Comment by ashtonkem
5 years ago
Pedantry time.
“Stand your ground” isn’t about defending property with lethal force. Stand your ground is about whether or not you have a duty to attempt to flee (if possible) before applying lethal force. Castle doctrine is a similar rule, but more narrowly scoped to your own home. Without stand-your-ground, you have to demonstrate that you tried to, or were incapable of retreating before applying lethal force.
That being said, there are very few states of the union where applying lethal force to protect property is legal. Texas is the only one I know of. In Texas you could shoot someone to protect property even if you feel that your life and limb are not at risk, but that’s not the norm in other states.
All states allow some level of force to stop a fleeing felon, the well named “Fleeing Felon” rule, but Tennessee vs. Garner limited this to non-lethal force. So you could tackle a fleeing robber legally, but shooting one would be illegal outside of Texas.
Now Minnesota only has castle doctrine and stand your ground from your own vehicle. If one reasonably feels that life and limb are at risk in Minnesota you can apply lethal force, but if you’re outside of your home and car you have a duty to attempt to retreat first. In my opinion this makes shooting at looters to protect your business a dicey proposition legally, as arguably you should have just fled.
As always, I am not a lawyer, and this is not legal advice.
That's very interesting information, thank you for taking time to research this and explain it in a friendly and informative way. I am from Texas, so I admit most of my knowledge comes from my own state's laws. If I'm not mistaken we are in agreement that the looters lives should not be at risk in this situation and that Minnesota law will likely not protect an equivalent of what the Korean population did in LA during their riots, when they took to protecting their shops by getting on their roofs with rifles.