[ArtK78]

There are laws that hold tavern keepers liable if their customers drive drunk and the tavern keeper served the customers alcohol when the customers were visibly drunk. Not criminally liable, but civilly liable. So it is not an urban myth.

[Cyberyeti]

ArtK78, on 2013-July-31, 14:08, said:

There are laws that hold tavern keepers liable if their customers drive drunk and the tavern keeper served the customers alcohol when the customers were visibly drunk. Not criminally liable, but civilly liable. So it is not an urban myth.

In the UK, you lose your licence to serve alcohol for that.

[mike777]

Times change.

I am old enough to remember the old

"STop or I will shoot!"

now they would get fired/sued and go to jail for doing that.

now the cops often have to make a split second decision or as MikeH says get sued.

as for bars getting sued I am amazed more don't get sued.

It is becoming more and more common in many professions to expect to get sued at least once during your career.

Of course I speak as an American who sued a local car dealer in Germany when I tried to buy a car there in the 1980's and the dollar was strong.

[mikeh]

ArtK78, on 2013-July-31, 14:08, said:

There are laws that hold tavern keepers liable if their customers drive drunk and the tavern keeper served the customers alcohol when the customers were visibly drunk. Not criminally liable, but civilly liable. So it is not an urban myth.

Nobody here claimed that commercial drinking establishments were immune from civil liability for overserving so i am not sure of your point. What I pointed out was that onoway had no facts to support the claim that a drunk got off by saying his waitress over-served him. Onoway's subsequent posts don't address that issue. I don't see anyone arguing that the establishment isn't liable (tho there are reasons why the waitress might not be, but that is an entirely different and complex subject), but I know of no authority for the notion that a drunk driver can dodge HIS liability by pointing out that others are ALSO at fault.

I am an expert in the area of motor-vehicle accident litigation, at least in British Columbia. About 55% of my practice has been in that field for 35 years, and I act on a regular basis for our Provincially owned Insurance Corporation. We have, in my firm, litigated both commercial and social host liability claims, so we are very familiar with law in this area, at least in Canada outside of Quebec (which has a different philosophy of civil litigation).

[billw55]

ArtK78, on 2013-July-31, 14:08, said:

There are laws that hold tavern keepers liable if their customers drive drunk and the tavern keeper served the customers alcohol when the customers were visibly drunk. Not criminally liable, but civilly liable. So it is not an urban myth.

Yes, such laws and lawsuits are out there. They do not reduce the liability of the perpetrator, as far as I know.

I live in a major college town. Every weekend, indeed every night, when school is in session there are many drunken students out and about. The idea of bars not serving people who are visibly drunk kind of makes me laugh (in an empirical sense). Often, everyone in the bar is visibly drunk, sometimes including the servers, bouncers, etc. It can be pretty rowdy, and the sales go on right up to the legal cut off. I have yet to hear news of the bars being held responsible.

[mike777]

billw55, on 2013-July-31, 14:21, said:

Yes, such laws and lawsuits are out there. They do not reduce the liability of the perpetrator, as far as I know.

I live in a major college town. Every weekend, indeed every night, when school is in session there are many drunken students out and about. The idea of bars not serving people who are visibly drunk kind of makes me laugh (in an empirical sense). Often, everyone in the bar is visibly drunk, sometimes including the servers, bouncers, etc. It can be pretty rowdy, and the sales go on right up to the legal cut off. I have yet to hear news of the bars being held responsible.

ya one would think there would be a juicy class action lawsuit there someplace.

I do wonder how BILL knows everyone in the bar looks drunk though...unless he is in the bar. I assume he only goes there to play Pong as I did in my college town where I grew up

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PONG

[billw55]

mike777, on 2013-July-31, 14:30, said:

I do wonder how BILL knows everyone in the bar looks drunk though...unless he is in the bar.

To be strictly accurate, I am describing conditions of 20 years ago when I was enrolled, and yes sometimes visiting bars. It may be possible that my perception was influenced by my own level of consumption

Nowadays I rarely enter the area late enough at night to observe the situation. I have no reason to think much has changed though. With campus populations, it is mostly foot traffic, so drunk driving is less than you might expect .. but it still happens often.

[FM75]

Who says it is easy to deal with 70 year old male Montrealers suffering from dementia?

http://cjme.com/cont...njured-standoff

Tough city, tough geezers.

[hrothgar]

blackshoe, on 2013-July-30, 23:40, said:

An analogy was not necessarily intended as "the best" analogy.

Bolas are not easy to use.

I own some bolas.

Blackshoes is right

1. They aren't easy to use
2. One of the failure modes involves a rock the size of a baseball smacking into the target's temple

There's a reason folks developed beanbag rounds and the like...

[Cyberyeti]

hrothgar, on 2013-July-31, 14:59, said:

I own some bolas.

Blackshoes is right

1. They aren't easy to use
2. One of the failure modes involves a rock the size of a baseball smacking into the target's temple

There's a reason folks developed beanbag rounds and the like...

2. is not the worst failure mode, that's when it smashes into YOUR temple.

[FM75]

Not everything will be clear from this youtube video....

[blackshoe]

Trinidad, on 2013-July-31, 01:18, said:

Pardon me, but here you are clearly wrong. In the whole rest of the civilized world a police officer wouldn't even get the idea of drawing his gun in the situation that onoway describes (a deranged person without a fire arm). The use of guns is an American thing.
[snip]

Clearly you have some bone to pick with the United States. I don't know what your problem is, and frankly I don't care. However, you picked a bad place to air whatever it is. You see, Montreal, where the incident onoway post about occurred, is not in the United States.

[hrothgar]

Cyberyeti, on 2013-July-31, 15:10, said:

2. is not the worst failure mode, that's when it smashes into YOUR temple.

I am not what you call graceful and even I haven't pulled that one off...

[kenberg]

This appears to be a follow-up on FM's post. I assume this is a different senior citizen than the one Onoway was posting about. Don't mess with us old farts.


http://cjme.com/cont...0-hour-standoff

Lot's of action in Montreal. Must be watching too much American TV.

[mike777]

Montreal..those are the guys in rebellion vs Canada I think.

[FM75]

Trinidad, on 2013-July-31, 01:18, said:

Pardon me, but here you are clearly wrong. In the whole rest of the civilized world a police officer wouldn't even get the idea of drawing his gun in the situation that onoway describes (a deranged person without a fire arm). The use of guns is an American thing.

In America, a psychotic who forgot his pills is half dead.

...

Rik

Perhaps "the rest of the civilized world" just needs better police training (ok, likely you just have no imagination). I live in a small town, about 0.5 km from where a man of "reduced mental capacity" (factual, as it turns out, not just a guess) was shot dead by a responding policeman. The homeowner had already been critically stabbed by a knife from the homeowner's kitchen drawers, and he had 3 family members hiding upstairs. The officer shot when the suspect tried to stab the policeman.

The homeowner arrived in critical condition at the hospital (instead of dead). He survived 10+ more years, to be killed by a tree falling on him in his driveway in hurricane.

[Trinidad]

billw55, on 2013-July-31, 14:05, said:

Well, to use your phrase - that pretty much sums it up.

When I use a phrase like that, I try to quote correctly (i.e. the key of the post that I am responding to) and I will provide arguments for my point of view.

But I understand you perfectly fine: You will not be a victim of police violence because you are a good guy. Nor will you be a victim of a vigilante like yourself, because you are a good guy. I hope you are correct.

But beware: There are tons of other good guys like you who believe the exact same thing. And some of them are not correct because from time to time good guys are victims of police violence (or vigilantes).

Rik

[billw55]

Trinidad, on 2013-August-01, 07:14, said:

When I use a phrase like that, I try to quote correctly (i.e. the key of the post that I am responding to) and I will provide arguments for my point of view.

But I understand you perfectly fine: You will not be a victim of police violence because you are a good guy. Nor will you be a victim of a vigilante like yourself, because you are a good guy. I hope you are correct.

But beware: There are tons of other good guys like you who believe the exact same thing. And some of them are not correct because from time to time good guys are victims of police violence (or vigilantes).

Rik

Rik, I do respect total anti-violence as a point of view and as a goal for society. I also recognize that it is not the reality I live in. Use of force is a necessary daily event for police, at least where I am from. Indeed, if physical force were not necessary, police would barely be needed at all. And I do believe that an imminent threat of serious bodily harm or death justifies use of deadly force. In real police work, the majority of threats are not of this type, and hence deadly force is not used. In rare events, an officer acts wrongly, and this should be investigated and punished as appropriate. But for every unjustified use of deadly force, there are probably tens of thousands of routine, daily, uses of nondeadly force. These are not reported precisely because they are routine, and hence not an interesting story in the publishers' view.

Not long ago, we had a serious incident in our town. Shooting broke out at the mall. When the police arrived, they found a gunman standing over another man lying on the pavement, shooting down at him. The police fired and hit the gunman (who survived as it turned out). In such a situation, I am very glad the police have guns and the authorization to use deadly force.

[gwnn]

Yes on that extreme example we certainly agree but would you really shoot somebody because they were threatening a baby with a fork?

[billw55]

gwnn, on 2013-August-01, 08:10, said:

Yes on that extreme example we certainly agree but would you really shoot somebody because they were threatening a baby with a fork?

Certainly, if the threat was imminent (say, he had the fork to the baby's throat or similar) and if shooting was judged safe enough for the baby, considering the danger it was already in. In fact with a baby, no weapon at all is needed. If an unarmed man was threatening to kill a baby and had his hands on its throat, or was positioned to dash it on the pavement - yep, shoot him, no regrets.