The Related Article:

http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nw...ws-booby25.html

Excerpts:


The Bill of Rights provides us with the right to be secure in our property. Moronic jurors have taken it away.

I am of the opinion that if one decides to commit a crime on another's property, the criminal is responsible for any consequences, intended or accidental.

The owner of the business had been burglarized 3 times in one week. He likely notified the police on each occasion. The police were clearly failing to "serve and protect" this guy.


The question I pose is in two parts:

1. Was the owner of the bar constitutionally protected in this situation?

2. Did the jury act appropriately and in accordance with the law when they found the bar owner liable in the wrongful death suit?

I will be submitting this thread to the Jay and Eileen Show on the 50,000 watt blowtorch out of Chicago, WLS-AM, as they have already read my email on the subject on the air.

Mike

was he CONSTITUTIONALLY protected? no.

they fourth amendment is to keep the government(police, FBI, etc...) from being able to go through you property, check your papers(ID) and what not without a reason. it has nothing to do with private citizens (which is why companies can sell your personal info for things like telemarketing, subscriptions, etc...)

the jurors should have gotten ALL the facts of the case before making any decision. the guy breaking in was drunk and hopped up on coke, they should have been told this. the owner of the bar had posted warning signs, but because the burglar's judgement was impaired, he didn't notice the signs.

I don't know what Illinois law is, so I can't really comment on wether or not they acted in accordance to the law. but considering they didn't have ALL the facts, I would say no.

I feel that a person, obviously, has the constitutional right to secure his/her business or residence, with conventional security systems. But a fatal electrocution device installed on all the windows . . .that is not acceptable. A cop would be liable if he shot an unarmed burglar leaving the scene of the crime; because he does not warrant the use of deadly force. Would a jury ever sentence a burglar to death. . . of course not, it would be cruel and unusual punishment. So what gives this bar owner the right to electrocute his windows, to kill anyone you breaks in? I don't care how frustrated the owner is. . .it doesn't give him the right to be judge, jury, and executioner. Whether the burglar is on drugs or not, really does not give that bar owner the right to decide his fate. What if it had been some young kids playing around at night in the area that had gotten electrocuted? I feel that the jury was right in making this bar owner held partially accountable.
Also, it is unfortunate that the police were not able to stop the previous burglaries. . . but the cops can't very well be expected to hold a stake out in front of every business every night on the off chance that someone might break into that establishment.

-Kisov

I'm in total agreement with kisov here.

The tavern owner was NOT constitutionally protected. A property crime does not warrant the use of deadly force. It may have been a bit more gray if this was his home, and it had been broken into 3 times in the past month, while his family slept inside, but an empty business establishment? No way.

I am sympathetic to the widow, assuming she did not know of or approve the device. Since the bar owner is dead, I'm not sure the liability should fall to his wife, but that's a different issue.

I understand self-defense, but property is just that, property. It scares me that someone can value an inanimate object over a person's life, no matter how messed up the guy's life may have been. You can fix a broken window. You can collect insurance on a burglarized or vandalized business. You can not, however, bring back the dead.

I think it is incorrect to equate business and home in this way, Mike. Protecting the lives of your family is a very different issue. Ditto tying this case in any way to the fourth amendment.

Cheers

I'd just like clarification. The article says he rigged the device for a 'strong shock'. Don't know if it was intentionally set for a fatal shock.

The fatal shock may have been a result of Mr. Drunk-and-Whacked-out's condition due to his substance abuse. Jury should've been told that.

Just me.

He boosted the power to 220 volts, which can very easily be fatal.

Center for Disease Control

Or look here

or here

Part of story not noted. FYI

I really don't want to get into how much voltage it takes to kill someone.

It is AMPERAGE that kills, not voltage.



Mike

I think that voltage or amperage is very important to this discussion. It goes towards whether this bar owner intended to kill, or set up a situation where a burglar would be killed if they tried to break in. It goes towards how responsible this owner is for the death.

-Kisov

I was sure to be very specific when I created this topic. I put it in Constitutional Debate because I want to discuss the Constitutional aspect only.

Feel free to start a topic to discuss the means by which people are allowed to secure their possesions.

The issues at hand in this topic are:

1. Did the owner have the right to secure his property under the 4th amendment.

2. If he did have that right, did this jury violate it.

The amount of voltage, or the means by which the burglar died is not relevant.

The man could have lined up spikes to close in on a burglar, aimed a gun at the door, had the place flood with hungry rats, or any other form of protection he wanted.

The issue is whether or not the Constitution provides a person to secure his possessions. The issue is not the means by which those possessions are secured.

Mike

I do not see Consitutional protection here. As Unabomber noted, that is a protection from illegal search and seizure by the government.

Mike your posting implies that the bar owner's families 4th amendment rights were violated. I would be interested to hear your argument as to why this is a violation of constitutional rights. I think I am missing something here.

I would definitely like to see some controls on the civil suit process that make it so you cannot be awarded monetary judgements for things that happen to you while you are committing a crime.

Let's read the 4th amendment again:

NO WHERE does it apply to protecting the citizens from the government alone. It allows citizens security in their persons, houses, papers and effects from ANY intrusion, not just the government. If it was from the government alone, it would have been written that way.

I have SO much more to say on this but am at work. I'll be back.

The bar owner should have checked with his or her lawyer. Similar cases have happened in Colorado and in other parts of the country. The results were similar too. You can't set booby traps on your property, even if people are trespassing.

The punishment for trespassing should not be immediate death. This bypasses due process and the rule of law.

I guess I was referring to the government because the constitution defines the role, powers, and limitations of the federal government.

OK since no criminal charges were filed, then it looks like he was justified. Maybe under the 4th amendment, I dunno.

I know in Texas you can use deadly force to protect not only yourself, but your property as well. That's why they always say if you kill someone. Make sure the suspect is in your house (Or drag them in).

This is a civil case, not criminal. Which is a whole other ball of wax. Not a question of could he legally booby trap his place (Obviously he can)? But more of a question of should he have?

AuthorMusician-

We all make choices.

If someone decides to disobey the signs on the side of the highway and cross 3 lanes of 70MPH traffic, that person takes their life into their own hands.

Likewise, if someone gets a killer pit bull and puts up a sign on their house that says "beware of dog", anyone that disobeys that sign is taking their life into their own hands.

This situation is no different. The signs were there. The man made a conscious decision to disobey the sign. In an attempt to seize another person's property, he took his life into his own hands.

Eeyore and Unabomber, I've got to agree with Jaime in the fact that the 4th amendment clearly makes no mention of government. It plainly protects us from any search or seizure without warrant. Since the burglar had no warrant, he was violating the bar owner's 4th amendment rights.

The bar owner's family's 4th amendment rights were not violated, and I never made that claim.

Mike

Mike:


This sounds dangerous to me. If all breaking and entering were considered to be in violation of the U.S. Constitution, would B&E be then a federal crime? Would petty larceny become a felony? There are better ways to curb crime than that.

It seems to me that viewing this break in as a violation of constitutional rights is a pretty slippery slope to start down.

Furthermore, I see the issue of the means of securing the tavern to absolutely be cogent to discussing the constitutionality here. After all, we all seem to be fairly clear in understanding that, for example, the right to bear arms does not include the right of a citizen to carry missiles, or to stockpile nuclear weapons. Likewise, there is a reasonable limit to the means of securing one's person or home or business. In other words, I can't pepper my lawn with land mines, but I can install a burglar alarm, etc.

Then why aren't break-ins prosecuted on federal charges of violating the constitution instead of under local or state laws against breaking and entry or burglary? At the time of the fourth amendment states did not have to adopt the same bill of rights as the federal government so there would have had to have been some federal responsibility for protecting the homes of civilians from other citizens violating this right.

If this was the intent of the framers of the constitution why was there no such mechanism put in place to protect people in all of the states from burglaries?

Mike, I think your interpretation is distorting the Constitution with fundamentalism. Do you think the framers were protecting all Americans from illegal searches by criminals? To me the Constitution is clearly a document that deals with the powers and limitations of the government in relation to the people and property of the individual states.

I think that wiring you business' windows for electrocution to anyone dumb enough to break in, is a form of vigilantism. And, like AuthorMusician said, that is a definite bypass of due process and the rule of law.
I feel the constitution protects our right to protect ourself against "unreasonable search and seizures" by the police. . . .I don't think it is referring to burglary. Would a burglar with "probable cause" be able to seize what he likes from your home. . .of course not, those are specifically law enforcement terms. . .and even if that is wrong, the constitution does not say that you can take the life of someone infringing on your 4th amendment rights.

-Kisov

I've always taken the Fourth Amendment to mean that the people are to be secure in their effects "against unreasonable searches and seizures" and other law enforcement or governmental impositions - as mentioned by Unabomber and Eeyore.

The whole language of the amendment is geared toward what constitutes a lawful search and what doesn't. Clearly, the amendment is not implying that there would be any situation in which one private citizen would have the right to search the residence, papers, or effects of another. To me, this amendment is exclusively about official searches and seizures. I can't imagine our founders envisioning circumstances in which a kidnapper or thief would seek a warrant establishing probable cause for their planned crime. Obviously, the only persons or entities which would be specifying a "place to be searched" or "persons or things to be seized" would be officials of law enforcement or the government. To imply that this amendment applies to sneak thieves as well strikes me as absurd - though I imagine I'll be hearing from Jaime on this one.

That being the case, the jury did not infringe on what I would see as his constitutional rights. In any event, I would've thought that burglary was more a matter of criminal or civil than constitutional law.

Correct me if I am wrong but the constitution defines the powers/limitations of government. That is why the STATES pass laws regarding the interactions of private citizens.

You are correct, Ultimatejoe, but the Bill of Rights enumerates specific rights of individuals.

(Update: research amassed - still writing the big post)

Uh-oh. Time to duck and cover.

Before Jaime's amassed research hits the fan, I'll add one amplification to my last post. I mentioned the language of the amendment, which I think becomes clearer if we remove all the qualifiers. In essence, then, the Fourth Amendment reads "The right of the people to be secure against unreasonable searches and seizures shall not be violated and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause." What "the people" and their "effects" are to be secure from is unwarranted search and seizure. Looking at the Amendment pared down, it seems to me that burglary wasn't what was on our founders' minds.

Okay: now I'm ready for Jaime's slaughter...

But those rights are only "rights" in the public domain. Lets break it down by each amendment in the Bill of Rights.

• 1. Freedom of religion, expression, the press... the STATE cannot restrict the free expression of ideas.
  
• 2. Bear arms... The STATE cannot restrict the right to bear arms
  
• 3. The Quartering of Soldiers... The STATE cannot forcibly billet soldiers
  
• 4. I skipped this one.
  
• 5. Trial and Punishment... The STATE must provide due-process, a jury of peers (outside military proceedings) and cannot force someone to self-incriminate.
  
• 6. Speedy trial, confrontation... The STATE must provide a speedy and public trial
  
• 7. Jury in civil cases... the STATE must provide a jury in civil matters (in excess of $20.)
  
• 8. Cruel and Unusual punishment... the STATE cannot inflict cruel and unusual punishment.
  
• 9. Construction of Constitution... Doesn't really figure in
  
• 10. Powers of the States and People... Establishes that only the powers spelled out in the constitution belong to the federal government.

It certainly seems to me that the rights enumerated are only in regards to their interaction with the state. Surely none of these apply to private interactions.

HERE is where I got the amendments... a handy site for this forum actually.

As I understand it, the 4th amendment was a direct result of the “writs of assistance,” which allowed English authorities to enter any persons’ property with a general warrant and search and seize items that were either prohibited or had not gone through the customs system.

The purpose of the amendment is to ensure that agents of the government first identify in each individual case the items that they are searching for and the property that will be searched, and in addition to this, be able to provide a reasonable account of why the person is suspected of wrong-doing.

While I don't think that this amendment is directed at non-government agents, I do think that this amendment sheds some light on the founding fathers’ respect for private property and personal privacy. I don't, however, think that the bar owner can be protected under this amendment. This seems to be a case that should rely on laws that are generated at the state level, not the federal level.

This is completely unsupported and close to being off topic. Perhaps you could start a new thread if you want to broaden this discussion to the intent of the Bill of Rights. Please keep this thread to a discussion of the 4th amendment's original intent.

The guy who broke in and got shocked got what he deserved. He knew that he was breaking and entering. He knew this was a crime. He was drunk. He was on coke. He ignored the warnings on the windows. Perhaps, he didn't deserve death, mind you, but he had to be ready to reap the consequences of his actions. The bar owner is in no way responsible for this. The police failed in their tax-paid duty. They neither served nor protected. If a citizen feels that his person/property is in peril, then he has the right to protect himself does he not? It is unfortunate that the criminal died due to his utter stupidity, however, he and he alone is to blame. No one else is deserving of the blame in any way, shape, or form.

It is NOT off topic and I resent your assertion. It does go to intent specifically. As I made quite evident every other amendment on the Bill of Rights serves to define how the STATE interacts with it's citizens ONLY and has nothing to do with interactions between PRIVATE citizens. If this is true, and I think I demonstrated quite plainly that it is, then the 4th amendment also defines merely how what rights a citizen has that the STATE cannot violate; which is the topic at hand.

Unless the 4th amendment was written in a vacuum with the other Amendments not being considered at the same time at all it is extremely pertinent to look at the whole of the document in analyzing a single element.

This thread is about the 4th amendment, Ultimatejoe. I will not debate that with you. However, you proved NOTHING to me. You gave me your opinions on the birth of the amendments. You provided no sources whatsoever.

See, I thought that my saying where *=In the Bill of Rights (I should have phrased that better I concede but too late now)... you know, that document with the 4th amendment. I am saying that the Bill of Rights, and therefore the 4th amendment are intended to define how the state can interact with it's citizens.

Please explain to me how the highlighted portion is off-topic. Because I don't understand.

(and I don't need a source to analyze a series of one or two sentence statements... I am offering MY INTERPRETATION of them, which you are free to refute.)

Because Mike asked us to debate the 4th amendment.


I will not bother to refute unsubstantiated opinions. I prefer debates that provide facts and sources for opinions.

To which you responded:



If you can EXPLAIN how that comment has nothing to do with the 4th amendment I would be glad to see it.



Ok, so provide some facts and sources then. What source is there that says that the 4th amendment exists to define an individuals rights in respect to their interactions with other private entities?

If the scholarly world was to hold your logic all critical thought would cease to exist by the by... a degree of unsubstantiated thought it necessary for intelligent exploration. That's what a hyphothesis is.

But since you are adamant on this point I will break down the structure of my argument:

My thesis (in response to the topic: The 4th amendment exists to define how a person is protected from unlawful search and seizure from government.
My evidence: The remaining elements of the bill of rights clearly defines what the government can and cannot do in respect to private citizens.
My observation: Since the Bill of Rights defines and sets out how the government and private citizens can interact, then The 4th amendment, being a part of said Bill of Rights must also exist for this purpose.