Does fleeing across the county line actually work for the Dukes of Hazzard? A common feature on that old Dukes of Hazzard show was the idea that once them good old Duke boys crossed the county line, they'd be safe from the mean old sheriff and his deputy. Under what circumstances, if any, would that actually work? Answers focusing on 1970s America are welcome, but so are insights into other times and places.
It would not work. There is apparently a common misconception in Georgia that this would be the case, based on Article IX, Section II, Paragraph III (b)(1) of the Georgia constitution, which says: No county may exercise any of the powers listed in subparagraph (a) of this Paragraph [including police protection] or provide any service listed therein inside the boundaries of any municipality or any other county except by contract with the municipality or county affected. What many people miss is the clause right before that: "Unless otherwise provided by law." Georgia courts have held that the law does provide otherwise when pursuing someone for a traffic offense: The plaintiff contends that when the collision occurred, the policeman-deputy sheriff had no authority to be pursuing the Mitchell car because he was outside the county in which he had a power of arrest. While ordinarily a peace officer has power of arrest only in the territory of the governmental unit by which he was appointed, there are two exceptions to the rule present in this case. Code Ann. s 92A-509, which deals with arrests for traffic offenses, provides by implication that certain officers (including deputy sheriffs) have arrest powers for these offenses outside their appointed territories. City of Winterville v. Strickland, 127 Ga. App. 716, 718, 194 S.E.2d 623, 625 (1972). What that case decided in 1972, the principle was in place well before the boys began their hijinks. I don't know of any state where the law is different, though the answer would be different if the boys crossed into another state.
You can start here, with the attractive nuisance doctrine, which is aimed at children and the fact that they don't have adult common sense. The extent to which you are at risk depends on your jurisdiction. However, a fence does not necessarily protect you, because children can find a way to get around a fence, instead you need to eliminate the risk (so you also have to identify the risk). This article reviews some of the outcomes in attractive nuisance cases: there is no simple rule like "put up a fence and you're safe". Insurance is more predictable, as long as you read the fine print.
The deputies have standing, but they're probably going to lose. &quot;Standing&quot; is just a legal principle that limits the legal process to people who have suffered certain types of injuries. Jen's answer offers a good explanation of why the answer is yes, they do have standing. But I assume you're less interested in whether the officers are capable of bringing the case than in whether their case is likely to succeed. The answer to that is no. Claim 1 alleges a violation of Ohio's right-of-publicity statute. But that statute includes a carveout for any &quot;use of the persona of an individual that is protected by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution as long as the use does not convey or reasonably suggest endorsement by the individual whose persona is at issue.&quot; Ohio Rev. Code 2741.09 . So the officers lose if Afroman's videos are protected by the First Amendment. And they almost certainly are, as the assumption is that all speech is protected unless it falls into one of several very narrow categories -- incitement, defamation, fighting words, etc. -- that are pretty clearly not applicable here. Claim 2 alleges misappropriation of persona. This claim strikes me as the strongest, but probably still pretty weak. To win this claim, the deputies must prove: that Afroman appropriated to his own use or benefit the reputation, prestige, social or commercial standing, public interest or other values of their name or likeness; that their names or likenesses have some intrinsic value; and that that value was taken by defendant for its own benefit, commercial or otherwise. Jackson v. Playboy Enters., Inc., 574 F. Supp. 10, 13 (S.D. Ohio 1983). See also Zacchini v. Scripps-Howard Broad. Co., 433 U.S. 562, 576 (1977) (&quot;No social purpose is served by having the defendant get free some aspect of the plaintiff that would have market value and for which he would normally pay.&quot;). It seems like it will be difficult to argue that the deputies' names or likenesses have any intrinsic value on which to premise damages. If the idea of this tort is to give the plaintiff the benefit of the commercial value of the misapporpriation, the court must evaluate whether there's any commercial value to the use of the deputies' names or images. Are these deputies moonlighting as models? Would they have licensed the use of their likenesses if Afroman had so requested? It seems unlikely. Instead, the value of using them in these contexts arises only from their connection with a newsworthy event on which Afroman wishes to comment. That seems to move us out of privacy territory and into protected speech territory, which means Claim 2 should fail. Claim 3 alleges false-light invasion of privacy. To win this claim, the deputies must prove: that Afroman gives publicity to a matter concerning them; that the publicity placed the deputies before the public in a false light; that the false light in which the other was placed would be highly offensive to a reasonable person; and that Afroman acted with actual malice. Welling v. Weinfeld, 113 Ohio St. 3d 464, 473 (2007). The complaint does not identify any statements Afroman made that were false or that placed the deputies in a false light before the public. The only things I can see as possibly &quot;false&quot; are the hyperbolic statements mocking the police officers, such as those suggesting that a female deputy is actually a man because her voice was &quot;three octaves lower&quot; than his, or his suggestions that the police are members of the KKK. Without something more substantial that reasonable people would have been likely to truly believe was true, this claim is likely to fail also, as hyperbole and opinion are generally protected under the First Amendment. Vail v. the Plain Dealer Publishing Co., 72 Ohio St. 3d 279, 283 (Ohio 1995) (“The ordinary reader would accept this column as opinion and not as fact. Therefore, the statements are protected.”). Claim 4 alleges unreasonable publicity given to private lives. To win this claim, the deputies must prove: there is publicity; the facts disclosed concern an individual's private life; the matter publicized was one that would be highly offensive and objectionable to a reasonable person of ordinary sensibilities; the publication was made intentionally, rather than negligently; and the matter publicized was of no legitimate concern to the public. Cox v. Hausmann, No. 3:17-cv-02420, 2020 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 181458, at *33 (N.D. Ohio Sep. 30, 2020). From my review of the complaint and some of Afroman's media, it doesn't look like Afroman has publicized any facts that are subject to a legitimate claim of privacy. Instead, Afroman has published video of government officials, engaged in the work of government, and commented on those videos. Those are matters about the deputies' public lives, not private, and the conduct of police is of legitimate concern to the public. Claim 4 should therefore also fail. It seems more likely that this case was brought to intimidate Afroman or to create some kind of leverage in the civil-rights claim Afroman will probably be bringing based on potential violations of his Fourth Amendment rights. If this is correct, the deputies will be lucky to have the case simply dismissed. Sanctions and an abuse-of-process counterclaim are more likely.
Calls to 911 are treated as genuine at all times until the complaint is dealt with. This is because most people only call 911 for legitimate reasons and even some criminals call 911 because they want them to know the situation (Bomb scares are an extreme version of this as they cause a lot of disruption; they cannot be ignored because if the cops were to call bullshit and it was proven not to be bullshit, it's gonna be a lot worse than if they treat it as real and find out it's an alarm clock.). From the point of view of the first responders, whether cops, fire, or EMS, the call is always real and to be treated as such. Entering without warrant is legit if they have a probable cause of a crime or a person in distress, such as a hostage or a person in medical need; the emergency call is almost certainly sufficient. As you correctly said, at this point any evidence of a crime in plain sight is good reason to pursue the criminal acts unrelated to the original call. 911 calls are recorded so they can prove to the courts they got a tip and were following up. However, tying up emergency services with fake crimes is still not a proper use of 911 and there are ways to find people making bogus calls. 911 also traces phone calls in case of prank callers or even generally locating people in distress (if the dispatcher has to tell someone who is hiding from robbers in her house to be quiet, they can still dispatch officers to the general area by pinging the phone's metadata) so a string of burners will be noticed. Burner numbers can be traced to point of sale and most stores that carry them will have cameras (staff that remembers, not so much). If using pay phones, in this day and age, again there is likely cameras because the frequency of the latter and the infrequency of the former. Phone Booths haven't been a thing for far longer, so much so that the Christopher Reeves Superman film had a famous gag about how Phone Booths were phased out, when Clark Kent, needing to switch to his iconic Persona, runs to a bank of payphones (all without booths) and desperately looks for a new place to shed his clothes... in the 1970s. Either way, cops would be looking for nearby cameras to identify you and without many pay phones reliably lying around it won't take long. The more dangerous aspect of this is that drugs and organized crime are pretty much hand in hand. It could be the crack house you just called in is well known to the cops, but they're trying to use it to find out who the supplier is. The vigilante could be ruining their sting by calling in a true threat. If he does this too much, the local gang members will be looking out for him and may try to find him too; and whereas the police have rules, the gangs do not.
Sometimes running away is a juvenile offense, but it is not an offense for which an adult aged eighteen or over would be arrested or punished. An adult would not be returned home.
There is pretty much never a right to retaliate against harm to oneself, even blatantly unlawful harm. There is a right to defend oneself and others. One can use force to stop someone from inflicting unlawful or unjustified harm, or to prevent someone from inflicting such harm when the harm is imminent. One is not permitted to use more force than is "reasonably required" under the actual circumstances. This is true in pretty much every jurisdiction that i know of. The details on how much force will be considered "reasonable" will vary. In some jurisdictions there is, under some circumstances, a s"duty to retreat". This generally means that if a person attacked can avoid the harm by fleeing with reasonable safety, that person must do so rather than using force in self-defense. In some jurisdictions this "duty to retreat" applies id the victim is attacked in public, but not in the victim's own home. The right to self defense does not apply when the "attacker" is an agent of the state acting lawfully. For example, a prison guard taking a condemned prisoner to a death sentence cannot be attacked on the grounds that the prisoner is engaging in self defense. In theory a police officer engaging an excessive force, particularly unjustified deadly force, may be resisted in self-defense. But courts are quite reluctant to find such resistance justified in practice. There generally must be very clear evidence of egregious misconduct for the court to rule for the non-police person in such a case. Note that "self" defense can equally be defense of another person. Pretty much all the same rules apply. Self defense applies no matter who the attacker is, but that force is reasonable may vary depending on the attacker. Only such force as is reasonably required to stop or prevent the harm may be used with a justification of self-defense.
At the federal level, per 18 USC 751, escaping is a crime. In United States v. Allen, 432 F.2d 939 it was held that an arrest need not be lawful in order for an escape to be illegal; Laws v. US states that "This court has said that a sentence imposed for a violation of 18 U.S.C. § 751 is 'not affected by the validity of the sentences being served at the time of the escape'", giving numerous citations. I don't find cases where the escapee was exonerated; prosecutors have the discretion to not prosecute for committing a crime, so it would be hard to find a case where the legality of such a conviction was upheld (also, hard to find a jury willing to convict in such circumstances).
None of the factors you list about Charlie committing a crime, about to commit a crime* or being responsible for the officer's injury apply to whether or not Bob can shoot Charlie on behalf of the officer. On the other hand, if Charlie's actions lead Bob to the reasonable belief that Charlie represents an imminent threat of death or grave bodily injury to anyone then Bob will be justified in using force, including deadly force, to stop Charlie. I'm aware of many states that also allow the use of deadly force to prevent the imminent commission of a forcible felony. A normal citizen can go to great lengths to assist the police and stories of citizens coming to the aid of police officers are easily found. There may be some reason the police officer felt the need to use deadly force against Charlie. Bob will need to make his own determination based on all the factors available to him, which may include communication from the officer. If Bob decides to shoot Charlie then an investigation will center on whether it was reasonable for Bob to deduce that the use of deadly force was justified given the information available to Bob at the time. Some states have laws that penalize refusal to aid a police officer. A list of them can be found on this wikipedia page. Notably, California just repealed their statute requiring assistance. *The statutes of some states allow the use of deadly force to prevent the commission of felonies, typically forcible felonies. However, just because a crime is listed as a forcible felony doesn't always mean that deadly force can be used to stop the crime. An example comes from Florida where the statutes state that deadly force can be used to stop forcible felonies, the statutes also define burglary as a forcible felony. However, the courts have ruled that the use of such force is not reasonable where the structure being burglarized is unoccupied.