# What if i killed an attacker



## Andy_46 (Sep 30, 2007)

Hi

Out of interest, if i was attacked by 2+ people and felt i had NO OTHER CHOICE but to defend myself, what are the chances of me being prosecuted if i ended up killing one of the attackers?

I'm in the UK by the way

Thanks
Andy


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## Sukerkin (Sep 30, 2007)

I would say that with 100% certainty you'd be far better off asking a lawyer that question.

All we could say here at MT is ... er ... humm ... this is not the place to seek legal advice of that sort.  Go ask a lawyer.

Also,  see you first thread here for other other more general forum advice on how to go about establishing yourself as a member.


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## Kacey (Sep 30, 2007)

Sukerkin is correct - you would need a lawyer.  No one on this board is qualified to give you legal advice; even if a lawyer from the UK happens to read your post, there are too many variables in this situation to be able to give an answer that would fit all possible scenarios.

You have come to a board that is frequented by people who are interested in martial arts - and all serious martial artists know that they train for self-defense, to do the least harm necessary in a situation to protect the person(s) in danger.  

If you are training in martial arts and feel unwilling or unable to discuss the scenario you present with your instructor, then your instructor has a good moral grounding and won't discuss it with you for fear you will go out looking for trouble... which it sounds like you are looking for.  

If you are not training in martial arts, you need to find a qualified instructor who can explain to you, in depth, why the above scenario is highly unlikely to occur - because _good_ martial artists would avoid the given scenario when possible, run when necessary, and, as I said previously, do the least harm necessary to escape with minimal damage to self and loved ones who might be present.

If you have questions about *martial arts*, rather than scenarios that serious martial artists would do their best to avoid, such as being attacked by multiple people, or wanting to knock someone out, as you asked about here, then please, ask them.  You will receive many useful responses.  But if you want to know how to hurt people and get away with it, you're in the wrong place.


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## bydand (Sep 30, 2007)

Wow, 2 posts, and 2 questions that are not worth answering.  Not a very auspicious start, my suggestion would be post in the _Meet and Greet_ section and spend a *LOT* of time in the other threads to see what this forum is really about.  MA's is *NOT* just whacking people and causing harm to others, in fact from what I have seen and heard, both here and in "real life" is the exact opposite.


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## jks9199 (Sep 30, 2007)

Legal principles and self defense are very, very complicated.  Several threads here have discussed some of the issues -- but, like everyone above me here has said, if you want legal guidance, you need a lawyer.  You might find that a self-defense instructor in England can offer some very general and nonspecific guidance about use of force issues -- but that's still not the same as real legal advice from a lawyer.

Or, to put it another way...  Free legal advice over the internet is worth every penny or pence or yen or whatever you pay for it.


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## tellner (Sep 30, 2007)

I'm not a lawyer and don't even play one on TV, so I would strongly suggest that you find one who is familiar with the case and statute law in the UK. You might also check out Massad Ayoob's material at http://www.ayoob.com . It comes from a firearms perspective which is not terribly useful to you. But his explanation of the ethical and legal parameters of self defense is superb. It is highly thought of throughout the English-speaking world and will give you a background in the basic concepts surrounding the subject. That will allow you to ask more informed and relevant questions when you talk to an attorney.


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## Decker (Oct 1, 2007)

www.nononsenseselfdefense.com

I think you might find this website useful. It approaches self-defence from aspects other than the purely martial.

I gotta admit, not long after I started training and showing satisfactory (to myself) improvement, I sorta developed such thinking too. But after reading through that website a couple times (it's very wordy, by the way), I realised that thinking like how I was is really wrong.

Tough to describe using mere words; I hope you'd perhaps at least take a look, and consider the many many aspects of self-defense, before reconsidering the nature of your question.

Just my 2 cents. :asian:


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## FieldDiscipline (Oct 1, 2007)

Decker said:


> www.nononsenseselfdefense.com
> 
> I think you might find this website useful. It approaches self-defence from aspects other than the purely martial.
> 
> ...



Looks interesting, will have to make time to read that.


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## Drac (Oct 1, 2007)

jks9199 said:


> Legal principles and self defense are very, very complicated. Several threads here have discussed some of the issues -- but, like everyone above me here has said, if you want legal guidance, you need a lawyer. You might find that a self-defense instructor in England can offer some very general and nonspecific guidance about use of force issues -- but that's still not the same as real legal advice from a lawyer.
> 
> Or, to put it another way... Free legal advice over the internet is worth every penny or pence or yen or whatever you pay for it.


 
What he said...


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## terryl965 (Oct 1, 2007)

jks9199 said:


> Legal principles and self defense are very, very complicated. Several threads here have discussed some of the issues -- but, like everyone above me here has said, if you want legal guidance, you need a lawyer. You might find that a self-defense instructor in England can offer some very general and nonspecific guidance about use of force issues -- but that's still not the same as real legal advice from a lawyer.
> 
> Or, to put it another way... Free legal advice over the internet is worth every penny or pence or yen or whatever you pay for it.


 
He makes a great point.


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## FieldDiscipline (Oct 1, 2007)

Self defence in the UK is all based upon what can be described as reasonable force.  It is up to YOU to prove that the force you used is reasonable.  That is that you can use force to nullify an attack, this is justifiable.  Doing a 56 move kata on his head afterwards is not.  

It is all based around this principle.

See above however:



> Free legal advice over the internet is worth every penny or pence or yen or whatever you pay for it.





> I would say that with 100% certainty you'd be far better off asking a lawyer that question.



Top tip, run away.  You will be asked why you didnt.


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## tellner (Oct 1, 2007)

Marc's site (nononsenseselfdefense) has some good bits and some which need to be taken with a huge grain of salt. And while he touches on the legal aspects he is about as qualified to give advice on it as anyone here on MT. Talk to a lawyer who is familiar with self defense law. Look at Ayoob's material since he's organized a lot of successful legal defenses for people involved in lethal force.


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## still learning (Oct 1, 2007)

Hello, "PREVENTION IS BETTER THAN CURE!"

Best to avoid ANY FIGHT....that way no one gets injury or killed.

Something as simple as pushing a person away who falls and hit their head on the concrete and dies, you can be charge for killing this person.
(this happen alot by the way).

When one has to fight back? ....accidents happen...some one dies from the incident? ...you or them?

Now worst thing is:   You will give you a place to stay,free room,meals,laundry service,court yard to play in,semi-permanent address, and lots of friendly people around you at all times. (Your lenght of stay may vary)  and have your very own protection services -Guards 24 hours too.

If you get killed? ....they just will bury you.  If you killed someone?  There is a price you may have to pay?

"Prevention is better than cure" ....Learn/study about what is "awareness", "avoidance" and READ Verbal Judo, Tongue Fu.....Gift of Fear too!

Aloha ( I like paying rent)


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## tellner (Oct 1, 2007)

still_learning,

I'm sure we all agree that avoiding the situation is the best course. But he's asking a legitimate question - what to do when it happens. You might as well say we shouldn't talk about self defense, seatbelts or first aid at all because it's best if you never need to rely on any of them. That's true but unhelpful.


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## still learning (Oct 1, 2007)

tellner said:


> still_learning,
> 
> I'm sure we all agree that avoiding the situation is the best course. But he's asking a legitimate question - what to do when it happens. You might as well say we shouldn't talk about self defense, seatbelts or first aid at all because it's best if you never need to rely on any of them. That's true but unhelpful.


 
Hello, OK?  If you kill someone?  Your country has it laws and you will have to face the courts.
1. You may get away with self-defense
2. You may go to jail.
3. You may not be caught (escaping). and the other attackers do not know you.
4. When you kill someone..expect revenge? from their families and friends? ..
5.Not sure about your country? ...but in Amercia you can get "SUE" too.
6. Loss of your job if at work?  unless proven self-defense.
7. NOTHING MAY HAPPEN TO YOU...go free!
8. Endless situtions or a combintions of the above?
9. NO two states have the same laws and rules....plus each sitution may be different (like the people above mention many times).
10. Even if you go to courts:  NO two courts,, No Judges,Lawyers are alike...Every jury will always have different people judging you a verdict.
(so in one case similar to yours one may be "innocent" another may be guilty).
11. Your past history, may effect your outcome too?  
12. Like everyone said:  Too many varibles here?  You can expect to be book and jail?   
13. You will need a lawyer for sure.....$$$$$
14. This will also change your life...you will never be the same after killing someone? ....well for some people it will?  expect some changes?

Did I get this right? .................Aloha


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## Big Don (Oct 1, 2007)

I'm sorry, but, I can't help it, I am a master smartass by birth and training.
Thus, my response:
What if I killed an attacker? A: The rest of the class is not going to go well for you...


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## tellner (Oct 2, 2007)

Nope, SL, you got it wrong. There are precedents. There are guidelines. There are people who are experienced and can give you an excellent educated guess about possible outcomes and the sort of things you can do to minimize your chances of getting on the wrong side of the law and make sure your deadly force encounter is within accepted legal standards.

You don't understand the issues so you throw out a whole bunch of possibilities scattergun style and say "Bad. Don't even think about it."

Now, for the original correspondent:

Again, I'm not a lawyer. You'd be a fool to take legal advice from me. Given that, to the best of my understanding...

Killing someone is never a good thing. It may sometimes be justified under the law. One of those times is the defense of yourself or an innocent third person against the immediate and otherwise unavoidable danger of death or serious bodily injury. Very often rape, forcible sodomy, kidnapping, armed robbery, attacks by multiple criminals at the same time or arson against an occupied building have been considered in the same class. Your mileage may vary. See an attorney.

Depending on the laws in your area you may or may not have the right to counsel or the right to remain silent. Again, that's outside my area of expertise. In any case, at some point you will need to talk to the authorities. Lying to them is always a bad idea. Cops aren't always the sharpest crayons in the box, but they are persistent and have excellent people sense; they have experience at sniffing out liars. You need to be able to articulate to them why you did what you had to do, why you had no other choice and why the alternatives were all worse. When and how much to say is something you need to discuss with a qualified lawyer who has experience in criminal defense and the laws concerning self defense.

"He might kill me some day" or "He deserved it" or "It was the manly thing to do" or "He did something bad back in the past" are all reasons for hurting or killing someone which will land you in jail. "My back was to the wall. I couldn't get away, and he was trying to stab me with a big knife" is a different matter entirely. 

I know that in some countries police are unfriendly to self defense either because of departmental policy, prejudice against certain classes of defendant or because they very seldom see a legitimate case. But even in places like that defenders have prevailed in court. Lying to them or altering evidence will get you in incredible trouble. Running away and hoping they don't find out it was you will destroy your self defense case no matter how justified it might have been. 

All I can tell you is search out people with expertise in the law. That does not mean random strangers on MT. It doesn't mean your martial arts teacher unless he is a lawyer, a high-level police officer or similar; being able to hit people is not the same as being an attorney. Find out what your rights are. Talk with legal professionals who have successfully argued self defense cases and find out what their clients have done that courts considered reasonable. Have a planned, practiced response. Avoid blind panic. Do what you have to to keep from getting injured or killed and no more. Don't make life or death decisions when your judgment is impaired.


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## FieldDiscipline (Oct 2, 2007)

Big Don said:


> I'm sorry, but, I can't help it, I am a master smartass by birth and training.
> Thus, my response:
> What if I killed an attacker? A: The rest of the class is not going to go well for you...



:rofl::rofl:


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## still learning (Oct 2, 2007)

Hello, This may help you in some cases?

If you are approach by someone/or more than one person...if there is inncent bystanders watching.

Learn to keep your hands up in a NON-threatening way. Look at the glance at the bystanders and to the person in front of you and say out LOUD......I am not looking for trouble or a fight...I am sorry....I apolizes...May I leave...Repeat " I am not looking for trouble or a fight...."
or anything that will make you look and sound innocent in courts/to the police.

Be non-aggressive...don't say I train in the martial arts? or If you hit me I going kick your ("S")...things like that will only get you into more trouble...try to act innocent as possible....So if someone is killed?  ....at least you will have a better chance of claiming SELF-DEFENSE!

Aloha


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## Mr. E (Oct 5, 2007)

Andy_46 said:


> Hi
> 
> Out of interest, if i was attacked by 2+ people and felt i had NO OTHER CHOICE but to defend myself, what are the chances of me being prosecuted if i ended up killing one of the attackers?
> 
> I'm in the UK by the way



Not even a legal expert can give you a clear answer for this because a lot of it depends on the exact circumstances.

Let us say that the police roll up to your house to find a body with your knife sticking out of his chest. When they run the name, they find out that the corpse is an escaped convict convicted for a series of home invasion robberies and murders. In this case, you probably will be OK. 

Almost anything else, and you are looking at trouble.

Lets look at another possible scenario. The police pull up to a parking lot to find a corpse with a tire iron in his hand and your knife in his chest. Now things get dicey.

Even if it is 100 percent clear that he pulled his weapon first, if the cause of the fight was over who was going to get the last parking spot they are not likely to let you free. Fight to the death over a place to put your car for a few hours is stupid and governments all over the world tend to prosecute in cases like that. Of course, there are no shortage of people willing to keep trying to up the ante in cases like parking space arguments so the idea of someone pulling a weapon is not that strange. Even though you think your were defending your life from his tire iron, the law will probably look at it with the attitude that you should have just pulled back and calmed down before things get out of hand. He may have been willing to kill over a parking spot, but you are the one that did kill someone and they have you dead to rights.

The best thing to do is to assume that if you kill someone you will go to jail for 10 to 20 years, loose all your money, ruin any future career you wanted, and have everyone you love turn their back on you and leave. Compared to dying, this isn't too bad. And maybe it will not come to it and you will be pleasantly surprised in that case. Prepare for the worst case scenario. But you would be amazed just how often you are willing to let the other guy have the parking space instead of being a macho alpha male when you consider where it might end up.

And here is something to think about- if the guy has any friends who saw things they will all lie to say you pulled the knife first. If you have any friends the jury will probably think you got them to say he pulled his weapon first. That is just the way people think- believe the friends of the person with the most damage. Police tend to think that way too. Most will tell you that they tend to take one guy to the hospital and the other to the station. 

Oh, and any martial arts experience you have might be used against you. The prosecutor might try to paint you as a guy just wanting to try out what you learned on someone. How do you think it would look if you were the one to bring a knife and the other guy was using an improvised weapon? It would be real easy to believe that you were the one prepared for violence because you were expecting to cause it.

So a lot of your question comes down to a case of 'it depends.' There is a lot of things that can affect whether you will be prosecuted or merely spend a few days behind bars while they sort things out. Oh yeah- police all over the world prefer to keep people who they know killed someone where they can't run away while they figure out if there is any problem with your tale of self defense at all. Even in the case of the escaped convict I gave as a possible example, they might wonder if you had a hand in hiding him and then turned on him for some reason.

But more than the legal problems, maybe you should worry about the cost to your soul. Younglings like yourself don't like to admit it, but part of you thinks it would be cool to use all your skills you have learned without holding back. They think it would make them look cool in the eyes of others, make them appear a bit more dangerous and less likely to be messed with if they were known as the guy that had to kill someone. The heros in the movies all seem to be killers. They never want to be killers it seems, but they are always forced into finally killing the bad guy and at the end of the movie they get the girl and the glory.

But in reality, the Mark of Cain is a badge of shame for those that wear it.

People will not think you are cool. People will be afraid of you. They might not admit it to your face, but the idea of being around someone that has taken a life runs counter to the drive for self preservation engraved on our DNA. And you may see it in their eyes, or in their voice as they decline to take you up on offers that would put them near you.

And there will be stories that start and they will discuss about how it was not as clear a case of self defense as you claim. Even if you are never charged with anything, to some that only means that the government did not have enough evidence to make a case against you NOT that you didn't have some amount of guilt. People will discuss it when you are not there, with most of your friends defending you, but still talking about it to get it off their chests and the story will spread. You may never hear it yourself, but you know that the people that you knew all your life and counted as your dearest friends may now be afraid of you. They may think you some kind of monster. You will come to fear running into people that knew you for fear that as soon as you turn the corner they will talk about you again.

Forget going to your high school reunion. You would be too scared that someone might recognize you and scream in fear. Your friends you used to know might have read about the story and have part of the facts, but not all of them. They really may think you are a monster.

Part of you will start to believe that as well.

Only a small percent of the population is born as sociopaths that can't fell others pain. The rest of us are cursed with empathy. We can't help feeling other people's pain or responsibility any more than a person who is scared of heights can tell themselves they are being silly and stop feeling afraid. Rationally it makes no sense to blame yourself, but you will. You remember as a child when you saw a horror movie during the day and laughed, but then huddled under your covers at night for fear of the monsters that were coming for you? It was easy to think that you would not feel that way during the day, but you could not help it at night. In the same way, as much as you tell yourself that you had no choice and that the other person had it coming now, that voice in the back of your mind will second guess everything you did in the worst possible light. Even in the case of the home invader, you will think that you could have woken up earlier, put on better locks or at least jumped out the window with your family and left him alive. How much worse do you think it will be if it is closer to the car space example?

You may move to another part of the planet just to get away from the fear of what others think about you. You may end up joining a military because that is a place that accepts killers. If you survive the experience, years later in therapy you might realize that your constant volunteering for dangerous postings was a kind of suicide attempt. You may not even get enough of a real military and join one of those private armies that will insure that you get sent to places where people shoot at you instead of sitting in a supply post near Surrey.

You may end up taking a job in another country just so you will not meet up with any of the people that knew you and might have read about the person you killed. All that you worked for to get a good job is pretty much wasted as you dig wells for villages in Africa.

You may find yourself drinking  heavier than you used to. And you might find yourself going through wild mood swings. Small things can set off a sort of melancholy as you realize that doors have been shut in your face forever. I doubt anyone registered here at Martialtalk is going to be a prime minister, but there is something about knowing that it is completely impossible because of the Mark of Cain that hits you hard. Spotting a news program from a place near where you used to live and is familiar to you hits you the same way as you know that you can never go back and live as you used to. You may never have wanted to if nothing had ever happened, but having that choice taken away from you makes it hurt. The same goes for hearing an old song you and your first love used to listen to together. Wherever she is now, she may have heard part of the story about you killing someone and would scream in fear if you ever ran across each other on the street. Isn't that a great image to have as you listen to the radio?

If you are lucky, you have people that depend on you. You may have children to raise and their welfare is more important than your own. Because otherwise you might feel tempted to just jump in front of a truck to escape the constant fear that people will see the Mark of Cain on you and think you a monster- one of them being the guy in the mirror.

This is just stuff I picked up from reading some old magazines. Think about it.


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## tellner (Oct 5, 2007)

I really have to disagree with Mr. E. on large parts of his post. The bits where he says "Even the legal experts can't predict because it depends on circumstances" is dead on. 

The part where he says "Assume you'll go to jail, lose everything, and everyone will run in fear" is pure scare tactics. Yes, that can happen. And the whole point of the "choice of evils" doctrine is that you need to be able to tell the judge with a clear conscience "I knew that all these bad things could happen. But the alternative was dying / being crippled / watching some sick bastard rape my three year old daughter with a broken Coke bottle. That would have been worse, so I did what I had to do to stop the crime."

With competent defense counsel and taking the right actions for the right reason it is entirely possible to get through the legal system without losing anything except money. 

There are social effects. I've known people who have had to use deadly froce either in the line of duty (police, military) or in defense. Yes, some of their friends turned out to be lightweight jerks (Mr. Ayoob uses a less polite term). They got different friends. A good support network turned out to be vital. There was adjustment. But in the end they integrated the experience and got on with their lives. Sometimes it took counseling. They weren't exactly the same, because it's a life-changing experience. But they got through. And not one one of them, not a single one, said "I'd rather have let him kill me."

Bad things can happen if you use deadly force. The Law in its Majesty can be blind and stupid and roll over you like a triple trailer over a possum. People can be jerks. But if the alternatives are using extreme force or letting yourself be murdered, sodomized or burned to death by an arsonist, you have to do what you have to do then and afterwards.


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## Mr. E (Oct 6, 2007)

tellner said:


> With competent defense counsel and taking the right actions for the right reason it is entirely possible to get through the legal system without losing anything except money.



And it is also possible under the same circumstances to end up spending a few decades behind bars. There have been cases like that. Are you familiar with the saying common among your country's law enforcement officers? "You can't make a bad shoot good, but you can make a good shoot bad."

The same goes for the social and psycological impact on a person. There are a few sociopaths in society who can kill children and not lose sleep. At the other end are the documented cases of men who had to kill in WWII who only opened up to therapists decades later the fear and shame they felt. That war was a clear case of having to kill or be killed and the nations that sent their kids off to war went through the rituals of recognizing and honoring those soldiers to tell them they did a good job that was now over and yet there still were cases of people who felt shame and had their lives impacted by their memories of killing.

Until you are there, you don't know one way or the other how you will react or how you will be treated by the state.

The whole thing kind of reminds me of the debate about seatbelts. I wear them and have done so even when they were not required by law. But I do remember my youth when for some strange reason I thought it was silly to wear them. Knowing myself, I probably thought at some level that people woudl think I was afraid if I used them and I was more afraid of them thinking I was not a man than I was of dying. I would never have admited that, even to myself and it is only after a few decades and being the first responder to a fatal accident that let me see what I might have been thinking. I remember the excuses I heard from others and sometimes still hear them. Most of the folks that do not want to wear seat belts trot out the one accident in a _billion_ that seatbelts would have hurt more than help and ignore the 999,999,999 other times that it was a good idea to have one on. But if you take a calm view of the matter, you probably would buckle up whenever you got the chance.

So, when a young student driver asks _HYPOTHETICALLY_ what would happen if they got into an accident without their seat belt, I know that somewhere in their mind the idea of going without one is not far off. They are mainly looking for justification of what they want to do than an answer they might not like. I was there where they were and can admit it now.

In the same way, when some young martial arts practicioner starts asking about cases where they just do not have any choice but to kill someone or use a deadly weapon, those same alarms go off.

I have known people that seem to be into martial arts more for the idea of doing harm to others and being seen as a real man than in honest self defense. But they probably honestly thought they were there to keep themselves safe. Never underestimate the human ability to lie to oneself about intentions. These are the kind of guys that grab an extra knife before they go through a dangerous area, but find some reason to not take an extra five minutes to go around and avoid the danger entirely.

You accuse me of using scare tactics. But you can't deny that some people have killed in self defense and ended up behind bars and some have become wrecks. People do sometimes walk away from accidents unharmed even without wearing a seatbelt- but I do not advise _counting_ on being better off without one. If you were asked by a young driver about seat belts and you thought he was looking more for an excuse than an honest answer, would you trot out the worst case scenario or the best?

I really doubt that anyone would take what I write here and fail to defend themselves and die instead. But if maybe the next time they think they might need an extra knife they instead think of finding a way to avoid a bad area, these posts may have served a purpose. I briefly knew a guy who defended himself and did several years behind bars. He did not think about the situation enough in advance, put himself in a spot he could have avoided and when he was trapped he did what he had to in order to survive. But all those mistakes he made convinced every member of a jury to put him behind bars. If people have a healthy respect of what might  happen, they may not put themselves in a position to need to defend themselves and face that choice.


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