Vandal With a Handle

(Original link via The Volokh Conspiracy)
All the way back to English common law, the right of a person to defend his own life is one of the constants. Whatever else may complicate the mix, people generally may not be condemned for stopping an assailant in the pursuit of his evil deed. In recent years, many persons, usually employed in low-paying jobs handling money for others, have been disciplined or fired for defending themselves against threatening robbers, or forbidden to carry weapons, even when otherwise legally permitted. Pizza delivery people and convenience store clerks are the most common examples. They get robbed a lot. Sometimes it is more reasonable to give up the money. Who wants to hurt somebody over $20? Or $200? Or $2000? Well, nobody, but what if they still want to hurt you after you give up the money? Three strikes laws and other mandatory sentencing guidelines make live witnesses a real problem for the robbers and people have been killed even after surrendering the cash because dead men tell no tales. Nobody should have to risk facing deadly threats undefended for any job. Here's the Vandal's Way-to-Go Award for the WV Supreme court in Feliciano v. 7-Eleven, No. 29564 where they decide in favor of an employee terminated for defending himself against a deadly attack. The defendant was represented by the Martinsburg office of Bowles, Rice, McDavid, Graff and Love. The question centered also on the WV principle of at-will employment, which means that unless there is an employment contract, either party can end the relationship at any time for any reason or no reason. There have been limits placed on the principle. For instance employers have been successfully sued for firing in retribution for standing for something of compelling public interest:

The rule that an employer has an absolute right to discharge an at will employee must be tempered by the principle that where the employer's motivation for the discharge is to contravene some substantial public policy princip[le], then the employer may be liable to the employee for damages occasioned by this discharge.
Syl., Harless v. First Nat'l Bank in Fairmont, 162 W. Va. 116, 246 S.E.2d 270 (1978). This exception to the at will employment doctrine recognizes that, in spite of the right of employers to terminate their employees, “'[o]ne of the fundamental rights of an employee is the right not to be the victim of a “retaliatory discharge,” that is, a discharge from employment where the employer's motivation for the discharge is in contravention of a substantial public policy[.]'” Kanagy, 208 W. Va. at 530, 541 S.E.2d at 620 (quoting McClung v. Marion County Comm'n, 178 W. Va. 444, 450, 360 S.E.2d 221, 227 (1987) (quotation and citation omitted)).

So, the question for the court was, "Is self-defense a matter of substantial public policy? Finding that it wasn't explicit in the state constitution or a law anywhere, they referred to their own prior decisions:

[w]hen one without fault himself is attacked by another in such a manner or under such circumstances as to furnish reasonable grounds for apprehending a design to take away his life, or to do him some great bodily harm, and there is reasonable grounds for believing the danger imminent, that such design will be accomplished, and the person assaulted has reasonable ground to believe, and does believe, such danger is imminent, he may act upon such appearances and without retreating, kill his assailant, if he has reasonable grounds to believe, and does believe, that such killing is necessary in order to avoid the apparent danger; and the killing under such circumstances is excusable, although it may afterwards turn out, that the appearances were false, and that there was in fact neither design to do him some serious injury nor danger, that it would be done. But of all this the jury must judge from all the evidence and circumstances of the case.
Syl. pt. 7, State v. Cain, 20 W. Va. 679 (1882) . More recently, we have similarly observed that

[s]elf-defense is generally defined as follows:


[A] defendant who is not the aggressor and has reasonable grounds to believe, and actually does believe, that he is in imminent danger of death or serious bodily harm from which he could save himself only by using deadly force against his assailant has the right to employ deadly force in order to defend himself.
State v. Hughes, 197 W. Va. 518, 524, 476 S.E.2d 189, 195 (1996) (quoting State v. W.J.B., 166 W. Va. 602, 606, 276 S.E.2d 550, 553 (1981) (citations omitted)). (See footnote 6) In the course of rendering these rulings, we have also clarified the essential elements of this offense. (See footnote 7)

and decided with only Mr. Maynard dissenting that

In conclusion, we answer the question certified by the United States District Court for the Northern District of West Virginia in the affirmative, but with limitation. Thus, the right of self-defense in response to lethal imminent danger is a substantial public policy exception to the at will employment doctrine and will support a cause of action for wrongful discharge. An aggrieved employer may then rebut the presumption of a wrongful discharge by demonstrating that it had a plausible and legitimate business reason for terminating its employee.

Leaving in doubt only one issue: What WAS Mr. Maynard thinking?