Is There a Right of Self-Defense Against Police?

A

AlongCameJones

Moderator
Maybe there is but an "ordinary citizen" who shoots a cop while claiming self-defense may have much steeper legal challenges to face than do cops who wrongfully shoot citizens. Courts and juries are often biased in favor of law enforcement. "We" like to think that lawmen are infalible.

The law is one thing, reality another. While there is some legal theory that a using lethal force in defense of a home would have been justified, the courts and the police tend to overlook the errors of law enforcement more generously than those of the general citizenry.


Source: https://thecrimereport.org/2019/06/10/is-there-a-right-of-self-defense-against-police/


I also fear that police might retaliate lethally or brutally against even a justifiable self-defender for merely shooting a "brother officer".


Here is a case where even a brother officer killed one of his very own in alleged self-defense:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kevin_Gaines_(police_officer)
 
The law is one thing, reality another. While there is some legal theory that a using lethal force in defense of a home would have been justified, the courts and the police tend to overlook the errors of law enforcement more generously than those of the general citizenry.
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In another recent post I highlighted the events surrounding the shooting death at the hands of the police of Brianna Taylor.

In short, police executed a no-knock 3AM raid seeking her, while she was at her boyfriend's apartment. Her boyfriend (who was not sought, nor did he have a criminal record) opened fire in the belief that he was the victim of a home invasion and shot an office in the leg.

The officers returned fire and killed an unarmed Brianna in bed.

The boyfriend, who had shot the LEO, was never charged nor injured in the shootout.

The context of this is that this occurred in a state with the castle doctrine, and that the police had recently and specifically warned people in that locality that gangs were posing as PO in order to execute home invasions without resistance.

So, there are situations where the answer to your question results in 'yes'. But, I would guess that those situations are very rare. In different situations, in different localities, any resistance to LEO will not end well.

Ultimately, the police are the manifestation of the states' monopoly on violence. The state takes a dim view of being challenged on that monopoly.
 
Sometimes police are shot when the supposed defender did not even recognize the police as POLICE to begin with. Any home invader can claim to be the POLICE. In that scenario whereby one LAPD officer shot another, both men were in plain clothes and may have not even recognized each other as fellow policemen. Sometimes cops are purposely shot and/or killed by other cops defending the "Blue Line" code of honor. Whenever govt. agencies, including police and military, have inside/secret codes of honor or fraternal loyalty, the law and justice can be compromised.
 
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There needs to be serious legislative reform in regards to how law enforcement is operated. The police need to be policed from the federal level on down.

I do like Texas law where property owners can get compensated for police damage by government. I do enjoy hearing whenever the police get beaten in tort lawsuits for doing stupid things. I was glad to hear the cop who killed George Floyd was convicted. Derek Chauvin's setence was much too light. Again, the court's being too soft on bad cops.

The notion of no-knock police stupidity entered my psyche from the 1987/1988?? film, Colors, with Robert Duvall and Sean Penn. The cops got the wrong d@mn address and killed a man for grabbing his pants out of embarrassment.

There was another film in the '90's with Tom Selleck about two bad cops that entered the wrong address and shot a man for holding a hair dryer.

I believe there are such idiots in the real-world of law enforcement.
 
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