Molter, J.
This is a case about a good guy with a gun shooting a bad guy with a gun when the only choices were to shoot or be shot.
Antonio Turner was one of three students studying organic chemistry at a classmate’s home, tucked away in a quiet neighborhood just outside of Indianapolis. While they were studying, the classmate’s jealous love interest, Dequan Briscoe, repeatedly called her. And when he learned Turner was at her home, Briscoe twice threatened to “pull up” on Turner—to attack him—which Turner heard over the speakerphone. Shortly after hearing the threat, Turner walked outside to his car, and moments later, he sensed that the unfamiliar car screeching towards him down the sleepy street was an ambush. Since he didn’t have time to reach the house and had nowhere to hide, he turned while running and fired four shots into the car, wounding Briscoe. Turner fired based on his intuition—he didn’t recognize the car, couldn’t see through its darkly tinted windows, and wouldn’t have recognized Briscoe if he saw him. But that intuition proved prescient. It turns out Briscoe was aiming a handgun to shoot Turner just before Turner began firing.
Because Turner shot Briscoe before Briscoe shot Turner, Turner is the defendant rather than the victim in this case; the State charged Turner with battery by means of a deadly weapon, a Level 5 felony. And following a bench trial, the magistrate judge convicted him. Yet the judge agreed with Turner that, in hindsight, it was necessary for Turner to fire at Briscoe to avoid being shot. But the judge rejected Turner’s self-defense justification because, without the benefit of hindsight, it was objectively unreasonable for Turner to fire at a car into which he couldn’t see. Turner made the best choice, the judge explained, and it was unfortunate that his only choices were a felony or funeral. But that paradox followed from the objective reasonableness standard governing Indiana’s self-defense law, and the law gave the judge no choice but to convict, he believed.
Fortunately for Turner, that isn’t how Indiana’s self-defense law functions. To be sure, the judge was correct that the self-defense statute justifies using force when the defendant’s actions are objectively reasonable in the circumstances. And many cases explain we don’t use hindsight to second-guess the reasonableness of the defendant’s decisions in the heat of the moment.
But this case presents a question of first impression in Indiana: Do we deprive defendants of the benefit of hindsight when it reveals their conduct was necessary in self-defense, even though that necessity wasn’t fully apparent in the moment? The answer is that we do not, and we base that answer on a sentence in the self-defense statute that our Indiana appellate courts have never interpreted before, which says: “No person, employer, or estate of a person in this state shall be placed in legal jeopardy of any kind whatsoever for protecting the person or a third person by reasonable means necessary.” Ind. Code § 35-41-3-2.
Because the trial court concluded that Turner’s conduct was necessary in self-defense, the statute justified the shooting, and we vacate the conviction.
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At this point in the case, there is no longer any dispute between the parties about the material facts: Turner avoided being shot by Briscoe only by shooting Briscoe first, but Turner fired based on intuition, unable to see through Briscoe’s darkly tinted windows. The magistrate judge reasoned that while it was necessary for Turner to shoot Briscoe in self-defense, it was not reasonable, because the necessity was only apparent in hindsight. The State agrees that was the appropriate analysis, and Turner’s argument on appeal is that the trial court’s reasoning reflects a legal error—the judge misinterpreted the self-defense statute.
We agree with Turner. Under Indiana’s self-defense statute, justification for using force based on a mistaken belief about necessity depends on the reasonableness of the belief given the circumstances. But using defensive force based on an accurate belief is justified regardless of the belief’s reasonableness. In other words, using force for protection based on a belief that is both unreasonable and turns out to be wrong isn’t justified, but acting on a belief that is unreasonable, yet right, is justified.
Below, we discuss how Indiana’s self-defense justification bars conviction for what would otherwise be criminal conduct. Then, we explain how resort to hindsight differs depending on whether it is used to second-guess the reasonableness of the defendant’s fear or instead to confirm the necessity of defensive force. Finally, we note that this analysis does not reflect a change in Indiana’s self-defense law but rather how the self-defense statute applies to a sliver of circumstances where the necessity of self-defense is only fully apparent in hindsight.
I. Self-defense justifies what would otherwise be criminal conduct.
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II. A defendant’s use of force based on what turns out to be a mistaken belief about the necessity is only justified if the mistake was a reasonable one.
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III. A defendant’s use of protective force based on an accurate belief that force is necessary is justified even if the necessity is only fully apparent in hindsight.
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… That is, at a minimum, a person is justified in using force when: (1) they are protecting themselves or someone else; (2) that protection is from an imminent threat (imminence is part of what makes the force “necessary”); (3) force rather than some other means is “necessary” for that protection; and (4) their response is proportional (the “reasonable means necessary” for protection). I.C. § 35-41-3-2(c).
This final sentence in the self-defense statute also reflects both a subjective and an objective standard. Subjectively, the defendant’s use of force must be for the appropriate purpose: to “protect[] the person or a third person.” I.C. § 35-41-3-2(c). Objectively, the force must be a necessary, proportional response to an imminent threat. But the only mention of reasonableness in this sentence refers to the means used, not the defendant’s belief. So for the core self-defense this sentence codifies, the justification depends on the accuracy of the defendant’s belief, not its reasonableness.
In other words, the factfinder must determine, in retrospect, whether the use of force was really necessary. If so, self-defense justifies the conduct, no matter how reasonable or unreasonable the defendant’s fear. But if not, the defendant must look elsewhere for justification because this sentence in the statute provides no refuge for mistaken beliefs.
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Our interpretation also does not, as the concurring opinion concludes, conflict with Trogdon v. State, 32 N.E. 725 (Ind. 1892). In Trogdon, the Court recognized the same subjective standard we recognize today: the defendant must be motivated to “protect himself from threatened danger.” Id. We said there—as we’re saying here—that “[t]he danger may be actual or only apparent.” Id. And we said there—as we continue to agree here—a defendant “who does not in fact apprehend any danger” may not “deliberately and maliciously kill another, and successfully interpose the defense of self-defense[] because it subsequently appears that there was actual danger.” Id. (emphasis added).
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Having concluded that Indiana’s self-defense statute justifies both (1) a defendant’s use of proportional force necessary to protect the defendant or a third party, and (2) the same force based on a reasonable misapprehension about the need to use force, we turn to applying that understanding to the facts here.
Given the trial court’s factual conclusions, to which we defer, Turner’s actions were justified here. After considering all the evidence and weighing the witnesses’ credibility, the trial court concluded that Turner was telling the truth, and his conduct was necessary to protect himself. Turner’s choices, in the judge’s view, were either to shoot or be shot, because Briscoe was lying when he testified, and he had drawn his gun to shoot Turner just before Turner shot him first.
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IV. All the limits our case law recognizes for the self-defense justification remain.
Our decision today is not a revision or expansion of Indiana’s self-defense law. Rather, it reflects that an unusual fact pattern—the sort which is usually only the subject of academic hypothesizing—enlivens a typically dormant statutory provision. See generally 2 Paul H. Robinson, Crim. L. Def. § 122 (2024) (“But the question of whether the justified actor who acts without the requisite purpose or knowledge should be exculpated, is clearly independent of the question of whether the mistakenly unjustified actor should be.”); id. (describing case law addressing facts like those here as “rare”). Still, the legislature’s recognition of a robust self-defense justification remains tempered by important limits.
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As both opinions reflect, the legislature’s statutory protection for the “robust self-defense rights that citizens of this state have always enjoyed” has important limits. I.C. § 35-41-3-2(a). But none of those limits require martyrdom in service of reasonableness. So Turner didn’t have to take a bullet as the most reasonable thing to do; the law permitted him to save his own life.
Conclusion
For these reasons, we vacate Turner’s conviction and sentence.
Rush, C.J., and Massa and Slaughter, JJ., concur.
Goff, J., concurs in the judgment with separate opinion.
Goff, J., concurring in the judgment.
Should the merits of a self-defense claim depend on the defendant having acted with knowledge of the justifying circumstances, even if his conduct is objectively justified in hindsight? Facing this very question well over a century ago, this Court held that a defendant who acted out of no apparent necessity to preserve life or limb may not “interpose the defense of self-defense” simply because it “subsequently appears that there was actual danger, of which he was at the time ignorant.” Trogdon v. State, 32 N.E. 725, 727 (Ind. 1892).
The Court today reaches the opposite conclusion, holding sua sponte that, under an obscure and otherwise dormant provision of our self-defense statute, “Turner’s use of force was justified not because his belief that he was about to be shot was reasonable but because that belief was correct, and force really was necessary to protect himself.” Ante, at 17. Defendants like Turner, the Court opines, enjoy “the benefit of hindsight” when the evidence “reveals their conduct was necessary in self-defense, even though that necessity wasn’t fully apparent in the moment.” Id. at 3.
In my view, the statutory provision on which the Court relies is less than clear. And its novel interpretation, I fear, will create uncertainty in the law, leading to potentially harmful consequences. What’s more, even if I were to agree with the Court’s interpretation, its holding rests on a flawed premise—there’s simply nothing in the record to support the conclusion that “Turner avoided being shot by Briscoe only by shooting Briscoe first.” See ante, at 8. For these reasons, and because I believe the Court’s novel statutory interpretation is entirely unnecessary to give Turner relief, I concur only in the Court’s judgment.
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