Indiana Steps Away from the Brink

 Posted on June 12,2012 in Uncategorized

About a year ago I wrote about the Indiana Supreme Court's sua sponte rewriting of Indiana's self-defense statute to deprive people of the right to use force to defend themselves against police officers committing crimes.

Yesterday Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels signed into law Senate Enrolled Act 1, which restored by statute that which the Indiana Supreme Court had taken away by judicial activism. In part:

(i) A person is justified in using reasonable force against a public servant if the person reasonably believes the force is necessary to: (1) protect the person or a third person from what the person reasonably believes to be the imminent use of unlawful force; (2) prevent or terminate the public servant's unlawful entry of or attack on the person's dwelling, curtilage, or occupied motor vehicle; or (3) prevent or terminate the public servant's unlawful trespass on or criminal interference with property lawfully in the person's possession, lawfully in possession of a member of the person's immediate family, or belonging to a person whose property the person has authority to protect.

That's as it should be. The police are not happy-also, as it should be.

"It's just a recipe for disaster," [the president of the Indiana FOP] told Bloomberg. "It just puts a bounty on our heads."

You know the answer to this, of course: it's what badgelickers tell people who complain of police brutality; I hope the police will take it to heart: You don't want people using force against you? Don't break the law.

Bravo, Indiana.

(H/T my arms dealer.)