In other words: don't be an idiot and call the cops instead. That's what they are supposed to be for!

Your example isn't quite as cut-and-dry because in a lot of cases that's going to involve the Castle Doctrine as well, and "starts shooting" means there is an actual danger merely than a perceived potential danger.

Counter-example: You're walking on the streets, at night, in the "bad part" of town. Someone walks towards you with their hands in their pockets, and their head covered with a hoodie. They say "Hey, what are you doing here?". You perceive this to be a threatening situation and fear for your life. Are you supposed to: a) pull out your gun and shoot them, or b) run away?

Some proponents of Stand Your Ground would say that option A is perfectly fine, some proponents of Duty To Retreat would say that you must attempt option B first, and fall back to option A only as a last resort.

> Somebody kicks in your door with a pump action and starts shooting- There are _some_ jurisdictions that require you to try and flee. You kill them and they werent bodily blocking your car in? Murder charge.

Which jurisdictions? Is this in the US? I’ve lived in a bunch of European countries and in none would you be charged with murder in that situation.

> Only when threatened and self-defense has to be proportionate. If someone attacks you with a knife you would not be allowed to defend yourself with a firearm if you had one.

Being attacked with a knife means your life is being threatened and using a firearm would be legal even in Germany. The response has to be proportionate to the threat on life or limb not the size of the weapon.

Search for Texas castle doctrine. The intention is to provide extreme deterrence against home invasion crimes. The liability for shooting a person, for any reason, in Texas outside the home is much greater.

> in Texas, where, from what I understand, if you catch someone in the night stealing you could just kill them even if they never threatend you.

It's worth pointing out that night is doing some of the work in this statement. Texas is unusual, as far as I know, that darkness makes a big difference in how self-defense and danger are viewed. It kinda makes sense, because in the dark, the would-be victim is less able to fully and accurately assess the situation. So Texans need to be aware that their actions may be interpreted more harshly in the dark.

> Only when threatened and self-defense has to be proportionate. If someone attacks you with a knife you would not be allowed to defend yourself with a firearm if you had one.

No, that's explicitly not the case, it doesn't has to be proportionate, only needs to be the mildest defence available to you that will stop the attack.

Not sure where people get the idea that the defense has to be proportionate, for some reason many believe that.

Defending yourself with a gun against an attacker with a knife is well within your rights (assuming that drawing and defending with a gun would even be effective).

See here for example as reference: https://zjs-online.com/dat/artikel/2020_2_1383.pdf

First 1-2 sentences.

About Germany, §32 StGB doesn't require proportionality, the test is "Erforderlichkeit" or "necessity". So if you only have a gun and get attacked by a knife, you don't have to "make things even".

Of course, if someone is simply stealing a Catalytic Converter you can't really shoot them, as it's a bit much... you can point a gun at them, and possibly even shoot the air, that's easier to argue as self-defence. If they threaten you back, the situation changes.

The problem is having a gun in the outside, in Germany, good luck with that... of course, if it's someone stealing something inside your house, it becomes a home invasion, which is a completely different thing than someone stealing your property on the street.

It's way more nuanced than Texas, which has a bit more clear cut law.

I think this even covers graffiti during the nighttime.

> I feel like it's a mistake for the legal code to distinguish between what are fully interchangeable terms in the language the code is supposedly written in.

I’ve thought about this too. They often vary from state to state as well. But the alternative would be to create new legal terms, which would be more confusing, or use just use numbers, which would be hard for laypeople to discuss.

> Private Domicile, BITCH

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEdaQcq4w88

I have a friend who came out of his house to shoot and kill a guy who was inside his car attempting to steal it. Friend was literally a local celebrity for months.

>I feel like it's a mistake for the legal code to distinguish between what are fully interchangeable terms in the language the code is supposedly written in.

They're not at all fully interchangeable, just many Americans have a poor grasp of the English language.

No, the driveway wouldn't count. Texas doesn't define burglary by property boundaries; you have to enter a "building" or a "habitation", and a habitation must be a "structure" or a "vehicle".

In this case Texas defines "criminal mischief" in three clauses, and separately defines circumstances under which it constitutes a felony. Felony mischief is largely but not exclusively defined by the amount of pecuniary loss.

The first two clauses are destroying property and damaging property in a way that causes pecuniary loss to anyone.

The third clause is making marks on property. This seems like it would always be included under "damaging property in a way that causes pecuniary loss", so I would guess it's there to make it completely explicit that graffiti counts as criminal mischief.

The quoted section of the penal code does not appear to apply any restrictions to the specific variety of criminal mischief that justifies deadly force (other than that it occurs at night).

For something like graffiti where the general sentiment is that deadly force shouldn't be considered justified, I could see an argument that the use of deadly force violates §9.42(3)(A), which requires the person using deadly force to reasonably believe that the land or property in question "cannot be protected or recovered by any other means". If we view both verbs as applying to criminal mischief, you could make the argument that when you catch someone spraying graffiti on a wall on your property, your property can be recovered, though not protected, by e.g. repainting the wall.

The counterargument might be that "recovered" is in there as the appropriate verb for cases of theft, and "protected" is in there for cases of mischief.

I don't think restricting §9.42 to felony mischief would be an improvement to the law; it's difficult to know whether criminal mischief is or isn't a felony until you've tried to recover from it and learned how much that will cost. If you catch someone keying your car, for example, that probably is a felony, but as far as social impact I would rate it similarly to graffiti.

It can also mean unjustified/immoral killing, which can be a useful definition (otherwise e.g. a true dictator can never murder anyone).