From: malloy@NPRDC.NAVY.MIL (Sean Malloy)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.guns
Subject: Re: Susan is still only thinking about herself
Date: 6 Apr 92 21:49:34 GMT
Organization: Navy Personnel R&D Center, San Diego

In article <susan.702533409@coombs> susan@coombs.anu.edu.au writes:
>	US LAW DOES NOT APPLY IN AUSTRALIA.  I believe we fought quite
>a large and loud flame war late last year over that little matter.  If
>you'd like to provoke it again, do so.
>
>	The fact that your political system has been designed in such a 
>manner that your public officials cannot be held responsible for their
>actions is a fault of that system.  You should therefore be doing something
>about fixing that fault rather than simply throw your hands up in disgust
>and buying a gun IMO.

This sounds like exactly the same flapdoodle that Brian Ross was
spouting about how, in Australia, the police _are_ responsible for
protecting individuals from criminals.

If the police have the legal responsibility to protect individuals,
then failure to do so makes them legally liable for damages incurred
by an individual as a result of their failure to protect him or her.
American law says that the police have no legal responsibility to
protect any given citizen, so they incur no liability from failing to
protect them; if Australian law makes the police responsible for
protecting individuals, then they will be legally liable for failure.

A month ago, I challenged him to provide hard proof (citation of
either the law or the court decision) that the police in Australia are
legally liable for damages resulting from a failure to carry out their
(claimed) responsibility to protect an individual.

From my response to his reply to that posting:

|>	However, I do know that here, the police are required to respond, 
|>or at least endeavour to respond to all calls made to them by the public.  
|>Failure to do so can bring charges of criminal negligence against them 
|>individually.   Such charges have been brought in the past, and have resulted
|>in prison sentences for those concerned.
|
|There is a _big_ difference between being required to _respond_ and
|being required to _protect_. All being required to respond does is
|make the police show up in response to a call; being required to
|_protect_ makes the police legally liable for damages if someone is
|has a crime committed against them in an area patrolled by the police.
|For example, catching a rapist after he has raped a woman is a failure
|to protect that woman; if the police have a legal responsibility to
|_protect_ individuals, the victim will be able to collect damages from
|the police for having failed to prevent the rape, regardless of
|whether they were there or not.
|
|>	In addition police cannot simply stand by and watch a crime being
|>committed and not act.  Again charges of negligence can be brought against
|>them.
|
|This was already covered; US police officers _are_ required to intervene
|in crimes that they witness (at least while they're on duty, and
|almost all police officers will intervene in crimes they witness when
|off-duty as well). You're dodging my question.

|>	Sean, thats your problem and you can seek to either avoid making your
|>police accountable to the public demand for protection, or you can simply
|>ignore it and carry a gun yourself because you don't feel you need police
|>protection.   However, when someone points out that in other, more civilised
|>parts of the world, the police are made accountable for their actions, don't
|>start claiming that it doesn't happen, or that it doesn't exist.
|
|Then supply proof that it _does_ exist. The US Supreme Court has ruled
|that US police officers are not legally liable for damages as a result of
|failing to _prevent_ a crime; prove that Australian police officers
|_are_, and I (and probably a good fraction of the other people reading
|this group that contest your position) will concede your arguments in
|this instance.


It's been a month, Brian; surely between you and your faculty, it
can't be _that_ hard to find a law that is the most fundamental
advantage your most civilized and enlightened culture has over us
poor, benighted Americans -- the knowledge that your police _must_
protect you, that you can rest secure knowing that if your body turns
up in the Outback shot seventeen times, your relatives will be able to
collect fantastic amounts of damage from the police for having failed
in their legal obligation to _protect_ you.

But we haven't heard word one from Brian about this; perhaps he's
discovered that the Australian police do not, after all, have any
legal obligation to protect any given individual, and he's hoping
we've forgotten about it . . .


-- 
random sig #31:
                                             | God grant me the serenity to
Sean Malloy                                  | accept the things I cannot
Navy Personnel Research & Development Center | change, the courage to change the
San Diego, CA 92152-6800                     | things I can, and the firepower
malloy@nprdc.navy.mil                        | to make the difference.