Most of the castle doctrine bills that have been worked through legislatures typically carry a provision to make someone who is involved in a self-defense shooting immune from civil suit from the attacker or his estate. It’s always seems to me this would benefit police officers as well.
Wyatt Earp tells of a case where a police officer was involved in a self-defense shooting that was completely justified, and which the city is likely to settle instead of fight. Â Yet the city politicians could be absolutely counted on to fight any kind of civil immunity for people involved in self-defense shootings, including police officers.
This is yet another example of the City of Philadelphia’s sick political culture, which does very little to empower police officers and citizens to fight crime, and does everything to empower the criminals. Two things kill Philadelphia: taxes and crime. There’s no indication that the cities leadership is interesting in tackling either.
It is my sincere hope that Michael Nutter will have a different approach when he is elected mayor. I know the election is not until November, but since Philly hasn’t had a GOP mayor in 50 years, I’m not holding my breath.
Thanks for the link, by the way!
I think it would be hard for Nutter to suck worse than the current leadership. I think he’d have to really try to suck more, in fact. I’m not holding my breath either, but I think Nutter will be an improvement.