KILL AND PLEAD GUILTY (Re-posted)

This was the second item I wrote and published in this blog. At that time the newspapers were full of details about a case where a farmer had shot at two intruders, killing one of them. Now the Government is making new proposals advocating greater leniency for people who take violent action to defend themselves from intruders. The underlying argument is that anyone breaking into a house must be aware of the risks they are taking and enter the house on that basis. In this little piece I widen the argument to include mercy killing. Whatever the Government decides my essential argument holds: fear of legal action should not impair your choice to defend yourself by whatever means come to hand or to help a loved one who is praying for a death that will not come.

KILL AND PLEAD GUILTY

How should the law treat you if you seriously damage or even kill an intruder in your home? How should the law deal with cases of mercy killing? The debate is always about whether or not a person taking such action should be prosecuted the assumption being that they would plead ‘Not Guilty’. I advocate a different approach. In essence I say, ‘Do what you have to do, admit you have done it, plead guilty to whatever charge is brought against you, offer whatever plea for clemency you can honestly muster and take whatever punishment is imposed’.

If my wife and I are alone in our house one night and we become aware of an intruder at that moment we have no way of assessing the degree of danger we face. The only assumption we can make at that moment is that our lives are in mortal danger and any intruder must surely be aware that this is the only assumption we can make – he surely enters our house on that basis. In such a terrifying situation the only action that is open to us is to try to render him powerless by using whatever weapon comes to hand. If the intruder dies in the process then so be it. The choice is either to face an intruder weakly and accept whatever action he chooses to take – which may mean the death of the intruded upon – or take violent action which will inevitably mean facing a sentence for having committed a criminal act. I’d rather be in prison than in a coffin.

The realisation that mercy killing may be the only solution to another kind of terrible situation presents us with an even harder challenge. To kill someone you love who is suffering because the alternative to not killing them now means they will die in even greater agony later is almost impossible to contemplate but people do summon up the courage to do this. For the act of mercy killing to be followed by prosecution and a plea of not guilty is stressful for those who survive as the arguments swing to and fro in court and diminishes the moral stature of the person who has carried out the act. Death has been brought about by the action of a person and that is a crime. Better to admit to that crime and allow the court to decide what the punishment must be.

Plead guilty and retain your essential innocence – and your dignity.