[b said:
Quote[/b] ]I think it's insane to risk killing someone over a few rolls of wire. Here in CT, a little girl told her mom a neighbor had molested her. Mom told dad and dad went right over and shot the neighbor. Now dad is facing a long time in prison and has added even more hurt to his daughter. Vigilantism is pure self-indulgence.
These are different situations so the analogy is invalid. Unless the father saw the neighbor molesting his daughter he was making a decision on hearsay, which is notoriously unreliable. I would agree that unless someone is guilty beyond all reasonable doubt no action should be taken until a further investigation can be made.
However, in the story linked in the OP the thief was clearly observed steeling the materials. I'm not sure how you can argue that he was innocent when he was actually caught in the act of stealing. Note also that our 'vigilante' did not attempt to harm the perpetrator. It seems clear that his purpose was to detain the thief. He did not get in his car and attempt to run the guy down; he simply cut him off. Your presentation of this situation is a
strawman argument.
The thief broke the law. I'm not sure why so many insist he should still have rights when he has committed a crime, willingly given up his rights, and is in the process of attempting to flee justice.
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]But the question is, does running over some guy who was probably out of his skull do you any good?
Perhaps.
Our justice system relied almost 100% on negative reinforcement and the threat of such to function. There is a direct relationship between the severity of laws and the rights of self and home defense and the amount of crime in an area. Where the populace is allowed to carry weapons to defend themselves and are allowed leeway to use those weapons the crime rate drops considerably. In other words, allowing a criminal's life to be placed in jeopardy reduces the number of innocents placed in jeopardy in future crimes. The question becomes: Do we allow a thief's life to be placed in jeopardy if it means several innocent lives will not? In most situations I would take that as an axiom.
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]Call the cops as you follow the guy so you can tell them where he is, you don't gain anything of of running him off the road.
I would agree that this would probably be the optimal solution, and I have already considered my reaction to these situations and decided this is exactly what I would do. Follow while reporting the thief's progress on a 911 call. However, I've noticed that few other people take the time to determine the best solution to situations like this; this guy probably didn't think a bit about what he would do until the situation was upon him. I would say he kept his cool rather well and handled the situation in a reasonable way, considering.
Again, I have to point out that this characterization is a straw man. He did not 'run him off the road', but merely cut him off. We do not know all the details of the situation, but I find it unlikely that someone riding a bike could not dismount without injury if impact with a stationary object was imminent. Further, I find it unlikely that the thief was not warned or commended to stop before this took place. He made a conscious decision to risk injury.