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Hallowindow III
shmokes:
And again, it's all about the apprehension of offensive contact. A kid at a parade expects to have candy thrown at him. That's what he's there for. That's what he's prepared for. If you come run out of your house and start unexpectedly firing candy at kids from some strange contraption the question becomes whether a reasonable person would expect this to cause another reasonable person to apprehend harmful or offensive contact.
Of course this is all academic. A judge may well roll his eyes and dismiss the case as lacking merits, in spite of the technical validity of such an assault claim. Or maybe as I mentioned before, the law would be technically respected, but the absurdity of the claim is also acknowledge with nominal damages like $1 being awarded which not only doesn't cover the "victim's" lawyer fees, but doesn't even come close to covering basic court costs like filing fees. The reality is that it's prohibitively expensive. Nobody would actually sue you for this except an independently wealthy person who really ---smurfing--- hates you. God knows a lawyer would never take the case on a contingency agreement cos he would never be paid. Nothing to fuss over.
ChadTower:
--- Quote from: shmokes on October 14, 2009, 11:31:33 am ---That's what he's there for.
--- End quote ---
Trick or Treating.
--- Quote ---That's what he's prepared for.
--- End quote ---
Costume. Bag. Entering someone else's property on the assumption that they are welcome.
--- Quote ---If you come run out of your house and start unexpectedly firing candy at kids from some strange contraption the question becomes whether a reasonable person would expect this to cause another reasonable person to apprehend harmful or offensive contact.
--- End quote ---
Halloween.
shardian:
Lawyers - they take all the fun out of hypothetical situations. ;)
Oh, and I also thought about mentioning the parades. Some of the local ones still do candy. Last year, we went to one that had so much candy that even kids stopped picking it up after a while.
And yeah, some of those little league kids like to throw the candy hard.
shmokes:
--- Quote from: ChadTower on October 14, 2009, 12:49:40 pm ---
--- Quote from: shmokes on October 14, 2009, 11:31:33 am ---That's what he's there for.
--- End quote ---
Trick or Treating.
--- Quote ---That's what he's prepared for.
--- End quote ---
Costume. Bag. Entering someone else's property on the assumption that they are welcome.
--- Quote ---If you come run out of your house and start unexpectedly firing candy at kids from some strange contraption the question becomes whether a reasonable person would expect this to cause another reasonable person to apprehend harmful or offensive contact.
--- End quote ---
Halloween.
--- End quote ---
These are, of course, your legal arguments. You're either convincing or not. But the other side would do a lot of theatrics and eye rolling, asking whether a reasonable kid expects to have candy converted into projectiles and fired at them from some kind of device when they knock on the door and hold out their bags for candy. They would be rather persuasive arguments. I think the majority of people would, in fact, be rather surprised by this behavior. Again, I only mean that it's very likely a technical assault, not that you shouldn't do it. I think you most definitely should do this. And it would almost certainly be fun and consequence free.
ChadTower:
Yeah. And OTOH, it's Halloween, and people jumping out from around corners with hockey masks is not unusual. Especially on their own property.
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