Legal ramifications

[gazza99]

Assault= A crime that occurs when one person tries to physically harm another in a way that makes the person under attack feel immediately threatened. Actual physical contact is not necessary; threatening gestures that would alarm any reasonable person can constitute an assault.
-This is taken from a legal dictionary.

Why wait for the other person to attack? If you know they are going to attack, wouldent it be better to throw the first, and last blow, instead of taking a chance you may react in a way that could hospitalize or even kill the poor fool? This argument will hold up, "your honor I am trained in the 999 instant kill methods, If he attacks I cannot be responsible."
I was once told by one of my students (who is a police officer as well) "Just run away, we dont care who started it, that is for the judge to decide, we will take you both in" I dont think this applies to justifiable homicide though. "why did you run then?" ,"uuuuhhh"
Also if someone pulls a knife, or any other object that could possibly kill you, you CAN use deadly force, but you must be able to prove it!! Of course it can be argued that if you are good enough to kill him, you are also good enough NOT to kill him, which is most likely true.
If anyone has any stories an the above please share! Hope this helps....
Gary

[Sam Wiley]

I posted a thread a while back about how I got into a fight and attacked the guy first just because of something he said, and many people here disagreed with the action, while there were some who agreed in part or whole. Myself, I believe attacking first is sometimes necessary. I read a book called Might is Right several years ago that changed the way I looked at martial morality. The author does not always advocate the first strike, but what he does advocate is to decimate the guy if he hits you. Not just return the same amount of force, but to just destroy him. If he lives, then the author says poetically, "he will possess much aditional wisdom to ruminate over."

However, we take martial arts, in part, so that we do not get hit any more. No self-respecting martial artist is going to let the guy hit him. And in my view, no self-respecting martial artist is going to let anyone move to hit him without destroying him. Look at it this way. If he is going to throw the first punch, he has thought about it. He has already pictured in his mind what it will be like to strike you. And as we know from our Taiji practice, that means he has already done it in his mind, probably long before, but certainly no later than his arm's initial movement. If he moves to physically express the intent and thought, then he has already done it in his mind. When we do our Taiji forms, and we do BKTS, we do not have to extend our hand out any more once we have sufficiently done the move to physically express the internal. And it's the same with an incoming attack. If he's moving to attack, he has already done it in his mind, and the mind knows no difference.

So I say that if you feel threatened, and believe he may escalate to physical violence any second, go ahead and take him out. And there are many other people who think the same way. For instance, where do people think the phrase "nip it in the bud" came from? And of course, in Taiji we have the classic that says if he moves to attack, strike first.

Something like this is echoed in America's laws, as you have begun to explore, where it says that assault is not just physical attack. Nowadays, assault is any dirty or threatening look, "fighting words," and other things that have nothing to do with being physically harmed. However, they are things that often lead to physical violence, and the person giving the look obviously has something unpleasant on his mind, just as the person who begins yelling obscenities is voicing what's on his mind.

And we know from fa-jing training that the voice is the meeting ground between mind/intent and body. Not just a word, but a sound or tone of voice. The eyes, in cases where a threatening look was given, are often said to "shoot daggers," which is a way of saying that intent was being projected through them. Situations usually begin with a look, though often it is unseen, indicating intent. The next stage is usually voice, threats, etc. What could possibly come next? Physical violence.

So if you're standing there with someone who is getting progressively more aggressive and violent in their behavior, and you get the feeling that they may attack, and it's strong enough, go for it and take them down. By the way, "get the feeling" is another way of saying that you understood their intent, or that you could feel and interpret their energy, that you were "receiving" and "listening..." There are times, of course, when you simply must not resort to that, or for some reason it is best not to. So it's not like it's the only rule. People can be passively threatening and yet for some reason they want to wait. Usually, they go away and rant about what they "should have" done. How many times have you walked away from a situation and thought to yourself that you should have said or done this or that? Plenty, I'll bet, unless you have absolutely no restraint. I believe that these things you feel you should have done were hidden intents you were not aware of (usually) at the time of the altercation. In some cases, of course, people think about them at the time, don't do or say them, and then wish they had later.

Personally, I do not suggest telling a judge or a cop that you are a martial artist. I would just tell them I was afraid for my life. If that's not enough, then pull the martial arts/martial morality card. "I'm trained to do it, but I don't do it unless it's necessary." Hell, if you tell them you train in Taiji, they'll probably think you just got lucky when you swung. Anyway, if you tell them that you did it to KO him to prevent the situation from getting any more serious, that might help, as it sounds like you actually defused a ticking bomb before it exploded, and that you were merciful.

Of course, I think I forgot to mention that you should try and talk your way out of the situation before using pre-emptive strikes, but I really think that goes without saying.

*********
"I put forth my power and he was broken.
I withdrew my power and he was ground into fine dust."
-Aleister Crowley, The Vision and the Voice