White man faces trial in US for shooting Black teen who went to wrong house
stopthatgirl7@kbin.social to 
aljazeera.com
Teenager Ralph Yarl was shot without warning through a door after going to the wrong house to collect his brothers.
You are viewing a single comment
What im wandering is this: is this one of those houses where you have to enter the yard in order to ring the bell/knock on the door? If so, this is an actual death trap - you dont know if this is the right house, and in order to verify you have to step into the property where you may be legally shot.
How do you protect yourself when you have to visit a house but are not sure which is the correct one?
You can't legally shoot someone for entering your yard...thats why he's on trial.
I think there is a low in the US that if someone infiltrates your property you can legally shoot to kill. Not sure about the specifics. I assume this case was either too extreme or that there are more specifics to this law.
No, specifics depend on the state but in none are you allowed to shoot someone for entering your yard.
These laws, castle doctrine, are not anywhere near that crazy. They're the same idea as self defense... however, normally you have a "duty to retreat", what castle doctrine says is if you're in your own home you no longer have that obligation.
You still have to meet the bar for self defense, i.e., they need to be a threat... someone walking in your yard or knocking on your door that's not brandishing a weapon is not going to meet that bar.
Edit: Wikipedia disagrees with me ... though I'm not sure if that's a factual disagreement or an editorial disagreement.
There's a lack of citation here which honestly should probably be raised on the wiki. The cited source does not support that text (I've added the appropriate citation requests on the wikipedia side -- if anyone can prove these claims, we should contribute the reference there as well).
Yeah i remembered seeing something similar to this somewhere. Either way US laws are completely irrelevant to me so this is pure mild interest.
You're talking about "Stand Your Ground" laws. They allow you to shoot in self-defense when someone enters your home or otherwise threatens you. This is why George Zimmerman got off after murdering a child. Don't forget, kids, George Zimmerman killed a child.
Being on your property probably doesn't count in most states, but I say "probably" because some states are fucking insane, so who knows.
Hey now, that's not fair. Zimmerman stalked a child through the night after police told him not to, started a fistfight with that child, and only murdered the child after it became evident that he was losing the fight he started.
That's what stand your ground is for, shooting your way out of fights you start. Ask Marissa Alexander, it's certainly not for firing warning shots at your abusive ex husband when he's on your property in violation of a restraining order and threatening your kids.
I know How could this monster
Have really killed this totally innocent angel of a child,
His social media post were so innocent!
BuT hIs SoCiAl MeDia
Get fucked
The laws on self-defense are extremely state specific. Your understanding of self defense laws is highly sensationalized and I recommend in the strongest possible terms you do some research before they become relevant to you personally one way or the other.
I dont live in the US and dont plan on visiting there in the near future. I am aware of the laws in my country.
But you had no qualms opining about those laws on the internet.
My posts here were full of "i think" and "not sure". Also not sure which part here was an opinion.
And this is the internet. Not an academic paper. This IS the place to ask/discuss topics you are not sure about. Just dont go around claiming to be an expert in something you are not.