Is it legal or not?

[FN1910]

Originally Posted by agentduder

The "Alter Ego" law is cool. It says that you can put yourself in someone else’s shoes and act accordingly. For example if two evenly matched men are fighting you cannot shoot. If a man was beating a woman she could shoot. If you saw a woman being beat by a man you could “put yourself in her shoes” and shoot. FN1910 did I explain this right?

That could be correct. If two evenly matched men were fighting then neither one would have the right to shoot due to the disparity of force issue. You just have to let the go at it as you don't know who started it, over what, etc. and as you said they are evenly matched.

In the case of a tough guy beating a small woman there it the disparity of force where the old saying about Mr. Colt made men equal. The woman would probably be justified is shooting his butt otherwise he is going to cause her major harm or even death. If she is justified in shooting him and left her .44 at home then you are allowed to step in under the "alter ego" principle and assume her role and taking the BG out and protecting her.

Remember that you would be justified only if she were justified. BG goes in to rob the bank and you are in there cashing your paycheck. The BG points a gun at the cashier and says gib me da money. If the cashier is justified in putting a slug between the eyes of the BG then you are justified even though the gun is not pointed anywhere near you and he hasn't even noticed that you werew in there due to his drug crazed eyes.

[fataugie]

And to be fair, I believe in NY you can use deadly force to break up a felony such as rape...but I don't think there is any Alter Ego clause anywhere on the books. I do remember rape being mentioned.

I'm not sure how many people would walk by a rape in progress and *worry* about whether or not it was on the books.....I'm pretty sure most people would break it up and damn the laws.

[FN1910]

If you have time to worry about wheter you can shoot someone leagally or not then you probably have time to consider other actions. A point someone made that actually made sense was that if you have time to fire a warning shot then you life isn't in danger at this time therefore never fire a warning shot.

[dave40sw]

Be very careful in that type of situation. Just because you see a gun come out and get pointed at an employee does not necessarily mean that the store is being robbed. It could easily be an undercover LEO arresting an employee.

[vn6869]

Originally Posted by dave40sw

Be very careful in that type of situation. Just because you see a gun come out and get pointed at an employee does not necessarily mean that the store is being robbed. It could easily be an undercover LEO arresting an employee.

This comes under "situational awareness" I believe. i.e. pay attention to what is going on around you, assume nothing.

[vn6869]

Originally Posted by fataugie

And to be fair, I believe in NY you can use deadly force to break up a felony such as rape...but I don't think there is any Alter Ego clause anywhere on the books. I do remember rape being mentioned.

I'm not sure how many people would walk by a rape in progress and *worry* about whether or not it was on the books.....I'm pretty sure most people would break it up and damn the laws.

I'm afraid you are incorrect in this assumption. I do remember several news articles relating how women were raped and beaten to death in plain sight of people driving and/or walking by in NYC. These were several years ago, so they may have changed the laws because of bad PR.

But the point is Mute, in NYC you can't have a gun anyway.