SD justifiable homicide bill
Feb. 15th, 2011 11:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
samsamkaPeople have been complaining, apparently, about a South Dakota bill to legalize killing in defense of unborn children.
It looks to me like the law is primarily aimed at killing in response to an imminent or ongoing unlawful assault that could cause a miscarriage, or perhaps an imminent/ongoing forced abortion. I'd actually support legalizing such killing, personally; unborn children mean a whole lot to people who actually want to continue a pregnancy, and I think perfectly reasonable people who totally don't deserve jail time might use lethal force to protect their or their partner's unborn child, just as they'd also use lethal force to protect their newborn. Plus, it's not axiomatic that all assaults that would endanger a fetus would also endanger the life of the mother; you do hear about abusers who have deliberately attempted to cause miscarriages without actually killing the mother.
On the other hand, even if a judge would never interpret this legislation to legalize killing an abortion provider (since such an interpretation would almost definitely fail even a rational-basis constitutionality test), it certainly could be read by crazy people as legalizing it, so it's disturbing that the lawmakers didn't see fit to put an explicit disclaimer in.
Of course, I'm not sure what you can even expect from legislators who write statutory language like this:
"Homicide is justifiable if committed by any person while resisting any attempt to murder such person, or to harm the unborn child of such person in a manner and to a degree likely to result in the death of the unborn child, or to commit any felony upon him or her, or upon or in any dwelling house in which such person is."
DANGLING CLAUSE ALERT. Because this is the third "or" clause in the sentence, you THINK it's supposed to be parallel to the others, but that makes no frigging sense: "Homicide is justifiable if committed by any person while resisting any attempt upon or in any dwelling house in which such person is." WTF.
After like 20 minutes, I figured out that the final "or" clause was actually supposed to be nested into the penultimate "or" clause: "Homicide is justifiable if committed by any person while resisting any attempt . . . to commit any felony upon any dwelling house in which such person is, or to commit any felony in any dwelling house in which such person is."
Which, by the way, is WAY SCARIER than a law saying that you can use lethal force in defense of your own fetus. I can totally shoot someone who's attempting to commit ANY FELONY in any house where I am. If this is to be taken literally, if I go to someone ELSE's house in South Dakota and they try to deal drugs or commit securities fraud or whatever in front of me, I CAN KILL THEM IN COLD BLOOD.
I'm pretty sure that's not what the South Dakota legislature meant to say. They probably missed it because the sentence overall is completely unreadable! Learn to write more clearly, South Dakota! You really need to work on your comma usage.
It looks to me like the law is primarily aimed at killing in response to an imminent or ongoing unlawful assault that could cause a miscarriage, or perhaps an imminent/ongoing forced abortion. I'd actually support legalizing such killing, personally; unborn children mean a whole lot to people who actually want to continue a pregnancy, and I think perfectly reasonable people who totally don't deserve jail time might use lethal force to protect their or their partner's unborn child, just as they'd also use lethal force to protect their newborn. Plus, it's not axiomatic that all assaults that would endanger a fetus would also endanger the life of the mother; you do hear about abusers who have deliberately attempted to cause miscarriages without actually killing the mother.
On the other hand, even if a judge would never interpret this legislation to legalize killing an abortion provider (since such an interpretation would almost definitely fail even a rational-basis constitutionality test), it certainly could be read by crazy people as legalizing it, so it's disturbing that the lawmakers didn't see fit to put an explicit disclaimer in.
Of course, I'm not sure what you can even expect from legislators who write statutory language like this:
"Homicide is justifiable if committed by any person while resisting any attempt to murder such person, or to harm the unborn child of such person in a manner and to a degree likely to result in the death of the unborn child, or to commit any felony upon him or her, or upon or in any dwelling house in which such person is."
DANGLING CLAUSE ALERT. Because this is the third "or" clause in the sentence, you THINK it's supposed to be parallel to the others, but that makes no frigging sense: "Homicide is justifiable if committed by any person while resisting any attempt upon or in any dwelling house in which such person is." WTF.
After like 20 minutes, I figured out that the final "or" clause was actually supposed to be nested into the penultimate "or" clause: "Homicide is justifiable if committed by any person while resisting any attempt . . . to commit any felony upon any dwelling house in which such person is, or to commit any felony in any dwelling house in which such person is."
Which, by the way, is WAY SCARIER than a law saying that you can use lethal force in defense of your own fetus. I can totally shoot someone who's attempting to commit ANY FELONY in any house where I am. If this is to be taken literally, if I go to someone ELSE's house in South Dakota and they try to deal drugs or commit securities fraud or whatever in front of me, I CAN KILL THEM IN COLD BLOOD.
I'm pretty sure that's not what the South Dakota legislature meant to say. They probably missed it because the sentence overall is completely unreadable! Learn to write more clearly, South Dakota! You really need to work on your comma usage.
