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Liko81 wrote: However, what middle ground do you suggest, especially when you say that if someone came up to you while you were wrestling with a kid having a temper tantrum you'd tell them to butt out? What exactly would you expect me to do next?

1) Butt out.

2) Call the cops if you think it is warranted.

3) Follow, if you think it is warranted, while staying on the line with the 911 people.

Liko81 wrote: I could assume that if you were a criminal you would have reacted differently ........

And someone's imagination could run away with them and get them in a whole heap of trouble.

Liko81 wrote: What is a call to 911 with a license plate going to do?

Uhhhh..... maybe your civic duty?

Liko81 wrote: If they stop you and you're not a kidnapper, you're going to be just as hacked with the officer as you were with me, and an officer will not let you go as easily.

You're making an assumption there. You have no idea how I would react to being pulled over by a uniformed police officer.

Liko81 wrote: Quite simply, if it looks like a kidnapping, sounds like a kidnapping, it's prudent to assume it is a kidnapping.

If you're ever in this situation, you'd better hope that the jury agrees.

Liko81 wrote: From a justification standpoint, "mistake of fact is a valid defense". If a "reasonable person" in my shoes would have concluded, based on what I had to work with at the time, that this was a kidnapping in progress, then my actions to prevent the supposed kidnapping are justified under a combination of Sections 9.22 (necessity as a justification) and 9.33 (defense of third person) of the Penal Code even if a crime was not actually taking place.

Technically, perhaps. But good luck with that if you end up shooting, or even pulling a gun, on someone who was NOT kidnapping. And that's assuming that the person you drew down on doesn't produce their own weapon and use it to defend themselves.

Liko81 wrote: All in all, you leave me with little recourse if I honestly think a crime is being committed and want to stop it.

I can't put my finger on it exactly, but there is something about that statement that leaves me feeling very uneasy.

Liko81 wrote: Put yourself in my shoes; if you honestly felt that you could be the last person to see that child alive if you didn't act, would you not act to protect that child yourself, at least until the police arrive and sort it out?

Somehow, I just think you would (paraphrasing) "honestly feel you could be the last person to see the child alive" long before I would.

At any rate, the course of this conversation is taking it places I don't really want to go, so I think I'm done with it for now.

Frankly, these "hypothetical" threads tend to do that a lot. ("If this, I'd do that, and if that I'd do this other thing...") It's one reason why I seldom get involved in them. I find discussion of true life incidents much more informative and interesting.

dihappy wrote: Hey you do what you want to do. I believe that if more average people got involved, this world would be a better place.

How many times have we seen videos where we see people just walking by not lending a hand to a helpless woman, man or kid whos in need of help.

I'm not saying that people shouldn't "get involved."

What I am saying is that there are different levels of "involvement", ranging all the way from wise to heroic to utterly foolhardy or wrong-headed.

We should always be aware that if one's main tool is a hammer, it is easy to start viewing almost every problem as a nail.

Put a hole in a hostage target (that is probably stationary) at an IDPA match and you lose a few points. Put a hole in an actual hostage, (who is probably moving erratically along with the BG) and someone might lose their life.

Big difference.

And it's even worse if one was mistaken and it turned out that the "hostage" was really not a hostage at all but rather someone's bi-polar kid.

So, yes, get involved. But do so wisely.

dihappy wrote: I think i would be grateful that someone erred on the side of caution.

So you're in the middle of an intense situation with your unruly kid, and you're going to stand there and be GRATEFUL while some perfect stranger starts questioning you and asking you to prove you're the kid's parent? You'd be grateful that they were snooping around in your car to see if it looked like a "parent's car", whatever that is?

As the saying goes, YMMV.

I'd tell the busybody to get out of my face and stay out.

And they darned sure better not produce a weapon. 'Cause if they do, the best thing that would happen to them afterward is getting thrown into the county jail.

You don't immediately DRAW on someone carrying a screaming kid to a car, but you should take a good long look and if anything at all seems fishy then start asking questions. A parent will usually be able to provide recent photos from their purse or wallet, or the general contents of their vehicle (toys, bags of finger food, children's books or magazines, car seats, a diaper bag) that is a natural consequence of parenting will indicate they're telling the truth.

If I were the parent in that situation I would tell my "questioner" to get out of my face and stay out, and that I didn't have to tell them a darned thing. No way am I gonna stand around pulling pictures out of my wallet or anything like that.

If someone then started to produce a weapon, I'm sure I would immediately acquire a reasonable belief that they were threatening me with unlawful deadly force.

If someone thinks something wrong is going down, they should get the license plate number and call the cops. My plastic says, "Concealed Handgun License", not "Batman".

In another thread I related where I once saw a man and a woman arguing over a child in a language I didn't understand. The man tried to take the child from the woman's arms and she held on. I was walking towards them and just stopped about 10 feet away and stared at them with my arms folded across my chest. (Note: I'm not a big guy and I wouldn't scare anybody.) A couple of other people who were walking up behind me did the same thing. The guy stormed off, still spouting off angrily in whatever language he was using.

I was legally armed at the time. I don't know what I would have done if things had gone further down hill from there, but drawing and/or shooting would have been pretty far down on the list.

There is a huge potential to misunderstand or misconstrue what may look like a kidnapping.

As another suggested, unless you see an obviously helpless person being taken at the point of a weapon, don't even think about drawing or shooting. Note all the details that you can. Call 911. Follow if possible to do so in safety.

That's what a "reasonable person" would do. And that's the standard that your actions will be held to, by the DA, the Grand Jury, and the civil or criminal trial jury (if it gets that far).