There is an interesting case playing out in deep Southern Illinois regarding Booby Traps

[Kleanbore]

The law says you have the right to a have a jury of your peers.

You are confusing the rights of accused persons in England with hose of accused people hare.

The Magna Carta guaranteed that lords would be tried only by lords, while in this country we have the right to a fair and impartial jury.

I wonder what the verdict would have been if a farmer or two had been on the jury.

Are you suggesting that farmers might condone murder?

 

[BSA1]

The Magna Carta guaranteed that lords would be tried only by lords, while in this country we have the right to a fair and impartial jury.

Are you suggesting that farmers might condone murder?

Many if not most lawyers wIll agree on the importance of jury selection and that trials are often won at this stage. I can tell you from first hand experience that one person can hopelessly deadlock the jury.

(However my experience has come from only serving on one jury so you may argue that my case was not the norm).

 

[Kleanbore]

I can tell you from first hand experience that one person can hopelessly deadlock the jury.

...which will lead to a retrial.

How many defendants can afford that?

 

[TomJ]

Law school was 20+ years ago, but I remember studying a case with almost identical facts to this and the defendant was found guilty. On a non-legal note, killing someone for breaking into a shed IMO is extreme.

 

[Meeks36]

Why not rig up a big can of pepper spray? Not hard to do. And it gets the point across. Saves hassle of going to prison for murder. That mixed w a couple camera's. You will hear them screaming or coughing.

 

[Elkins45]

Hence my question/comment about a camera and 2-way communication.

You aren’t in danger of bodily harm if you aren’t physically preset in the building, so I doubt that would work as a defense. Generally you can’t shoot someone just to protect property.

 

[boom boom]

Generally speaking booby traps, even the intended less than lethal, might get the owner in legal hot water. If not criminal, then civil lawsuits make this expensive. Remember a lot of insurance companies will not cover liability against intentional torts and so if the yuteful burglar gets suffocated by a pepper spray booby trap bomb because of asthma--it might mean criminal charges depending on the state and caselaw and most certainly a civil wrongful death lawsuit. Insurance is cheaper than lawyers and judgments.

People get sued enough by trespassers that get injured due to property features such as sinkholes, wells, etc. If you intentionally create something to harm someone, even short of mortal injury, you get to play legal jeopardy.

 

[Meeks36]

Generally speaking booby traps, even the intended less than lethal, might get the owner in legal hot water. If not criminal, then civil lawsuits make this expensive. Remember a lot of insurance companies will not cover liability against intentional torts and so if the yuteful burglar gets suffocated by a pepper spray booby trap bomb because of asthma--it might mean criminal charges depending on the state and caselaw and most certainly a civil wrongful death lawsuit. Insurance is cheaper than lawyers and judgments.

People get sued enough by trespassers that get injured due to property features such as sinkholes, wells, etc. If you intentionally create something to harm someone, even short of mortal injury, you get to play legal jeopardy.

I never understood how someone could illegally enter my property get hurt and then sue me. Makes no sense to me. They broke a law entering my domain. Fell got hurt and can sue me. I reckon I'm not sue Happy. Could have sued a few but never did.

 

[boom boom]

I never understood how someone could illegally enter my property get hurt and then sue me. Makes no sense to me. They broke a law entering my domain. Fell got hurt and can sue me. I reckon I'm not sue Happy. Could have sued a few but never did.

It makes a warped kind of sense just as imprisoning folks that do not pay their child support despite most states explicit prohibitions on debt slavery. It is the idea that society might have to pay instead of one of the parties involved in the dispute. Society through its laws has allowed great leniency for lawbreakers to collect damages despite their lawbreaking. In the old days, the doctrine, "He who comes into equity must come with clean hands" barred many lawsuits such as this.

The basic rationale is that someone has to pay for injuries suffered and usually the trespassers are lacking funds to do so. Thus, the landowner pays absent explicit no trespassing signs (and maybe not even then in leftist jurisdictions) or explicit warning signs about hazards on the property. Basically, the law assumes that property owners will keep their properties up and are insured. Thus, allowing trespassers to sue for harms caused to them allows society not to have to pay for the trespasser's medical injuries and the like.

Sometimes the trespasser is a child and unable to comprehend dangers such as swimming pools. For that reason, attractive nuisance torts more or less demand that you have a fence around such or risk a massive wrongful death suit.

 

[herrwalther]

People do booby traps all the time, but they aren't lethal. Like putting broken glass on the top of a fence or leaving exposed screws or nails in areas where a person might break in. When I was young my dad put his electric fence charger up to a piece of metal he used to plug a hole people were using to break into his barn. Again, nothing lethal.

Do you honestly believe such acts to be lawful?

Interesting correlation with both of these. Legal grey area with non lethal booby traps. In New Orleans it is common for bars to have broken glass (Home Alone anyone?) near windows. Not a deliberate trap but not something quickly picked up. What about plants? Many plants have thorns or sharp edges. A court would have a hard time dictating a rose bush under a window as a booby trap compared to someone who likes roses.

In this case, setting a lethal booby trap is just plain not smart. It doesn't matter how many signs you have saying do not enter. It is like having a bright red button that says do not push. Someone is going to push it.

 

[Kleanbore]

Legal grey area with non lethal booby traps. In New Orleans it is common for bars to have broken glass (Home Alone anyone?) near windows. Not a deliberate trap but not something quickly picked up. What about plants? Many plants have thorns or sharp edges. A court would have a hard time dictating a rose bush under a window as a booby trap compared to someone who likes roses.

There are things that will be accepted and things that will not.

Roses, yes.

Glass, no.

Barbed wire, yes, if visible.

Electrified fence, it depends.

Andrew Branca covers the subject well in his courses.

 

[zorro45]

I think anybody with a small modicum of intelligence would think about a situation such as a fire, volunteer F.D. rolls up, etc.

 

[old lady new shooter]

A guy in Maine was now killed by a booby trap he set up.
https://www.foxnews.com/us/homemade-booby-trap-maine-kills-homeowner

 

[GEM]

Or themselves:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-50619952

A 65-year-old American man who rigged his home with a booby trap to keep out intruders has been killed by the device.

Ronald Cyr called police in the town of Van Buren in the state of Maine to say he had been shot.

Police found a door had been designed to fire a handgun should anyone attempt to enter. Mr Cyr was taken to hospital but died of his injuries.

 

[old lady new shooter]

Or themselves:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-50619952

One sentence in that article caught my eye, "It is not known how he managed to set off the device.". I wonder whether this could have been an elaborate suicide scheme...

 

[pert near]

One sentence in that article caught my eye, "It is not known how he managed to set off the device.". I wonder whether this could have been an elaborate suicide scheme...

...or murder?

 

[desidog]

I would suggest a more suttel trap. One that flings manure or dye onto the burglar. After all the bank puts explosive "DYE PACKETS" into the loot bags of robbers and it's not a crime. Seems like you oughta' be able to do the same.

It's been done for poachers.

If you put up cameras, and substitute bear spray for the shotgun... you'd be making some great youtube content too.

 

[Jeff White]

Update: 30 years.......

http://www.southernillinoisnow.com/...-with-trick-gun-gets-30-year-prison-sentence/

I still can't believe they took this to trial....

 

[Mr. Zorg]

The justification argument is probably moot.

I haven't researched IL law in depth, but it looks like booby traps are not legal. So there is no justification that would allow their use.

TX is similar--there are specific laws against deadly force booby traps. So even if deadly force were obviously justified by the circumstances of the situation, it would still be illegal if done by a booby trap instead of by a person.

When I was about 13(?) growing up in Corpus Christi, TX, mid-1970's, some guy with specialized tools that was sick of break-ins trying to get them he wired the toolbox up with a system that supplied enough electricity it killed the final attempted thief. The tool owner was arrested, tried, convicted, & sentenced to prison. I doubt if TX laws and legal stance regarding such things have changed much in the interim.