Deadly force to protect property and nighttime requirement

[jamminbutter]

Punctuation seems to really matter here.

[Javier730]

Punctuation seems to really matter here.

[ELB]

I think the basic rules of grammar and the construction of the sentence indicate that "in the night time" only applies to those nouns to which the phrase appears immediately after, i.e. "theft" and "criminal mischief". If it applied to the other crimes listed, the construction would be different.

Furthermore:

In the case of robbery and aggravated robbery, "...in the night time" doesn't matter: they are already justifications for the use of deadly force under defense of persons, and you can't have robbery or aggravated robbery without a person (victim) to be defended.

It is an element of each of those crimes that the robber intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly causes bodily injury to another, or intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly threatens or causes or places someone in fear of imminent bodily injury or death.

Robbery and Aggravated Robbery also both have as an element "committing theft", which is unlawful appropriation of someone else's property.

It would not make sense to include Robbery and Aggravated Robbery in this list of justifications for protection of property if it was only valid "in the night time", when Defense of Persons places no limitations on the time of day for justification of using deadly force to prevent commission of Robbery/Agg Robbery. I think you can't logically separate Robbery/Agg Robbery of property from Rob/Agg Rob of person.

In addition, it would be completely absurd to read that you can used deadly force to prevent arson only in the night time: that's saying if you catch someone getting ready to burn your house at night you can shoot him, but if it is noon, you have to hold fire and let him torch it. The obvious purpose of this section of the law is to protect property in extreme circumstances, and arson is about as extreme as you can get. Once it burns down there's no possibility of recovery. Note the law does not justify shooting someone fleeing from arson or criminal mischief, only to prevent them. And for criminal mischief, note that the justifications is modified by "in the night time." This is not the case for preventing arson -- preventing arson is not limited to the night time.

I am not a lawyer and did not stay in a Holiday Inn last night, but I did stay in a hotel in Maui last month, and thems was pretty nice digs...

[casp625]

Also, the only definition of "nighttime" I could find was:

Code: Select all

TITLE 7. VEHICLES AND TRAFFIC
SUBTITLE C. RULES OF THE ROAD
CHAPTER 541. DEFINITIONS
(5)  "Nighttime" means the period beginning one-half hour after sunset and ending one-half hour before sunrise.

Because of the seasons and daylight savings, 8pm may or may not be considered nighttime