Boobytraps and the American Legal System

At 6:36 PM 7/22/96, Vinnie Moscaritolo wrote:
>>   You pop a claymore in a building with any substance up to the level of
>>concrete re-enforced, and you _will_ be going with them.
>
>booby traping your home is a really stupid idea, I promise that your
>dog/child/spouse will be theone to accidentally set it off. besides for
>this you can get sued..
>
>every hear the one about the case of a guy who constantly had his radar
>detector stolen out his his car, he decides to set a trap and rigs his next
>one with exposive. The perp steals the box, sells it. someclown powers it
>up on his dash board and BANG!.. well you'd figure justice is served, but
>the NYC judges awarded the mass of flesh damages and charged the guy with
>manslaughter.

Agree, very foolish to ever plant boobytraps in one's own home.

Still, I remember vividly in college when the court case was decided
involving a guy in Florida who was tired of being burglarized and the cops
doing nothing about it: he rigged a shotgun to go off when someone broke a
window and entered. A perp did, was shot, survived, and the case went to
trial.

The boobytrapper was found guilty of some serious crime--I don't recall the
details (this was circa 1972).

However, all of my dorm roommates at the time were chortling over the
stupidity of imprisoning someone for the crime of trying to defend his
property against repeated invasions by scum. This was a "touchstone"
example for most of us, raised on Heinlein and Rand as we were. More than
chortling, we were uniformly angry. (The world seems to be divided into two
basic types over issues like this: those who  are outraged that the burglar
could collect damages from his victim, and those who are outraged that the
owner was even able to buy a shotgun in the first place.)

(Later examples were to be even worse. For example, the burglar who climbed
on a roof and stepped through a skylight. He sued, and won. I guess the
owner of the property was obligated to install night lights so burglars
could see their way, and to generally make his property more
"burglar-friendly." Or the woman who sued a hospital, claiming her psychic
abilities were lost after a CAT scan. She won.)

As Vinnie said, "only in Amerika."

--Tim May

Boycott "Big Brother Inside" software!
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tcmay@got.net (Timothy C. May) writes:

 > Agree, very foolish to ever plant boobytraps in one's own
 > home.

The problem that I would have with boobytrapping my home is that
there are numerous people (police, firepersons, maintainance
workers, etc...) who might have a legitimate reason to try and
gain entry.  An automatic device cannot anticipate some
complicated scenario which might play itself out while I was
away, such as someone with a medical emergency trying to get to a
phone, or public service personnel needing to gain entrance to
fight a fire or to search for people to evacuate in case of a
biological or chemical accident.

The other reason I wouldn't do such a thing is that I do not own
anything that I consider worth death or serious injury to another
human being.  I recognize that this is a personal view, and
others opinions on the value of their possessions may differ from
mine.

Regarding the topic of children with guns, I recall a classmate
of mine whose father gave him a loaded rifle to keep in his room
for "protection" when he reached the advanced age of 12.  That
very night, he got scared when he thought he heard an intruder
sneaking up the stairs, and emptied the gun into his dog.  He
really loved the dog, and the whole experience was very
traumatizing for him.

Statistically, guns in the home are far more likely to be used to
shoot someone in a domestic dispute, or to be taken away by a
criminal and used against the homeowner, than they are to be used
to defend the homeowner against injury.  I can see very little
purpose for guns in densely populated urban settings, where
people tend to be paranoid, and stray bullets can hit almost
anyone.

--
     Mike Duvos         $    PGP 2.6 Public Key available     $
     mpd@netcom.com     $    via Finger.                      $

I think Tim May is growing senile...

tcmay@got.net (Timothy C. May) writes:
> (Later examples were to be even worse. For example, the burglar who climbed
> on a roof and stepped through a skylight. He sued, and won. I guess the
> owner of the property was obligated to install night lights so burglars
> could see their way, and to generally make his property more
> "burglar-friendly."

Actually, he fell through the roof of a school he was trying to burgalize.

In a similar incident a burglar broke into a house that was being treated
for pests (i.e., was full of toxic fumes). He died; his family sued the
owners and won.

Maybe someone can post a reference to these two cases. I recall that both
happened in New York, but I could be wrong.

---

Dr.Dimitri Vulis KOTM
Brighton Beach Boardwalk BBS, Forest Hills, N.Y.: +1-718-261-2013, 14.4Kbps

On Tue, 23 Jul 1996, Timothy C. May wrote:
> 
> Agree, very foolish to ever plant boobytraps in one's own home.
> 
> Still, I remember vividly in college when the court case was decided
> involving a guy in Florida who was tired of being burglarized and the cops
> doing nothing about it: he rigged a shotgun to go off when someone broke a
> window and entered. A perp did, was shot, survived, and the case went to
> trial.
> 
> The boobytrapper was found guilty of some serious crime--I don't recall the
> details (this was circa 1972).
> 

Set-guns are illegal in most, if not all jurisdictions (IANAL), as it is 
generally illegal to use deadly force to defend property. I would expect 
that any "booby-trap" would fall under the same legal category.