The Innocent Bystanders Caught in Deadly Crossfire of Self-Defense Shootings

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Amid a rise in self-defense homicides across the U.S., there also has been a toll on bystanders killed by stray gunfire. Often, prosecutors don’t file homicide charges in those cases. Many grieving families, angry that nobody is being held to account for the loss of their loved one, are left to try to seek a measure of justice in civil courts.

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Gun-control advocates blame some of these bystander killings on stand-your-ground laws, which provide enhanced legal protections for people claiming self-defense in public places, and on the rise of permitless carry laws, which in many states allow almost anyone to carry a weapon in public with no required training. “When untrained or panicked shooters miss their target, it’s children, neighbors and bystanders who pay the price,” said Nick Suplina of Everytown for Gun Safety, a nonprofit focused on gun-violence prevention. “These laws don’t deter violence, they create more of it by turning public spaces into crossfire zones where anyone can be harmed.”

The Second Amendment Foundation, a nonprofit that supports gun rights, said the rights of self-defense and to bear arms come with a duty to act responsibly. Instances where someone accidentally kills a bystander while defending against an aggressor “are the responsibility of the criminal perpetrator,” the foundation said, not of the person engaged in legitimate self-defense.

The legal grounds for shielding shooters in bystander killings is a long-established doctrine called transferred intent, experts say. If a person engaged in legitimate self-defense accidentally shoots a bystander, their intent—to defend against an assailant—is transferred to include the unintended victim.

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In most states, and echoed in the Massachusetts decision, a person acting in legitimate self-defense who kills a bystander could still be charged, legal experts said, if they acted recklessly or negligently. The charges typically would be for a lesser offense than murder. Even when prosecutors bring lesser charges in such cases, they don’t always win a conviction.

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