Legal Definitions - choice-of-evils defense

Choice-of-Evils Defense

The choice-of-evils defense, also known as the necessity defense or lesser-evils defense, is a legal argument used when a person commits an otherwise illegal act to prevent a greater, more significant harm from occurring. For this defense to be successful, the individual must demonstrate that:

• They reasonably believed a serious and imminent harm was about to occur.
• Their actions were necessary to prevent that greater harm.
• The harm they prevented was clearly more severe than the harm caused by their illegal act.
• There was no reasonable legal alternative available to prevent the greater harm.

Essentially, it involves choosing the "lesser evil" when faced with an unavoidable situation where both choices lead to some form of harm, but one is significantly worse than the other.

Here are some examples illustrating the choice-of-evils defense:

• Imagine a hiker lost in a remote wilderness during a sudden, severe blizzard. Facing imminent hypothermia and death, the hiker breaks into a locked, unoccupied ranger cabin to take shelter and use its emergency radio. While breaking and entering is a crime, the hiker could argue a choice-of-evils defense. The harm caused (property damage and trespass) is significantly less than the harm prevented (the hiker's death from exposure).

• Consider a situation where a parent is driving their child, who is experiencing a sudden, life-threatening allergic reaction, to the nearest hospital. Due to the urgency, the parent exceeds the speed limit and runs a red light, actions that are typically illegal. If pulled over, the parent might invoke a choice-of-evils defense. The harm caused by the traffic violations (potential danger to others, minor legal infractions) is argued to be far less than the harm prevented (the child's severe injury or death due to lack of immediate medical attention).

• Suppose a small town is threatened by a rapidly spreading wildfire. A local farmer, seeing the fire approaching his property and the town, uses a bulldozer to intentionally knock down a section of a neighbor's fence and clear a strip of land to create a firebreak, an action that technically constitutes property damage and trespass. The farmer could potentially use a choice-of-evils defense. The damage to the fence and land is a lesser evil compared to the widespread destruction of homes and potential loss of life that the uncontrolled wildfire would cause.