Texas Justice

[Jeff Lebowski]

Strange case:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/05/03/....ap/index.html

[il Padrino Ute]

Holy cow.

[ewth8tr]

Originally Posted by Jeff Lebowski

Strange case:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/05/03/....ap/index.html

I agree, while the wife certainly has some responsibility, I'm puzzled that the husband is getting off without any apparent charges.

[ute4ever]

In my criminal law class, the professor gave the following hypo:

A, B, and C are standing near the edge of a cliff. Suddenly, A pushes B into C, causing C to plummet to his death.

C's death came as a result of B forcing him over the edge. Who should be charged for his murder?

[ewth8tr]

Originally Posted by ute4ever

In my criminal law class, the professor gave the following hypo:

A, B, and C are standing near the edge of a cliff. Suddenly, A pushes B into C, causing C to plummet to his death.

C's death came as a result of B forcing him over the edge. Who should be charged for his murder?

But, unless I'm mistaken, the wife didn't point the gun and then push the guys trigger finger. I certainly understand why he did it, but he shot 4 times into a fleeing car.

[ute4ever]

Originally Posted by ewth8tr

But, unless I'm mistaken, the wife didn't point the gun and then push the guys trigger finger. I certainly understand why he did it, but he shot 4 times into a fleeing car.

True - different scenario, but same principle: the court found that it was A's actions that caused B to react in that manner.

[UtahDan]

Originally Posted by ewth8tr

I agree, while the wife certainly has some responsibility, I'm puzzled that the husband is getting off without any apparent charges.

Come now, and let us reason together.

Wife is guilty on involuntary manslaughter, which is a negligent homicide. This means that the person does something negligent (breaches a duty of ordinary care) that proximately results in death. If I am not paying attention and kill someone in my car, I have committed a negligent homicide.

Wife is not trying to kill the man, but the reasonable wo/man (which is how you measure ordinary care) doesn't yell rape in that scenario. With the benefit of hindsight, we are not surprised that a death resulted (this is what proximate cause means). I think there is even a good argument that she is reckless (which would make it manslaughter), that is she knew that death was a possibility (though not a probability) but didn't care.

Husband is not charged because he was acting within the scope of a "defense of others" privilege. The privilege is stated differently different places, but essentially when you are threatened with imminent death or serious bodily injury you are privileged to defend yourself with lethal force. Any privilege you could assert your self, another can step into your shoes and assert. So when husband believes his wife is being raped, her privilege to respond with lethal force transfers to him. Now he does make what is called a "mistake of fact", that is she is not really being raped. But so long as his mistake of fact was reasonable (which I think here it pretty clearly was) the privilege still protects him.

I'm not sure whether rape falls into the category of "serious bodily injury" everywhere, but I imagine it does.

This actually sounds like a case where the justice system did exactly what it was supposed to.

[ewth8tr]

Originally Posted by UtahDan

Come now, and let us reason together.

Wife is guilty on involuntary manslaughter, which is a negligent homicide. This means that the person does something negligent (breaches a duty of ordinary care) that proximately results in death. If I am not paying attention and kill someone in my car, I have committed a negligent homicide.

Wife is not trying to kill the man, but the reasonable wo/man (which is how you measure ordinary care) doesn't yell rape in that scenario. With the benefit of hindsight, we are not surprised that a death resulted (this is what proximate cause means). I think there is even a good argument that she is reckless (which would make it manslaughter), that is she knew that death was a possibility (though not a probability) but didn't care.

Husband is not charged because he was acting within the scope of a "defense of others" privilege. The privilege is stated differently different places, but essentially when you are threatened with imminent death or serious bodily injury you are privileged to defend yourself with lethal force. Any privilege you could assert your self, another can step into your shoes and assert. So when husband believes his wife is being raped, her privilege to respond with lethal force transfers to him. Now he does make what is called a "mistake of fact", that is she is not really being raped. But so long as his mistake of fact was reasonable (which I think here it pretty clearly was) the privilege still protects him.

I'm not sure whether rape falls into the category of "serious bodily injury" everywhere, but I imagine it does.

This actually sounds like a case where the justice system did exactly what it was supposed to.

But the article says "her husband fired four shots into the truck as Devin LaSalle drove off, killing him", so if the guy was driving away, there was no imminent threat. The wife was out of the car and the guy was driving away. If a police officer fired shots into a fleeing car, unless the fleeing car was driving towards someone and likely to hit them.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Originally Posted by ewth8tr

But the article says "her husband fired four shots into the truck as Devin LaSalle drove off, killing him", so if the guy was driving away, there was no imminent threat. The wife was out of the car and the guy was driving away. If a police officer fired shots into a fleeing car, unless the fleeing car was driving towards someone and likely to hit them.

When I lived in Austin, there was a controversial shooting case. A guy in town heard a noise in front of his house. He grabbed his pistol and slipped out in the night to find a kid in his car in the driveway trying to steal his stereo. The would-be thief noticed the man and took off running. The man shot him in the back and killed him just as he was about to get off the property. Naturally, some people were furious but they guy was not charged with anything. Turns out that there is a law in Texas stating that if someone is committing a crime on your property, you are authorized to use deadly force, whether or not you are in danger.

If you like and appreciate guns and want maximum license in using them to kill people, Texas is the best place to live probably in the entire world.

[UtahDan]

Originally Posted by ewth8tr

But the article says "her husband fired four shots into the truck as Devin LaSalle drove off, killing him", so if the guy was driving away, there was no imminent threat. The wife was out of the car and the guy was driving away. If a police officer fired shots into a fleeing car, unless the fleeing car was driving towards someone and likely to hit them.

Guess I should have read down further. That doesn't change my analysis as to her, but it sure does as to him. Perhaps he was offered immunity in exchange for testimony?