Hello again everyone. Welcome to Washington Gun Law tv. I'm Washington Gun Law President William Kirk. Thanks for joining us. Life really is the best teacher that we will ever have. We learn so much from just living life. In fact, we learn a lot more from our mistakes than we ever do from our successes. Take for example, me as a trial lawyer when I was much younger trial lawyer. I can tell you that the greatest learning lessons I ever received are the days that I got my ass handed to me in court by a much more skilled trial attorney. Well, I love to be able to use real life examples, things that really happen that we can go back and take a look at to teach all of you how the laws of self-defense work in general around this country. And today is a very good example about how you might place somebody in a position where they really have no other option. It's also a classic example in what we like to call F around and find out. So today, let's go through a very disturbing video and let's talk about how road rage can end your life quickly.
Okay, America, this is what we're talking about. It is a video clip that has made it all around the twittersphere today. You guys have probably all seen it. It says short clip, and it looks a little something like this.
Okay, now we stopped the video right before the bad part or the good part, however you want to define it here. And y'all know what happened. I know all of you have seen the video. And yeah, we'll link up a tweet down below so that if you really want to check out what the end product is, you'll be able to see. But the reason we stopped that is, well, the folks here at Google have a real tendency to get really pissed off about that, and we figured that might actually allow us to release this video somewhat contemporaneous with the events. But depending on what day this actually is published, I guess you will all be able to determine just how much Google really liked this. Now, before we go through the video and break it all down, it's important that we go over the rules of engagement.
What do I mean by the rules of engagement? I'm talking about the rules of self-defense generally as it applies to you somewhere in the United States. Now, I certainly hope I'm right. I always tell everybody to contact local counsel because yes, there are nuances based upon local jurisdictions. I'm sure if I'm wrong, Andrew Bronca will get back out online here and tell everyone what an idiot I am, why he's spitting into his microphone angry little man he is. As we know, all self-defense cases, whether it involves a fist or a firearm, whether the end product is a fat lip or a dead body must meet three criteria in order to be deemed lawful use of force. There are as follows, the force we use must be necessary. Number two, the force we use must be reasonable both objectively and subjectively. And finally, the use of force must be proportional.
The last one being simple, that you cannot bring a gun to a fist fight. So when we're going to be deploying lethal force, and if proportionality is a component thereof, what we must be encountered with is something very tantamount to lethal force being used against us. And as a matter of fact, if you break down all the case law in most states, you will see that there are four instances in which an individual can lawfully use lethal force, and they are as follows. Number one, you are an imminent threat of death or serious bodily injury. Number two, somebody else in your presence is an imminent threat or death or serious bodily injury. Number three, you have a felony being committed upon your person, which is really another way of saying you're an imminent threat of death or serious bodily injury. Or number four, you have a felony being committed inside your home.
Now what we're going to focus on right now is we're going to assume that there is no other individual in the car. If there are passengers in the car, which is attacked by this gentleman here with the green shirt, then arguably we're going to also have the other people in your presence which are in imminent threat of death or serious bodily injury. Okay? Now before we break down the video, let's obviously disclose something. This video is about six seconds long. There is a lot of activity that preceded this incident. There is some activity that succeeded this incident. I don't have any of that. Could that change the equation? It most definitely could. We're going to make some assumptions here and we're going to tell you when we're making assumptions. And then we're going to also isolate some very specific facts that are objectively right here on this very brief video.
The first thing we're going to take a look at is right here, the position of the cars. Now the would-be attacker. Now deceased appears to be coming from a car that has either been involved in a collision with our subject's car, or worse yet, he has potentially blocked him off as you can see here. So now if we have a situation in which one driver has basically tried to run the other driver off the roadway, and that's how the contact occurs, that's how the contact begins. Well, we need to understand that there's going to significantly change the context of that contact and could theoretically allow the subject here to use lethal force more rapidly. Okay, number two, yeah, our now deceased. Well, he comes out of the car immediately carrying a firearm. And I had a lot of folks today on Twitter tell me this.
And I actually have a tendency to agree that if this individual had forced this gentleman off the road, the individual with a green shirt, now deceased, had forced him off the road and then comes out of the car carrying a deadly weapon, which is clearly identifiable right here is a firearm at that point, the driver of the other car, the one that we're calling the subject of today's video, I candidly believe at that point he's already an imminent threat of death or serious bodily injury. He, in all likelihood, has the right to use lethal force right there. Now, he does get to approach the window and he is not acting in a particularly stable fashion. The language that he is using, his lack of emotional regulation would and should alarm every other person. Now, this is where things get really, really dangerous and candidly, this is how the gentleman in the green shirt cost himself his own life.
Because you'll see right here that although he approached the car with the firearm in his right hand, he now switches it here to the left hand, but he does that below the driver's window. So depending on the jurisdiction, at the very least, we could honestly say that our subject here was absolutely positively placed an imminent threat of death or serious bodily injury. Depending on the jurisdiction, the forcing him off the road and threatening him with a firearm probably constitutes a felony being committed against this person, which would also authorize the use of lethal force. I believe that the legal authorization to use lethal force actually occurred moments before lethal force was actually deployed. And with all due respect to the victim's family here, candidly, he got himself killed. Now, as you know, we preach here at Washington Gun Law all the time that one of the best ways to manage conflict is to avoid conflict all together.
In this situation, I don't really see how our subject had any other option but to defend his life with the use of lethal force. This gentleman is on him in very rapid fashion. He's in a car. Clearly this is being now videotaped by somebody who's in a car behind our subject car, which means he's likely pinned in and no ability to drive away. He now has a crazed maniac at his window acting completely unstable and waving a firearm around. He reaches into the car with one of his hands. I'm sorry, but in my opinion and in Washington gun law's opinion, this is an absolutely positively lawful shoot. Okay, listen, you may have more questions about this or anything else related to what's left of our Second Amendment rights. You guys should know how to get ahold of Washington gun law by now. If you don't, that's okay.
That information is down there in the description box. Maybe you got ideas for videos we should be doing here. If you do, go ahead and click on that link right there. Most of the best ideas we had candidly weren't our ideas to begin with. And then finally, and most importantly, let's everyone remember that part of being the lawful and responsible gun owner, like we talk about all the time here, is to know what the law is and every situation, how it applies to you in any instance that you may find yourself. Until next time, thanks for watching and stay safe.
YouTube Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZC7ufq5V0BQ&list=WL&index=6&t=3s
Credit: William Kirk, ESQ Washington Gun Law