Criminal Defenses and Criminal Punishments - Term Paper Example

The Supreme Court in one-way support the police use of force, the court stated “the calculus of the reasonableness must embody allowance for the fact that police officers are often forced to make split-second judgments- in circumstances that are tense, uncertain, and rapidly involving- about the amount of force that is necessary for a particular situation.”(Supreme Court, n.d.). When officers are pursuing criminals are outnumbered, or suspects have more powerful weapons than they do, force is justified (Sharrar, 1992).

Deadly force is used when the suspect threatens an officer or officers with deadly weapon, when the officer believes that the suspect might end up killing the officers in defense, force is also applied when the suspect has killed or caused deadly harm to another person. Non-lethal weapons and non-lethal skills may be used in this case. The case of Rodney King where the police used a Taser and multiple baton strikes on him was viewed as not excessive force though the public complained. Rodney king received 50 powerful blows and strikes after he resisted arrest.

The only part that excessive force was misused was when the King had complied with the commands; assumed felony prone position but was kicked by the officer and struck with a baton six times by another officer (United States V. Koon, 1993). Use of deadly weapons on fleeing criminal was abolished in 1995. Shooting of Doyle in the back was the use of excessive force, the de facto excessive force. The Castle Doctrine and “stand-your-ground” criminal defenses are the favorable defenses for individuals charged with murder cases.

Castle Doctrine is a communal law doctrine that state that a discrete person has no duty to flight when in his or her homegrown, or in his “castle,” and may use sensible strength, including lethal force, to defend his or her property, being, or other issues at hand. Outside of the “castle,” or home, however, an individual has a duty