Is a Laser deadly force?

There is a word not much used in modern parlance, it is "maim." Which is to cause permanent, debilitating injury.

It's an old concept, and one that ought to have established law behind it.

If a person meant to chop off your hand, but not kill you with a machete, how should that be defended against? Or, closer to the point, if a person engaged in fisticuffs with an intent to win by gouging out your eye--but not kill you, what response is appropriate?
On the latter, eye-gouging used to be a common way to settle streetfights, ought to be plenty of precedents in trial law to cite.
The laser is just a newer, technological, means to the end. And one with far more stand-off than using a sap or blackjack.

As a guess, the threat of being maimed is sufficient justification. The problematic question is more about distance. Are you justified in taking a low margin 50m pistol shot to prevent maiming? Or a 100m carbine shot? You are at risk at those distances (presuming the guilty party is able to discriminate targets at those ranges--which they may well be--and how would you know).
In military service, under LOAC you can retaliate with all the reasonable resources to hand--war crimes are like that.
John Quincy Deaux does not have that luxury, but could be at that level of risk.

RetiredUSNChief said:

For Class IV lasers, even the briefest of exposures will cause permanent eye damage. You cannot blink fast enough to avoid that damage, much less turn your head or raise a hand in time to avoid it.

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Class IV lasers are not in common use with civilians. Even my PEQ-15 had a safety nut to prevent the dangerous output settings. IV is nothing to mess around with.

If some one puts a laser on deployed army or marine assets they will pop some Willey Pete, return fire and seek concealment.
Because the enemy is either laser ranging them or about to send a laser guided device to them.
I wouldn't disapprove of WP on rioters but it would make for some really bad press. They would stop rioting for sure. I bet the crowd would be happy to the finger the guys with the lasers who got them WP'ed.
Next best thing, probably lots of marine signal smoke?

herrwalther said:

Class IV lasers are not in common use with civilians. Even my PEQ-15 had a safety nut to prevent the dangerous output settings. IV is nothing to mess around with.

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But there are no proscriptions against "common civilians", and they've become readily available and affordable over the last decade or so, ever since high output solid state LED lasers have come out. I have two, myself, specifically bought because they are cool looking light sabers in appearance.

I submit they're more common that you give them credit for.

I'll be buyng more as I see power output going up and affordable pricing becoming available.

As I said before, I have two Class IV lasers in the 1,000 mW and 2,000 mW range. They're considerably cheaper now than when I bought them a few years ago. More powerful lasers are available now at the prices I first paid...and anybody can order them on line. And I'll wager some of the people flashing lasers at people in these protests are using Class IV lasers.

I'm drifting on the rape issue in this thread, as it's not in line with the topic of lasers and deadly force.

But any instance of assault and is of force in response has to stand on its own merits. I stated that before. And rape IS an act of violence (assault) upon another, the outcome of which MAY be as deadly as any other act of violence depending on the circumstances.

Just as "simple assault" may not warrant the use of deadly force based on the specific circumstances of the incident, rape may likewise not warrant the use of deadly force.

But then, the opposite is also true as well.

Anyway... I'll leave this as my last posting on the matter. If someone wants to discuss it further, PM me or start another deadly force thread where it's more appropriate.

How many people here have had a laser pointed at them? I think most people know that they can be blinded by a laser if it's shined in their eyes.

I've had it done to me at work, this while operating a train/locomotive. If I had a firearm with me, I would've shot the person for doing it!

Think about what could've happened, think about it if it was you driving your car.

I know the rape part of this isn't or didn't start out in the thread. Seeing how it has popped up a few times, here's how I feel about it.

Any and all rapists should be shot, whether it's during or after. Rape of a female or male has to be the most vile and disgusting thing that one person can do to another. It's also not about sex, it's about power/control over another person.

The person that's the victim definitely has the right to shoot the attacker. Im sure that they're thinking they're going to be killed. Likewise, if you came upon someone raping another person, you would probably think that your life is in danger also. That would give you the right to defend yourself and defend the other person.

I have. In summer of 2015 I was just driving along highway 70 in texas near a little town called matador and some one somewhere lit up the back of my car with an incredibly bright green light. I got out of there as fast as my wife's turbo VW would go.

It seems to me that some firearm owners have a propensity to ask the question, "May I shoot it?" For law enforcement responding to riot-type situations where they have reason to believe a laser weapon could be used, there is a simple technological solution. Lasers are technologically limited to a narrow bandwidth of electromagnetic radiation. What's more, powerful lasers are even more limited with respect to what wavelengths are practical for a portable weapon. Therefore it should be fairly straightforward to filter that portion of the spectrum while allowing most visible light to pass. There's no need for a "welder's helmet" type shield. Only the laser's narrow band of wavelengths need to be blocked. Glasses, eye-shields, goggles, or visors that block the most common high-powered laser frequencies while letting other frequencies pass would not hinder vision even in low-light situations at night, but they would be very effective at blocking blinding laser light.

At some level of power, plastic filters are going to succumb to heat, but this is not a concern at present with 1W, 2W, or 3.5W lasers that are pocketable and sell for a few hundred dollars. Penal codes are quite likely to already contain statutes that prohibit their malicious use, so anyone using one criminally can expect to be prosecuted. They could only melt though plastic filters after many seconds of sustained aim which is not practical without a very sophisticated guidance and tracking system. So I do think that laser eye protection is an important part of riot response gear for law enforcement, but the civilian who witnesses someone playing with a laser would be ill-advised to gun them down or blow them away on the premise that the laser might have hit their eye.

There are more powerful lasers for sure, but I don't think they are practically portable, generally affordable, and they would be regulated as destructive devices similar to explosives. A few months ago, the Navy tested a 60kW system on the USS Portland and they burned down a drone. They're testing even more powerful lasers than that on ships with greater power generation capabilities. These are not the lasers civilians downtown need to be concerned about, at least not until you hear Cyberdyne Systems is introducing a new model.

RetiredUSNChief said:

I submit they're more common that you give them credit for.

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Most likely. It is semantics really. Class IV are more available. And even if they weren't, 3R and 3B are enough to cause eye damage. And I don't think those folk shining lasers in officer's eyes in Portland were using glorified cat toys Class I/II.

Since the drift (doesn't it always happen, a little) has ebbed from rape isn't rape to flow, ''WillyPete-rounds complete. ''

BTT / Back to Topic...Are there any glasses precautions that can passively guard against laser threats? Such as, looks like a great pair of sunglasses, and they are, they have an XYZ layer/composition that guards against laser blasters, photon torpedoes, hybrid missiles, other space weapons

During the Cold War, US pilots carrying nuclear weapons were issued special eye protection intended to prevent eye injury from seeing a nuclear explosion. Bomber pilots had special rapid-blacking high-tech goggles like these, This Is What USAF Bomber Pilots Would Wear During a Nuclear Apocalypse.
But for fighter pilots, "To mitigate this, pilots were issued eye patches to cover one eye, to have one functional if the other was blinded by the flash" (The One-Way Nuclear Mission). When I was a kid, dad brought a few of these simple eye patches home. They were a hard material, glossy white on the outside and black on the inside, with foam strip around the inner edge for good seal around the eye, and an elastic cord to wear it. Even today, these simple patches could be mass produced at very low cost. (I have seen unconfirmed reports on the web that the patches later had gold lining to further block the radiation.)
Maybe it is time for LEOs on crowd control / riot duty to have one eye protected with these patches.

I'm pretty sure the military solved this problem like in the 1990s and we see the civilian technology manifested in the form of transition lenses.

DoubleMag said:

Since the drift (doesn't it always happen, a little) has ebbed from rape isn't rape to flow, ''WillyPete-rounds complete. ''

BTT / Back to Topic...Are there any glasses precautions that can passively guard against laser threats? Such as, looks like a great pair of sunglasses, and they are, they have an XYZ layer/composition that guards against laser blasters, photon torpedoes, hybrid missiles, other space weapons

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The short answer to your question is "yes".

But the longer answer is that they don't provide total protection against all laser frequencies available.

Class IV lasers come in a variety of wavelengths, visible and invisible. What works well for blue/violet (360 to 480 nm) won't work well for IR (700 nm to 1mm). Lasers in red, green, blue, violet, and IR are readily available.

Then you've got to realize that the laser protection against a given wavelength isn't total. So a high powered laser may still result in enough light being transmitted through the lenses to cause eye damage. Lenses which are designed to protect against multiple wavelengths will have varying light transmission characteristics for each.

They will all affect visibility to some extent, just like regular sunglasses will. Some more than others.

Here are a few cool sites to read up on the matter:

https://www.lasersafety.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/LaserSafetyGuide.pdf

https://www.thorlabs.com/newgrouppa...0r9f8tDevTVHrvm4JbxGZ1XAEcZRMAYBoC-vYQAvD_BwE

https://lasersafetyindustries.com/laser-safety-buyers-guide/how-to-choose-your-laser-safety-glasses/

I have trained with and used a soft tissue surgical laser that is not visible spectrum (and only 3.0 watts). It is slaved to a class 1 visible laser for aiming purposes. Everyone in the room, including the patient, is required to wear filtered safety glasses provided by the manufacturer, and the operatory door must remain closed. The danger is that the invisible beam can be reflected off of metal or glass, and cause instant, permanent retinal burns (blind spots) that would not be noticed until it is too late. Needless to say it was used with great caution. I would not feel inclined to play around with someone who was trying to permanently blind me.

I read that the initial laser used on faceted disco balls were blinding folks. Thus banned. Brings up an interesting point, does the 2nd Amendment cover lasers as 'arms'?

Would a ban cover the laser sights on guns? Some are green as you know.

in my experience a laser dot on anything means a gun is pointed there also. act accordingly. but if in the hands of a storm trooper you're probably safe from getting injured.

Unfortunately, we have kids pointed lasers as I posted before. Act accordingly is not a really useful decision point. It might be true in a war zone but in our non military areas?

When my daughter was a little girl, I bought her a realistic Beretta 92 electric water gun. It was really neat. We used to chase each other around the front yard with it. Glad someone didn't shoot me dead (or her).

People keep saying this class or that class of lasers - commercially available lasers have been hacked to up their output, the process for doing so has also been widely distributed across the internet, you can watch the YouTube videos. The hack usually changes the frequency of the laser. Sure, you need a power source, but if you only want a few seconds at a time, batteries will do. Even the laser pointers and gun mounted laser sights have warnings on them.

As far as police go, they should have protective eyewear available, and designated officers with laser pointers to paint the rioters to deter them from this crap, at a minimum.

It's just about like stealing a taser from a cop & shooting him with it. Is that deadly force? But if then you take his gun away while he is incapacitated & shooting him with it would be.

instead of blinding someone with a laser how about throwing acid in their face? is that worth a few chunks of lead to the mid section?

You have a large crowd of folks and a few with lasers, opening fire into a crowd will not be acceptable to the general public when innocents are shot. Just being in a crowd does not make you a justifiable target.