Once upon a time, a young man told me that about midnight he was watching television when he heard a noise in back of his home. Leaping up and grabbing a golf club he raced to the back door, scaring away a man who was trying to break in. This man jumped over the 6 foot wooden fence which enclosed the property and escaped. He suspected the man had climbed the fence to get into the back yard as well.
The young man relating this scary episode is a 6′ 2″, 190 lb, 20 year old marine in excellent condition. At the time I was puzzled why this potential intruder would go over the neighbors’ fence into her yard (the neighbor is a 50 year old woman living by herself) and THEN climb over another fence to get into the back yard of a home with a large, wide awake marine sitting in it.
Either the criminal was an idiot, or it was all bullshit. I suspect the latter, the marine and his wife wanted out of their lease is my guess, and that was the excuse they used.
But, I digress, you’re probably asking yourself “what does the marine have to do with violence in England?” Well, it’s like this, after he told me the story I decided to look into products that can be mounted on top of a fence to prevent an intruder from climbing over it.
An internet search quickly found sources for “intruder deterrents” easily mounted to the top of many types of fences. What surprised me was they were designed to do little or no harm! None of them are made in the United States, they come from the United Kingdom and Australia. In those countries it is apparently illegal to intentionally inflict harm on an intruder.
Lets review that, in England you MUST NOT harm an intruder. Or do something that may potentially harm an intruder. Therefore products designed to deter a criminal from violating your property or your person must be NON-HARMFUL to this potential thief, home invader, rapist and bad guy.
Some quotes from a British article written by Joyce Lee Malcolm, located here:
http://www.socialaffairsunit.org.uk/blog/archives/000219.php
Until now the Home Office and the government have shown little willingness to change the bizarre practice of punishing householders who injure burglars while guaranteeing burglars all their rights. When thousands of Radio 4’s Today listeners called last Christmas for a law authorizing them to use force to protect their homes, the MP who had pledged to introduce the winning measure as a Private Members Bill denounced the proposal as a:
“ludicrous, brutal, unworkable, blood-stained piece of legislation. The people have spoken, the bastards!”
But as violent crime continues to soar, “the bastards” have continued to speak. Seventy-two percent of those polled recently branded the current law on home defence “inadequate and ill-defined.” Unmoved by popular opinion, or a spate of brutal attacks on householders, the vice-president of the Superintendents Association insists no change in the law is needed, only better locks. In case of a burglary, he urges families to retreat to a “secure room” there to await police help. On no account are they to arm themselves with anything, or approach the intruder. Someone might get hurt. If that someone is the intruder the resident can be sued by the burglar, and will certainly be prosecuted by the state. After all, as the Association of Chief Police Officers explains:
“We don’t believe in vigilantism or excess violence.”
When self-defence is considered “vigilantism” and burglars sue for injuries sustained, we have well and truly entered Alice’s Looking Glass World.
Ironically, the supposedly “ludicrous, brutal, unworkable, blood-stained” legislation now requested by the public was, for centuries, the law of the land. Was there more crime, or “excess violence”? On the contrary, until 1954 violent crime had been declining for nearly 500 years.
For those who respond that traditional approaches won’t work in the twenty-first century, there is the modern American example – invariably dismissed by UK police as a Wild West free-for-all – where the English common law of self-defence survives. In contrast to current British law that presumes a burglar only wants to help himself to your moveables, items it is never “reasonable” to use force to protect, common law begins with the presumption that the house-breaker poses a threat to the inhabitants and their property. He loses his rights at his victim’s door.
More interesting is this quote concerning the United States and how defending our homes agressively has reduced violent crime.
While American law on defence of the home differs somewhat from state to state, the millions of residents of the large, “liberal” states of California and New York, for example, can presume anyone who breaks into their homes means to do them harm and can act accordingly. A more explicit Oklahoma statute, passed in response to a spate of violent burglaries, allows householders to use force no matter how slight the perceived threat. Has this “vigilante” legislation resulted in “excess violence”? Just the opposite, the American burglary rate is less than half the English rate. And while 53% of English burglaries occur when someone is at home, only 13% do in America, where burglars admit to fearing armed homeowners more than the police. Violent crime in the US is at a thirty-year low.
I don’t understand it. Glad I live in the USA.
Have fun,
Clyde
