You are at home watching tv in your bedroom with your spouse and the children are sleeping snug in their beds. You hear a noise downstairs and then hear someone walking around. You grab your shotgun (which is in the top of the closet, out of the reach of children-following Massachusetts law), remove the trigger lock (It is locked in accordance with Massachusetts law.), grab 5 – 00 buckshot shells from the locked ammo case (following Massachusetts law) which is in a drawer, load the shotgun’s magazine and chamber a round.
You leave your bedroom and walk to the top of the stairs (your loved ones are in their bedrooms behind you) where you see a thief starting up the stairs. You shout: “I am armed, go back and leave my house or I will shoot”. You are confident of yourself since Massachusetts has the Castle Doctrine which allows defense within of one’s home, so you are good to go. The person stops on the second to the bottom step and looks at you looks away then turns back towards you. You point your shotgun at the intruder’s chest and send a load of buckshot (8 – 0.33 caliber pellets with a nice tight pattern at 15 feet) into the intruder. The thief’s accomplice then runs past the stairs and heads to and out your front door. You run to the bottom of the stairs, jumping over the corpse of Intruder #1 and get to the front door and nail the running thief (drops like a sack of potatoes) in your front yard. You are pumped, knowing that you are the hero (You-The-Hero 2, bad guys 0) having saved your family from these evil, Ne’er-do-well intruders.
What happens next?
You go to jail! You are charged with murder in the 2nd degree. You have to sell you house to pay your legal bills. Your spouse and children move to Montana to get away from the media, who are like vultures, leaving you alone and miserable. Worse of all, they took your dog with them.
If you own a gun, understanding self-defense law is an absolute requirement.
In case you don’t get why you are going to jail:
First, the things that you did right:
- You armed yourself with a great in-home defensive tool – shotgun and load it with double ought buckshot.
- You go to the top of the stairs and hold, keeping yourself between the intruders and your family.
- You shout a warning “I am armed, go back and leave my house or I will shoot”.
- You have legitimate reason to feel endangered.
Then it all falls apart. Here are some things that you did not do correctly, getting you arrested:
- You did not know if Intruder #1 was armed and you fired at him.
- Intruder #1 was not advancing towards you when you shot.
- You were not in imminent danger as you had a shotgun pointed at Intruder #1 at 15 feet and if he started to advance towards you, you would have time to shoot him.
- Intruder #2 certainly was NOT a threat to you as he ran out of your house as soon as the shooting started.
- You pursued Intruder #2 out of your house, making you the aggressor.
- You shot Intruder #2, presumably in the back, as he was running away from you.
The Castle Doctrine is very limited in most states.
- It only applies to the interior of your dwelling; not the front yard, not the garage, not the porch, not the back yard, only within the four walls of the house.
- You can defend yourself or other innocent parties under a limited set of circumstances if someone is illegally in your house or entered legally and has been told to leave.
- You, or an innocent party, must be in imminent danger of death or grievous bodily harm. In this scenario, you were not in imminent danger as intruder #1 did not display a weapon and, although he had turned towards you, he had not advanced which would have at least indicated an intent to harm you and you has a shotgun pointed at his chest.
What you don’t know can hurt you. It is not uncommon in the United States for someone to defend him/herself only to end up in the hoosegow.
Self-defense law is complicated. In order to be justified in a self-defense action you must meet certain criteria. Take a self-defense justification course to be prepared. Forewarned is forearmed.