I wonder what the chances are that if I need to use my gun that they try to prosecute me?
There is
absolutely no way to answer this question meaningfully. If you had a fullblown scenario and could provide all the details and the information about the prosecutions in your area and the law where you are then it might be possible for someone to spend a lot of time and maybe come back with a reasonable estimate. What you're asking for is a guess based on nothing at all. There can't be an useful answer.
I mean, if it’s clear cut SD...
I gave you an idealized scenario of clear cut self-defense. It took place in the defender's own home, the person was badly injured and had a completely clear criminal record, couldn't be expected to physically resist the attack, the criminals clearly broke in, had long felony records, there were multiple attackers, all armed, there was no hint that the defender was looking for trouble, etc., etc.
If you start changing the circumstances, then things become less and less clear cut. Take it out of your house and maybe there's the possibility of asking why you were there in the first place or why you didn't just run away. Make it one unarmed attacker and you a physically capable adult male, that opens the question of why you didn't just resist physically. Make the attackers kids with no prior criminal records it gets more complicated. Throw in some stupid from the legal system in your area (see
THIS thread) and who knows what could happen.
Self-defense is there as an absolute last resort. That's how it's set up in the legal system, and that's how it's going to be viewed by the system and those who operate it. Generally speaking, the system is going to want to make sure that it really was an absolute last resort, of course taking account any special legal protections that the region may have provided to provide additional protection to self-defenders (Stand Your Ground, Castle Doctrine, etc.). In some places, you MUST be arrested after shooting someone, there MUST be an investigation. The investigation is NOT going to be an attempt to prove that you are innocent, that's not how the legal system works. I'm not saying that cops are out to get you or the legal system is there to persecute you, but the bottom line is that the legal system isn't set up to go around proving people innocent. It's there to either prove that someone is guilty or fail in the attempt. Failing could mean an acquittal, it could be a failure to indict, it could be that it's not possible to make a case against the person based on the available evidence.
What you are doing, what we ALL are doing when we choose to carry a firearm in self-defense is to play the odds. We've decided that we want the means to protect ourselves if worse comes to absolute worst. But that choice comes with a risk of being found guilty of a crime in a situation that we believe is self-defense. There are ways to mitigate that risk, but
there is no way to eliminate it. You believe that one of the means available to mitigate the risk is not available to you. That means you will either have to bear the risk, come up with some other method that you think mitigates the risk, or decide not to carry.
There simply are no magic words, or magic spell, or special knowledge that will guarantee that you will skate out of a self-defense situation without needing legal counsel.
There's a ton of information on this forum and from other sources on things a person can do to try to shade things in their favor or things a person shouldn't do that might stack the odds against them. That kind of discussion tends to infuriate those who think that it's always black or white, that it's always clear cut self-defense or else it's obviously murder and so often those discussions bog down in back-and-forth between two camps who are going into the discussion with fundamentally different assumptions and significantly disparate views of how the world (and the legal system) actually works.
But putting it all down into one place would be like writing a book (which has been done, by the way). It is a very complicated subject.
If you want a simple answer, here are some. This is not an ordered list and it is not a cohesive strategy, it is a list of things that could make it less likely a self-defense case would be prosecuted.
- Don't carry outside your home. There are generally legal protections for self-defenders inside their home that make it much harder for the state to make a case against a defender. Outside the home, there are questions that can be raised that are either easily answered or aren't asked at all if the defender is in their own home.
- Use your firearm only as an absolute last resort. By this, I mean, you want it to be immediately and blatantly obvious to everyone who witnessed the scene, looks at the evidence in the aftermath, or talks to any witness, that by the time the gun was fired all other options were off the table. Ideally this would mean that an innocent person was actually badly injured before shots were fired. You realize that I'm not saying to wait until someone gets hurt really bad before you shoot, I'm just saying that someone being hurt badly would make the case much more clear cut. Then there's no question at all about whether the attacker had means/motive/opportunity because they demonstrated all of those factors for everyone to see.
- Consider the idea that minor circumstances may seem minor but that taken together they can either strengthen or weaken a case of self-defense. A person defending their home with a lever action deer rifle is going to be viewed differently from someone who shoots another person in the parking lot of a bar at 2AM using a black plastic semi-auto pistol with a mag that sticks out 6" below the grip. That's true even if both of them have equally valid claims to self-defense. A person who looks like your average joe is going to make a very different first impression than a guy with neck tattoos and non-organically colored hair. Someone wearing a T-Shirt that says "Kill them all and let God sort them out" will be treated differently than someone who looks like they are stopping by the grocery on the way home from the office.
The general idea is that you want to think about self-defense scenarios that you might find yourself in from the perspective of the legal system and you will want to think about what possible questions might arise. Then you want all those questions to have extremely obvious answers that all make it clear that the situation was self-defense. This idea of thinking about things from another perspective is nearly impossible for some people. Other people can do it but choose not to because the idea of it makes them angry.
Here's an incomplete list of questions that might be asked. In these the "person" refers to the person claiming self-defense.
Why was the person there in the first place?
Why didn't the person leave when things started going south?
Why did the person have a gun with them at the time?
Was the firearm involved in the incident legally owned?
Was the firearm involved in the incident a legal firearm?
Was the ammunition involved in the incident legal to possess?
Was the person carrying the firearm legally?
Why was the person uninjured if the threat was so severe?
What evidence besides the person's word (or the word of their spouse/child/girlfriend/boyfriend) is there to support the idea that there was deadly danger?
How did the person know that a deadly threat existed?
Has the person made statements in the past (verbally, in writing, or on social media) that suggest they are prone to violence?
Was the person wearing clothing or sporting tattoos that suggested a propensity to violence?
Does the person have a criminal record?
Was the person breaking any laws at the time of the encounter?
Had the person broken any laws leading up to the encounter?
Did the person initiate the encounter?
Was there bad blood between the persons involved?
Could the claim of self-defense be to cover up an accidental shooting?
Has the person ever been involved in an accidental shooting in the past?
How did the person behave after the incident? Did they indicate they wanted to cooperate or were they uncooperative?
Did the person try to leave the scene after the incident?
Why didn't the person use non-violent/non-lethal means to resolve the incident?
