatens the family... you can use
reasonable force to defend yourself or others... If the guy is still
alive afterwards... well, they was lucky... But you shouldn't have a
hand gun, and that shotgun had better have been secured when you grabbed
it (and got the ammo out of another locked cabinet).


I don't know if you have any experience with guns, but I know how long it takes
to unlock my ammo locker and my gun safe. I also know how long it takes to load
any of my guns. By the time I have done it the bad guy is going to have had
plenty of time to do what he wants. Do you seriously expect the bad guy to
stand there and wait until you have armed yourself?

I was talking about the NZ situation re getting the weapon from a
secured gun safe (although I think you can have weapons on the wall as
long as they have a trigger lock...)


As for getting a gun from a cabinet..., the one case I can think of
where a householder used a legally owned handgun to kill an intruder,
did just that.. And the rules for securing handguns in NZ are pretty strict.

As for the bag guy... As soon as he (most of them are he) to have done a
runner as soon as they think they have woken someone... They really
don't like any noise and are liable to run at the first sound....



Technically you

shouldn't have the golf club lying handy (it implies premeditation,
however, I don't see a jury convicting and neither will the police), but
pulling one out of the golf bag is ok....


It shouldn't matter at all where a weapon is stored. Premeditation implies I
intended to harm or kill that specific bad guy. It also implies I went out of
my way to do it. Self defense by whatever means is NOT premeditated murder.

Nope the premeditation implies you intended to use maybe excessive
force, if you grab a golf club from a bag (and you play golf)... then
its an spur of the moment action.

Premeditated doesn't need a specific victim/ target, otherwise those
guys convicted in that sniper case couldn't be convicted of murder (the
targets were random)
SNIP

I don't think any intruder who gets whacked while engaged in 'home
invasion' has a chance of even getting the case to court, let alone
winning. OTOH we tend not to sue at the drop of a hat in NZ...


As long as the householder used reasonable force there is no chance of
them being sued.


You may not be law suit crazy in NZ, but it's unbeliebably rampant here in the
U.S.
Have you heard about the grandmother who won a law suit for burning herself
with coffee she had just bought from MacDonald's? She was the passenger in
that car which was stopped at the time of the incident. There are criminals
who sue and win for injuries incurred during the commision of their crimes.
Doctors get sued because a baby is not born perfect.

Feel free to research this. You may get quite a few laughs.

Re the McDs coffee... it does sound extreme, until you find that McDs
coffee was being served much hotter than anybody else was, and that they
had been warned about serving it so hot (especially at a drive in window).