Homeowner fights back against home invaders, gets in trouble bc he is a prohibited person/felon

Problem is, he might have to cough up a few dozen thousand dollars to pay a good attorney to get him cleared, in this racket that we erroneously call a justice system. Unless the cops and DA actually know the law and apply it correctly. He will probably need a ton of luck on his side.

 

Unless it's a public attorney, his life is wrecked. It's a disgusting racket. I wish him luck.

 

I don't know any background on Crowder but if the state deemed him safe enough to be released then he should be allowed to defend himself and others with deadly force. If not, then the state screwed up. We all have a natural right to defend our lives.

 

Like I've said here many times before, I don't think the law was meant to apply to illegal gun possession that existed prior to the need to use a gun in self-defense. Seems nobody else agrees with me on the site, but then again this is the site for gun lovers to echo chamber each other's opinions.
Professional prosecutors and judges don't come to this website (for good reason) and that's why you'll never hear their opinions.

 

Imagine the law said this:

Stealing cars is illegal. Stealing cars will get you 10 years in jail.
However, a person who uses a car to take an innocent person to a hospital for emergency medical care shall not be prosecuted under this Code section.

SCENARIO #1. Joe doesn't own a car. Or a cellphone. He's walking to the store when he sees a woman staggering down the street with the handle of a butcher knife sticking out of her neck, bleeding profusely. He remembers that he just walked past a man who was waxing his car, and the door was open and the keys were in it, radio playing. He turns to call for that man to help, but he finds the man is gone (the car's still there, though).
Joe helps the wounded woman walk to the stranger's car, get in it, and then Joe takes the car and drives the woman to the emergency room with it.


Scenario #2. Oliver can't afford to buy or insure a car, but he's tired of walking or taking MARTA everywhere he goes. Oliver steals a car on May 11. He covers it with a tarp when it's parked at home, and he never drives it after midnight, to try to avoid the attention of the cops.
On June 14 Oliver is driving down the road and sees a woman staggering down the street, bleeding, with the handle of a knife sticking out of her neck. He chooses to "do the right thing" and take the woman to the hospital himself, and he hopes nobody will notice that he's using a stolen car to do it. He takes the chance. His gamble doesn't pay off. Cops notice the stolen car.

*****************

At the hospital, both of these people are questioned by the cops, and the cops discover that both men were driving stolen cars. One recently stolen, and one long-ago stolen.
Do they both have immunity from prosecution?
Which one was the law's "...except when driving someone to a hospital" clause designed to protect?

 

What part of "shall not be prosecuted" indicates it was "designed" to do anything but not prosecute?

What part of "absolute defense to any violation" is evidence it was "designed" to distinguish between any kind, length, or purpose of possession?

Are the words so ambiguous and unclear that we have to turn to the "intent" of the legislature? Are the legislators so unskilled at their craft that they couldn't have written the law to say that self-defense provided immunity to "immediate" possession, "recent" possession, or some such?

 

Gunsmoker, the point you raised was debated in the legislature when that exception was passed just a few years ago. Antis complained that convicted felons could "get away" with possession of firearms if they used them to defend themselves. This was before it passed the legislature. If what was passed is not what was intended, it sure wasn't because nobody considered the possibility. It was openly and loudly discussed.

 

Hmmm ... so was the legislature's intent to forgive already-completed (but undiscovered) crimes that were done prior to any self-defense situation developed?

I just assumed the intent was to allow people to break gun laws (most of which are misdemeanors anyway) when they perceived the need to arm themselves in response to a violent criminal, or bring a gun into a forbidden location for that reason.

Statutes should be interpreted by

1-- looking at the harm or danger that motivated thd legislature to pass a bill, and

2-- considering how well or poorly the old laws dealt with that problem, and

3-- the fit of the new law to the problem, or how well the alternative interpretations of the law would address the problem.

That's a paraphase of O.C.G.A. 1-3-1(a).

When the issue is interpreting an exception to a law, and I think especially when it's an exception to a criminal law that deals with the public's safety,

"...legislative exceptions in statutes are to be strictly construed and should be applied only so far as their language fairly warrants.”

"All doubts should be resolved in favor of the general statutory rule, rather than in favor of the exemption. "

Both from the Georgia Supreme Court in
Sawnee EMC vs. Georgia PSC (March, 2001).

 

Are the cases cited in GeorgiaCarry.org et al. v. City of Atlanta no longer precedential?