Great article on self-reliance for self-defense

[Hoi Polloi]

I came across this well-written article when looking for a reference. The premise is obviously something most will be familiar with here, but I thought some of the historical info was less common and that it puts so much in a neat and compact article including footnotes for citations that it makes it a great reference.

Police Have No Duty To Protect Individuals
Self-Reliance For Self-Defense -- Police Protection Isn't Enough!
by Peter Kasler

[10Shooter]

interesting link....a fact of law and of practical necessity that individuals are responsible for their own personal safety, and that of their loved ones.
Drives the point home doesn't it, carry 24x7.

[fm2]

Good find, Hoi. Camera's & security guards can't be counted on to protect you either.

[TexasGal]

Hey, thanks for posting that. I told a co-worker about this a while back and the look of dismay on her face was visceral. Her response was; "Then what good are the police?!" I replied for the general order of society. Many dedicated policemen and women would jump to save a citizen's life, but they are not obligated to lay down their lives to do so and they can not be everywhere at once. We must consider ourselves our first line of defense. For women in particular, I think this realization is avoided by most.

[Seabear]

Good read. Thanks for posting the link.

[BrianSW99]

I've read a number of English novels from the mid 1800's and the general sentiment regarding the police at the time seems to be that they were ineffectual bumbling idiots and that a person often had to pay for the services of a detective out of his own pocket to investigate a crime.

Now, these are fictional novels, but the theme recurs often enough among the different authors I've read that it leads me to believe that was a commonly held view at the time.

[lrb111]

Good find!. I had looked a couple times before on "No duty to protect." but only came up with a couple of cases.
What I was primarily looking for was a list or compilation of cases where the SCOTUS had ruled the police had no duty to protect.

My intent was to show that the Supreme Court had ruled over and over that the police could not be obligated to perform in instances where it was impossible for them to perform. ("instant response in all situations")

I'm not LEO, but wanted to show those that think the police are going to, somehow, magically appear for instant aid when needed.

[baldeagle]

Thanks so much for finding this, Hoi. It will be sent to both my daughters and to all of my loved ones. It's time for all Americans to wake up. Our safety is our responsibility and no one else's.

Since the laws are so tilted in favor of the police, it's incumbent upon us to ensure that the use of force and use of deadly force laws we live under are written to allow us sufficient latitude to protect ourselves and our loved ones without running afoul of the state. The cruelest of all situations is for the state to claim it has no obligation to protect us and then refuse to allow us to protect ourselves.

[Hoi Polloi]

BE,

I think the New York case of Ms. Riss is the one that stood out to me the most because the unsuccessful case against the city for failing to protect her had only one dissenting judge who ruled in her favor saying, "What makes the City's position [denying any obligation to protect the woman] particularly difficult to understand is that, in conformity to the dictates of the law [she] did not carry any weapon for self-defense. Thus, by a rather bitter irony she was required to rely for protection on the City of New York which now denies all responsibility to her." And the city still won.

[Excaliber]

Good find, Hoi. Camera's & security guards can't be counted on to protect you either.

Cameras are great for documenting what happened to you so the attacker can be prosecuted after your death.

Security guards are almost always instructed to only "observe and report" and not to physically intervene, with the exception of armed officers in certain circumstances. Unarmed security officers can have a deterrent effect against casual crime through vigilance, verbal challenge, and denial of access. They have virtually no deterrent effect on violent crime, although many organizations that hire them use them in ways that attempt to create a perception of a protective effect that is not there.

This is known as "security theater."

[Excaliber]

Excellent post, Hoi - it brings together the major case rulings in a way that effectively communicates the true picture of the role of the police and the extent of the remaining responsibility for protection of the individual which must be self provided.

Here's a bit of math to use with those deluded souls who still think the police are protecting them as individuals:

An average ratio of police officers to population is 2 per 1,000. In any given place there may be a little more or a little less, but this is a good working number.

The two officers covering those 1,000 people have 2,080 working hours each, just like the rest of us (52 weeks x 40 hours). This means those 1,000 folks have 4,160 hours of police work assigned to them.

Each officer receives a nominal 3 weeks of vacation and one week of training. That's 320 hours that have to be subtracted from the 4,160, leaving 3,840 hours.

An active patrol officer makes arrests, issues citations, and testifies in court. Another 160 hours per officer per year would be a conservative number to use for these duties. Removing this from the protective time available leaves 3,520 hours.

Each call an officer takes requires a report. Report writing often takes longer than the initial call handling, particularly when a serious incident occurs, or one that has lots of paperwork attached to it (like family violence) is involved. Take away another (conservative) 320 hours, leaving 3,200 hours.

Officers are generally allowed 30 minutes for meals and 2 15 minute breaks during a shift. This removes 1 hour per working day of available time. This comes to 440 hours for those two officers (not counting the vacation and training days), giving us a remainder of 2,760 hours of protective street duty for those 1,000 people.

An average officer will take about 4 sick days per year. This eats up another 64 hours, leaving us with 2,696 available patrol hours.

Keep in mind that about 1/3 of an agency is not assigned to primary protective patrol. They are administrators, trainers, and follow up investigators. Remove 1/3 of those available hours to account for this, and we arrive at 1779 hours of primary protective patrol available. All of the calls for service, citizen interactions, traffic stops, and random patrol activities for those 1,000 people comes from these remaining 1779 hours. This gives each person about 1.8 hours of available service time in each year of 8,448 hours. Remember this is time available to serve each individual, and the officer may be nowhere near that individual during his available time. This works out to about 2/100's of one percent of the year with officer service availability per each individual.

Feel free to jiggle the figures to tweak the assumptions in the times I allocated to various tasks. When you work those changes through the calculations, you'll find they won't change the final result much.

If you speak to folks who can't follow the math, here's the simple test to see how well they're protected by police in a position to do anything effective at any given time:

1. Stand erect with arms outstretched parallel to the floor on each side
2. Turn slowly in a full circle
3. Count the number of officers touched during this rotation

The result is the number of officers in a position to protect that individual at any given time.

If your Barack Obama, you come up with about 5.

If you're you or me, nearly 100% of the time, you come up with zero.

The takeaway: You're on your own for immediate protection of life and property during the period it takes for police to be notified, dispatched, travel to your location, and take effective action.

Keep in mind that if they're already committed to other emergencies at the time, it may be awhile. Plan accordingly.

[Excaliber]

I found this mentioned in a news-report from the Petit murders in Connecticut:

Capt. Robert Vignola acknowledged that a half-hour passed between the time police first learned of the break-in, and the time they saw the two accused murderers, Steven Hayes, 47, and Joshua Komisarjevsky, 30, run out of the house, get into the Petit's car, and try to escape. It was only then that police noticed the house was on fire.

Vignola said there was no sign of activity inside when police arrived, and that they set up a perimeter around the Petit house, in accordance with standard procedure. He said that if he had known what was going on inside, "I would have been the first one through that door," The Associated Press reported.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/police-defend- ... d=11654076" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I'm not posting this to bash the police - but it's tragic how different things might have been :( :(

Police respond according to the information they have. In this case, they were reportedly told by the bank teller that Mrs. Petit had said her family was being "held hostage." In this situation, setting up a perimeter, establishing contact, and letting the clock run until tension and fatigue take their toll on the bad guys is generally the best way to go. Usually the longer it runs, the less likely hostages will be harmed.

Officers at the scene had no way of knowing that the situation inside was a horrific violent attack in progress, which calls for an immediate door breach and tactical entry.

It turned out very badly, but I don't envy the position the scene commander found himself in either at the beginning ..... or afterwards.