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From: ddb@mrvax.DEC (DAVID DYER-BENNET MRO1-2/L14 DTN 231-4076)
Newsgroups: net.women
Subject: Self defense
Message-ID: <188@decwrl.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 11-Jan-85 13:04:31 EST
Article-I.D.: decwrl.188
Posted: Fri Jan 11 13:04:31 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 13-Jan-85 08:49:37 EST
Sender: daemon@decwrl.UUCP
Organization: DEC Engineering Network
Lines: 25

Self defense, in the legal sense, is a very peculiar subject.  In most
jurisdictions you cannot legally use deadly force in defense of property;
often you cannot use deadly force against a less deadly attack.  Anyone
interesting in defending himself would do well, I think, to investigate
how these matters are treated in the jurisdiction where he lives.

There is a horror story about an old woman who shot a male attacker in her
own home, after he had chased her into the basement; she was convicted of
some moderately serious charge, possibly a flavor of manslaughter, on the
grounds that she could have escaped the attack by crawling out a window
(remember how high above the floor basement windows are?), and thus the
use of deadly force was not justified.  I'd like to think this isn't true,
and I've never seen a specific citation of the exact case, so maybe it
really ISN'T true.  But anyway, be careful who you kill and where you kill
him!

It has also been pointed out that it may well be better to worry about
standing trial for killing your attacker, than to worry about recovering
from the damage done to you in the attack.  

Here's hoping you never need to worry about it!

		-- David Dyer-Bennet
		-- ...decwrl!dec-rhea!dec-mrvax!ddb