This week’s After Action Analysis show does it’s usual plain-English legal analysis of a use-of-force event captured on video. Unlike the typical After Action Analysis show, however, this particular use-of-force event is a product of one man’s imagination—literally one Mann’s imagination, by which I mean movie director Michael Mann.
If the name Michael Mann is not familiar to you, and you’re a red-blooded American male, then shame on you—but certainly the many movies and TV shows he was involved in, whether as writer, technical advisor, or director, will certainly be familiar to most everyone.
I’m talking about movies like Thief (1981, with James Caan), The Last of the Mohicans (1992, with Daniel Day Lewis), Heat (1995, with Robert DeNiro and Al Pacino, the first time they two acted in a movie together), Ali (2001, with Will Smith), Collateral (2004, with Tom Cruise and Jamie Foxx), as well as TV shows like Starsky & Hutch and Miami Vice.
Today’s use-of-force event is pulled from the last of those movies listed, Collateral, released in 2004 and starring Tom Cruise and Jamie Foxx. In the movie Cruise plays a character named Vincent, a hitman on a contract killing spree, and Jamie Fox plays a character named Max, a taxi driver that Vincent essentially kidnaps to courier him from hit to hit.
The scene I’ve selected from the movie is commonly referred to as the “briefcase” scene. In it, Vincent is in a high rise building to perform his nefarious deeds, and he’s left Max zip-tied to the steering wheel of the taxi out in an alley behind the building. Max calls out for help, and several men approach to investigate.
Unfortunately for Max, two of the men decide to commit an armed robbery of the helpless Max, taking his wallet. Unfortunately for the two thieves, they also decide to steal Vincent’s briefcase from the back seat of the cab. The briefcase is of vital importance to Vincent, as it contains the information necessary to locate each of his assassination targets.
Just as the two thieves begin to walk down the alley away from the cab with Vincent’s briefcase, Vincent turns the corner into the alley and the confrontation between Vincent and the hitmen begins. It’s primarily that confrontation that we’ll focus our use-of-force legal analysis on, including every shot on every target.
ENJOY THE SHOW!
And remember:
You carry a gun so you’re hard to kill.
Know the law so you’re hard to convict!
Stay safe!
–Andrew
Attorney Andrew F. Branca
Law of Self Defense LLC
Law of Self Defense CONSULT Program
With respect to innocence, would the fact that Vincent had just committed a crime (assassination/murder) influence his claim of innocence?
It wouldn’t be relevant to the use-of-force issues around his encounter with the two thieves, as these are completely independent events.
Obviously “Vincent” is guilty of many things, but we use term”innocence” as one of the elements of self-defense in a very narrow sense, as it applies to a specific use-of-force event.
–Andrew
Attorney Andrew F. Branca
Law of Self Defense LLC
I suppose one could argue that Vincent was engaged in one of several ONGOING crimes–contract killing/murder for hire, for example, was still ongoing, as was the kidnapping of Max. There are a couple of states that do explicitly condition self-defense on not being engaged in ANY unlawful activity, and in one of those jurisdictions a prosecutor could argue Vincent was engaged in those ongoing unlawful activities and therefore not entitled to self-defense.
Off the top of my head I don’t recall that CA is one of those few states, so the option may not apply here, but if it was an option and I were the prosecutor I’d certainly make the argument.
–Andrew
Attorney Andrew F. Branca
Law of Self Defense LLC
That’s what I was thinking when I posted the comment. I seem to recall you saying something to the effect that a claim of self defense depends on you legally being allowed to be in the place where the self defense act occurred and not otherwise engaged in unlawful conduct at the time. If you’re committing a robbery (not necessarily displaying or threatening with a firearm but never-the-less armed) and an armed citizen pulls a gun on you to stop the crime and you pull your own gun and shoot the citizen, wouldn’t you fail the test of innocence (or maybe imminence) in a claim of self defense? Florida statute 776.013.3(c) says in part that the presumption of reasonable fear of imminent death or great bodily harm does not apply if: …. (c) The person who uses or threatens to use defensive force is engaged in a criminal activity….” No idea what the Ca statute says.
You’re conflating a bunch of different things. There’s the core right to self-defense, the five elements we discuss.
That’s NORMALLY NOT contingent on NOT being engaged in unlawful activity. Of course, if the particular nature of the unlawful activity is physical aggression (such as an armed robbery), you lose self-defense because you’ve lost the element of Innocence as the initial aggressor. But what if you’re just a street-corner drug dealer, exchanging drugs for cash? That’s not an act of violence or aggression, wouldn’t lose you the element of Innocence, and so wouldn’t lose you self-defense (EXCEPT in the few states that DO condition self-defense on not being engaged in ANY unlawful activity).
So, let’s assume we’re talking about a typical state that does NOT strip you of self-defense just because you were engaged in ANY unlawful activity. Although those states might not strip you of your CORE right of self-defense just because you were engaged in a non-violent crime at the time, they OFTEN strip you of SPECIAL PROVISIONS of self-defense if you were involved in ANY unlawful activity. Special provisions like “stand-your-ground” or like “presumptions of a reasonable fear of deadly force harm.”
You can lose those special provisions and STILL argue self-defense–but if you lose “stand-your-ground” you may have re-acquired a legal duty to retreat, and if you lose the “legal presumption,” well, you no longer have that legal presumption. But you can STILL argue CORE self-defense, without those special provisions.
It’s important to not conflate (overlap, confuse) the CORE right to self-defense with the “accessories” that many states make conditionally available.
–Andrew
Attorney Andrew F. Branca
Law of Self Defense LLC
Consider the following case – in a legal self-defense response, a defender legally fires 3 rapid successive shots neutralizing the attacker. Then after a delay the defender shoots the downed aggressor again after which the aggressor is found dead. If the autopsy determines that the aggressor was killed by one of the first 3 shots, can the defender still be found guilty due to the last shot not being imminent?
Is it the intention of the defender taking the last shot that matters?
The complicating factor in your scenario is that it’s generally ambiguous which bullet killed, and generally any of the bullets constitutes deadly force that’s deemed capable of killing.
I suppose if the facts involved the body first being decapitated, so there’s no ambiguity that it’s already dead, and then a shot was fired into the skull, a good argument could be made that the final shot into the skull could not have caused deadly injury as the body was clearly already dead. Then it’s, what, malicious tampering with a corpse or some similar charge, but not a use-of-force charge.
–Andrew
Attorney Andrew F. Branca
Law of Self Defense LLC
Decapitation by defender in a legal self-defense case would seem rather extreme and not prudent. However, I have read reports that stated what shot in the series of shots actually killed the victim, which would dispense with ambiguity, and thus my question. In any event, it seems that it would be in the defender’s best interest not to decapitate the aggressor. This I suspect were agree.