VA law question: criminal hurt, can he sue?
Posted: Mon, 05 Feb 2018 12:31:45
Can someone sue if they are hurt while committing a felony here in Virginia?
Some years ago there was a case, somewhere in the US, in which a burglar gained access into a restaurant by crawling down a ventilation duct. He fell into a HOT deep fat fryer and was seriously burned spent quite some time in pain in hospital.
He sued the restaurant for damages.
Cases like this, where someone gets hurt or killed during the commission of a crime and then sues the owner of the target of the crime for damages, that causes the Ohio legislature to modify their tort law to prevent this.
The legalese is somewhat hard to follow but here's a link to the Ohio state law I'm talking about.
http://codes.ohio.gov/orc/2307.60
The interesting passages are after (B) (2)
"(2) Recovery on a claim for relief in a tort action is barred to any person or the person's legal representative if any of the following apply:"
Essentially, if someone is hurt or killed while in the process of committing a felony or a misdemeanor that is an offense of violence they are forbidden by law to sue anyone.
This includes them, their heirs, relatives, or any other representative of them or their estate.
And the wording is such that it includes persons that WOULD have been found guilty if they had survived.
What's interesting is that this was that the gun community in Ohio wasn't really aware that this change was in the works until the change in law was passed. It was a change in tort law, we were worried about concealed carry and no gun zones, so who cared?
Well, it turns out that that simple change took a hell of a lot of worry out of whether or not to protect yourself with deadly force. Granted, you could still be indicted if you used your gun inappropriately but if it was found to be a good shoot. No one could sue you.
Now for my question. Does something like this exist in Virginia law?
Some years ago there was a case, somewhere in the US, in which a burglar gained access into a restaurant by crawling down a ventilation duct. He fell into a HOT deep fat fryer and was seriously burned spent quite some time in pain in hospital.
He sued the restaurant for damages.
Cases like this, where someone gets hurt or killed during the commission of a crime and then sues the owner of the target of the crime for damages, that causes the Ohio legislature to modify their tort law to prevent this.
The legalese is somewhat hard to follow but here's a link to the Ohio state law I'm talking about.
http://codes.ohio.gov/orc/2307.60
The interesting passages are after (B) (2)
"(2) Recovery on a claim for relief in a tort action is barred to any person or the person's legal representative if any of the following apply:"
Essentially, if someone is hurt or killed while in the process of committing a felony or a misdemeanor that is an offense of violence they are forbidden by law to sue anyone.
This includes them, their heirs, relatives, or any other representative of them or their estate.
And the wording is such that it includes persons that WOULD have been found guilty if they had survived.
What's interesting is that this was that the gun community in Ohio wasn't really aware that this change was in the works until the change in law was passed. It was a change in tort law, we were worried about concealed carry and no gun zones, so who cared?
Well, it turns out that that simple change took a hell of a lot of worry out of whether or not to protect yourself with deadly force. Granted, you could still be indicted if you used your gun inappropriately but if it was found to be a good shoot. No one could sue you.
Now for my question. Does something like this exist in Virginia law?
