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Let's call a murder a murder

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Re: Let's call a murder a murder

#231

Post by dragonwriter »

zahlman wrote: post #230
metaphysicalyes wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope you are not claiming perception of intent is enough to claim a life. It is the actual intent that counts. Appeal to mental ineptitude is not a defense of murder. If a person can't distinguish between intention of person to kill others vs escaping when driving in a completely different direction then that person does not have right to posses a weapon which can take human life. Also interesting that you do not a…

> I hope you are not claiming perception of intent is enough to claim a life. It is the actual intent that counts. As an objective legal matter, it is. There is abundant case law for this. Cases relevant to the specific case where the shooting victim is attempting to flee the scene include https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graham_v._Connor and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tennessee_v._Garner . > If a person can't distin…

> > I hope you are not claiming perception of intent is enough to claim a life > > It is the actual intent that counts.

> As an objective legal matter, it is.

You are both wrong. The requirement for self-defense (which may or may not even be available here if it is ever charged, because it doesn't apply to all kinds of murder, notably generally not to felony murder, which given ICE's very narrow jurisdiction there is a very good case, IMO, applies here) is neither mere subjective perception nor actual intent, but objectively reasonable fear. Actual perception of a threat which is not objectively reasonable in the circumstances does not justify self-defense.

Re: Let's call a murder a murder

#232

Post by mindslight »

zahlman wrote: post #226
mindslight wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You keep throwing "belligerently" out there to describe protest behavior. Yes, protesting is belligerent. I don't see which vehicles here you are saying were obstructed The first black Jeep is a probable ICE vehicle, but it looks like they decided to reverse without interacting with her, so that's not obstruction. Black sedan (ICE) pulls out at 1:23, but then pulls over. Grey SUV with plate on dash (ICE) pulls out th…

> You keep throwing "belligerently" out there to describe protest behavior. Yes, protesting is belligerent. You keep throwing "escalation" out there to describe ordinary law enforcement procedure. No, "get out of the car" is not an escalation; it is a response to someone who has already demonstrated non-compliance with a previous request to stop the obstruction. > I don't see which vehicles here you are saying were o…

> You keep throwing "escalation" out there to describe ordinary law enforcement procedure

Yes, because it's an escalation, even if it is per procedure. This is another case of you wanting to define words narrowly to absolve the choices and actions of law enforcement officers as if they're some kind of mechanical robots. In reality we expect them to exercise judgement to minimize harm, regardless of whom they're dealing with. And we can use words like escalation when criticizing their behavior.

> The ones that cannot continue forward in a straight line because the SUV is in the way, perpendicular to the road.

That's the thing, I did not see any of these in this video, which is why I asked you to point out a specific one! Vehicles only end up stopping around her after the left lane is completely clear. One ICE vehicle even ends up in front of her because they got around her to the right! If they had to go to the right into the parking/snow, we could call that obstruction. Except that vehicle ends up stopped right in front of her, so its intent was to box her in rather than merely go past her.

> (I don't know how you're deciding which vehicles are or are not ICE in this video.)

Common sense. Seeing an agent get in, or parked around the agents milling about before it starts moving, with an eye for the larger SUVs that LEOs favor. If I've judged wrong and you think that affects my point, you could have pointed it out though.

> if I see that you're in my path, and I elect to choose a different route to avoid you, you have still obstructed me

Have you really never driven in a city? Other drivers doing weird shit and having to negotiate is the norm. If the Jeep didn't drive up to her and ask/signal her to move, then she did not obstruct them - rather they made a voluntary choice to go around. The fact you're misinterpreting everyday behavior so incorrectly demonstrates some highly motivated reasoning, so I don't know that there is any point in continuing here.

Re: Let's call a murder a murder

#233

Post by zahlman »

mindslight wrote: post #232
zahlman wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You keep throwing "belligerently" out there to describe protest behavior. Yes, protesting is belligerent. You keep throwing "escalation" out there to describe ordinary law enforcement procedure. No, "get out of the car" is not an escalation; it is a response to someone who has already demonstrated non-compliance with a previous request to stop the obstruction. > I don't see which vehicles here you are saying were o…

> You keep throwing "escalation" out there to describe ordinary law enforcement procedure Yes, because it's an escalation, even if it is per procedure. This is another case of you wanting to define words narrowly to absolve the choices and actions of law enforcement officers as if they're some kind of mechanical robots. In reality we expect them to exercise judgement to minimize harm, regardless of whom they're deali…

There is no "motivated reasoning" involved in using the word "obstruction" to mean what it is commonly agreed to actually mean. Nor is my implied definition of "escalation" narrow or unreasonable. (The only hypothetical alternate behaviours you have described are grossly unreasonable and would have obvious negative consequences completely not in keeping with how law enforcement works.)

I agree that there is no point in continuing here.

Re: Let's call a murder a murder

#234

Post by zahlman »

dragonwriter wrote: post #231
zahlman wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I hope you are not claiming perception of intent is enough to claim a life. It is the actual intent that counts. As an objective legal matter, it is. There is abundant case law for this. Cases relevant to the specific case where the shooting victim is attempting to flee the scene include https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graham_v._Connor and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tennessee_v._Garner . > If a person can't distin…

> > I hope you are not claiming perception of intent is enough to claim a life > > It is the actual intent that counts. > As an objective legal matter, it is. You are both wrong. The requirement for self-defense (which may or may not even be available here if it is ever charged, because it doesn't apply to all kinds of murder, notably generally not to felony murder, which given ICE's very narrow jurisdiction there is…

Fair enough, I misspoke, implicitly accepting a false dichotomy. The case law I cited agrees with you WRT the standard.

But I don't understand the distinction in "kinds of murder" that you are describing; murder is always a felony and "misdemeanor murder" is a term of art not describing an actual statutory offense (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misdemeanor_murder). Nor can I see how the "narrow jurisdiction" of ICE is relevant here, given that it includes (https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1357):

> (a)(5) to make arrests — (A) for any offense against the United States, if the offense is committed in the officer’s or employee’s presence

Obstructing federal officers in their duty is a federal offense, and it necessarily occurs in the presence of those officers.

Anyway, given the evidence I find it quite clear that the threat was "objectively reasonable in the circumstances" (i.e., with the available information in the moment, without benefit of hindsight and given the time pressure).

Re: Let's call a murder a murder

#235

Post by dragonwriter »

zahlman wrote: post #234
dragonwriter wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> > I hope you are not claiming perception of intent is enough to claim a life > > It is the actual intent that counts. > As an objective legal matter, it is. You are both wrong. The requirement for self-defense (which may or may not even be available here if it is ever charged, because it doesn't apply to all kinds of murder, notably generally not to felony murder, which given ICE's very narrow jurisdiction there is…

Fair enough, I misspoke, implicitly accepting a false dichotomy. The case law I cited agrees with you WRT the standard. But I don't understand the distinction in "kinds of murder" that you are describing; murder is always a felony and "misdemeanor murder" is a term of art not describing an actual statutory offense ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misdemeanor_murder ). Nor can I see how the "narrow jurisdiction" of ICE…

> But I don't understand the distinction in "kinds of murder" that you are describing; murder is always a felony

“Felony murder” is not “murder which is a felony” but “murder where malice is established not by, by the fact that the death was the consequence of the commission of a felony by the perpetrator, rather than by intent to kill or any of the other alternatives”.

> Obstructing federal officers in their duty is a federal offense

There is no reasonable case, based on any of the video I've seen, continuously from before to through the incident, to be made that she could reasonably be perceived to have been doing that when they exited their vehicle and accosted her.

Re: Let's call a murder a murder

#236

Post by zahlman »

dragonwriter wrote: post #235
zahlman wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair enough, I misspoke, implicitly accepting a false dichotomy. The case law I cited agrees with you WRT the standard. But I don't understand the distinction in "kinds of murder" that you are describing; murder is always a felony and "misdemeanor murder" is a term of art not describing an actual statutory offense ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misdemeanor_murder ). Nor can I see how the "narrow jurisdiction" of ICE…

> But I don't understand the distinction in "kinds of murder" that you are describing; murder is always a felony “Felony murder” is not “murder which is a felony” but “murder where malice is established not by, by the fact that the death was the consequence of the commission of a felony by the perpetrator, rather than by intent to kill or any of the other alternatives”. > Obstructing federal officers in their duty is…

Their job involved driving their own vehicles down the road. Her vehicle was in the way, deliberately stopped and deliberately perpendicular to traffic. That is an obstruction of their duty.
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