Would You Kill a Person

[DiscoBiscuit]

I wouldn't kill him, but I would ask him which his dominant leg and arm were.

I would then take that knowledge, and use my BJJ skills to force him to learn to use his opposite leg and arm...

 

[Valiant]

I wouldn't kill him, but I would ask him which his dominant leg and arm were.

I would then take that knowledge, and use my BJJ skills to force him to learn to use his opposite leg and arm...

If you could also make the remaining arm numb, things would be perfect.
Then doing "the stranger" in his wheelchair would be a recurring favorite.

 

[DiscoBiscuit]

If you could also make the remaining arm numb, things would be perfect.
Then doing "the stranger" in his wheelchair would be a recurring favorite.

You're just full of fun ideas.

 

[Valiant]

You're just full of fun ideas.

I live to serve

 

[nomadic]

this sounds like the plot of OldBoy haha

 

[Timmy]

You're either talking about either premeditated vengeance or premeditating killing someone you believe is a threat to society.

If it's vengeance then it would not be a rational decision, my personal values do not agree with taking another's life except in self defence, therefore if I purposely went to kill someone I would literally have to be out of my mind. After years of torture, this may be the case, for the torture to be most effective it would have to be psychological not just physical.

Would not killing such a torturer be self-defense...so that she or he could never do it to anyone else, ever again?

If not, then I opine the "battered wife syndrome" is no longer a defense.


Which I do not believe.

As a good friends from the South likes to opine now and again, "There are some people who just need killin'."

 

[Kasper]

Would not killing such a torturer be self-defense...so that she or he could never do it to anyone else, ever again?

If not, then I opine the "battered wife syndrome" is no longer a defense.

A few problems with that:

Self defence is not a free pass.

Self defence is applicable only when someone believes their life is in imminent danger, or they are in danger of being seriously injured.

And excessive force cannot be used.

Therefore, hunting down and attacking someone who is no longer a threat is not self defence.

What's more, if you do that, they have a case for self defence if they harm you.

Battered wife syndrome is not a free pass either, it's a case for diminished responsibility.

But... Seeing as the torturer is not a spouse in the scenario, battered wife syndrome is not relevant here.


The rest of my initial post already dealt with the idea of self defence though:

If it's done because the person is a danger to society and yet the legal system would not hold them accountable because torture has been sanctioned then I see more grey area. If others were in imminent danger, potentially. If other people that I cared about were in imminent danger, it's probable.

In the moment of being tortured though, yes.

At the end of the day the law states quite clearly that no one has the right to take another life, if you make a rational decision to do so you will be held accountable and rightly so.

 

[Asterion]

In the state of mind that we are all likely to have now (ie. we go to work/study, go to the beach, sleep, work some more...) I think most of us would hesitate. If you were a police officer and had been through a lot, you'd be better able to handle such mental decisions, because you know the consequences. While being tortured, you're not adjusting to becoming a malicious killing machine, you're adjusting to getting tortured, if you fought back frequently, you might adjust to the idea, and you might pull it off. Everyone's different though, there's so many different ways it could go...

yes, I'm sorry but this bullshit of oh i'll never kill anyone I'm too good of a person is bullshit. I'm not likely to kill someone, but I know their's that glimmer of a chance that everyone has and stop lying about ooh i'd never kill anyone. and if they're fucking torturing me damn straight I would.

Have you ever seen death? It's not about good or bad, or how much guts you've got, though maybe it is for a feeler... hmmmmm

 

[Timmy]

But... Seeing as the torturer is not a spouse in the scenario, battered wife syndrome is not relevant here.

My point with the BWS is that it's a similar model...killing someone (in this case, a spouse) based on what the person has done to you in the past, and what they MIGHT do in the future.

In the OP's hypothetical scenario, the person has "done" stuff to you for 16 years. There's no guarantee that this person won't come after you again....and there are 16 years of history of abuse/torture. Same with a battered wife...how many years have they endured the beatings, etc?

Thus, I think they're nearly identical...just that one torturer is a spouse and one is not.

Killing a spouse while the spouse is in actual commission of an offense is, IMO, a "self-defense" case in the classic sense.

 

[Siúil a Rúin]

who has tortured you?

Imagine you live in a police state. You have been "in" for 16 years.
Now you are free. You know where he lives.
You will not get caught.

You will kill him.
You will not kill him.
You do not know.

I can't project for certain, but do know that the greatest submission to cruelty is to internalize it to a point that one reflects it back into the world. My torturer is an individual living in a police state that is oppressive and shapes its members into cruel oppressors. I wouldn't want to become him. I suspect I would not kill him for the sole purpose of punishment for what was done to me. If he placed a direct threat in the world presently, then it would be a different scenario in which non-action could become complicit form of aggression towards another.

My hope would be to fight the contagion of cruelty by becoming immune to its influence and instead finding it within myself to become its opposite.

 

[Into It]

I don't think causing pain is a good thing. If I did, I wouldn't be mad at him in the first place. I would try to get him into a situation where he could not do that again, like prison. They can give him cable and all the ice cream he wants - just keep him from hurting others.

 

[Kasper]

My point with the BWS is that it's a similar model...killing someone (in this case, a spouse) based on what the person has done to you in the past, and what they MIGHT do in the future.

In the OP's hypothetical scenario, the person has "done" stuff to you for 16 years. There's no guarantee that this person won't come after you again....and there are 16 years of history of abuse/torture. Same with a battered wife...how many years have they endured the beatings, etc?

Thus, I think they're nearly identical...just that one torturer is a spouse and one is not.

Killing a spouse while the spouse is in actual commission of an offense is, IMO, a "self-defense" case in the classic sense.

They're not nearly identical, the entire basis of 'battered persons syndrome' is that the predator is their spouse, that means there's is all sorts of emotional attachment and emotional issues there that stop the battered person from leaving and may even cause them to defend their spouses action, battered wife syndrome is not the same as being tortured by someone who is holding you captive and is not your spouse, the closest thing I can think of to that is Stockholm Syndrome when the victims became emotionally attached to their captor.

As for "no guarantee that this person won't come after you again", in order to use this as a defence you have to show that the victim feared for their life and was in imminent danger, the idea that there's no guarantee they won't isn't enough.

The law is quite simple: We can't kill other people, even if they've wronged us.

Self defence is: The use of an equal amount of force, being faced with immediate provocation, and being in imminent danger.

Anything outside that scope isn't self defence and if the torture victim here hunts down and kills their torturer they are accountable. Being tortured may cause mental health issues that could assist a defence and/or give them sympathy from the jury or when being sentenced, but it won't clear them.

 

[Timmy]

Trinity:

I understand exactly what the law says regarding self-defense, and the various nuances of escalation of force and disparity of force. But that's not the topic of the thread.

But, to address your point, if BWS is more akin to the Stockholm Syndrome, then there's even less of a defense unless the homicide occurs during an actual attack, as one is free to leave at any time, even if they choose not to, for whatever reason.

 

[Kasper]

Trinity:

I understand exactly what the law says regarding self-defense, and the various nuances of escalation of force and disparity of force. But that's not the topic of the thread.

I'm not so sure you do:

Would not killing such a torturer be self-defense...so that she or he could never do it to anyone else, ever again?

If not, then I opine the "battered wife syndrome" is no longer a defense.

If you hunt someone down and kill them you are not acting in self defense. This is why I divided my original post into 3 sections: Vengeance, fear for another's life and self defense during torture. Any way you look at it, and no matter how evil the person is, you are not free to seek them out and take their life, that is not self defense.

The thread is asking 'would you' not 'is it legal' but you were the one that suggested it would be self defense.

But, to address your point, if BWS is more akin to the Stockholm Syndrome, then there's even less of a defense unless the homicide occurs during an actual attack, as one is free to leave at any time, even if they choose not to, for whatever reason.

It's a syndrome that can be used as a defense, doesn't mean it's a good defense, it doesn't meet the requirements of self defense which is where it's an issue.

And I said it was the closest thing I could think of in regards to what you're talking about, not that it was akin to Stockholm Syndrome. This situation has nothing to do with Battered Wives Syndrome.

 

[Timmy]

No, I really do understand what the law says. But, to quote Gross Pointe Blank "I have a certain moral flexibility..."

What I would actually do, versus what the consequences of what breaking the law would be, given that my innate sense of "oh shit...those are the consequences?" Heck, there are many things I don't post on forums I moderate because my mind wargames the likely responses, and I find it's not worth the coming troubles....

But back to the topic.

One other part of a self-defense argument is that the person doing the killing/defending must prove they were in fear for their life or great bodily injury. Actually, that's not really true....in most states (and in Arizona again, thank God!), the state has to prove you were not in fear for your life or GBI.

In Arizona, if someone is a documented victim of domestic violence, "the state of mind of a reasonable person under sections 13-404, 13-405 and 13-406 shall be determined from the perspective of a reasonable person who has been a victim of those past acts of domestic violence."

Previously, if self-defense was being used as a justification, the defendant had to essentially admit to the underlying "crime", and they say "but it was justified because...". Now, it's been switched back to "innocent until proven guilty". But I digress.....

Part of my posts come from my proclivity to debate. What the law says about self-defense as a justification is very clear. But two points in this hypothetical situation: If DV can be used to determine how the "reasonable person" would view it, any good lawyer could use (or try at least) that same type of defense for someone who was held prisoner and tortured for 16 years...there's bound to be some element of a "relationship" that can be argued.

There was no "relationship" as defined by our state's statutes (As far as I can tell...don't know about UT or CA), but do you believe a jury ever convict Elizabeth Smart or Jaycee Dugard if they went back and killed their captors? Would it really be all that difficult for either of them to choreograph things to create a situation in which self-defense were "legit"?

 

[wildcat]

I really don't know, there would be a lot of factors going into my decision and even then I don't think my mind would be made up until the very last second possible.

Ruining his life but leaving him alive would be very tempting, though if I still had a life waiting for me outside I don't think I could choose that option, because long term revenge tends to take time and effort (as in The Count of Monte Cristo).

I'd say that it would all depend on the moment I saw him really

Monte! The hero of my childhood.

Originally Monte was a simple sailor.
He was educated by a priest. In jail, of course.
The jailhouse is the best university.

A moment is a thief.