I gotta ask Stig, what constitutes legal self defense in Denmark? I guess pepper spray is out, no concealed handguns, what about other weapons? Can you defend yourself with a pocket knife?
What would happen if you broke a 2x6 over the head of an attacker?
I'm the person to ask, Jim, since I've taught self defense for ages, including the legal aspects.
The easiest would be to quote the law, but that is in Danish of course.
Basically you are allowed to defend your self, family or third party with whatever means necessary.
The key word here being "necessary".
That does not mean emptying a full mag into a skinny teenager holding a knife.
So, yes, you can use a 2x6 ( if you like an unwieldy weapon) or a gun, knife whatever.
As long as the situation justifies it.
We've had plenty of people using shotguns against a home invasion, that is perfectly ok as long as they are licensed to own the gun.
There is a sub paragraph #3 to that clause that states that should you exceed the amount of violence that is deemed justifiable , you will be found not guilty of doing so in case you were driven by extreme fear, panic or ( And this is the interesting part) anger.
So you catch someone raping your teenage daugter and "accidentally" kill him/her ( Notice my PC
) you will most likely go free, simply because freaking out in that situation and going overboard is understandable.
What you can't do, is punish someone.
Classic situation: Someone pulls a knife on me.
I disarm him.
Then we are back to status quo.
If I then say, I'll teach you never to draw a knife against anybody again ( Or at least to get smart enough not to choose someone who has spent a lifetime training for that kind of situation) and beat the crap out of the person, it is assault and I'll be punished.
If I disarm the person and damage him severely while doing so, it is the sub paragraph 3 again.
See the difference between the two situations.
Doing something in the heat of the situation and doing something in cold blood as punishment.
The last 7 or so shots fired by that cop was clearly not covered by sub paragraph 3 and would, here, have him in jail for manslaughter.
When I sicced ol' Sam on those would be thieves a couple of years back, that was illegal. They were no threat to me, so I had no cause to use a semi lethal dog against them.
I figured they were from the refugee center, otherwise I'd have used the old " Time to go pee, before bed time, little doggie" trick.
Outcome is the same, but I haven't sicced the dog on them, they tried to break in and encountered a dog...................Too bad
So I don't think the self defense situation here is so much different from Montana except we don't allow people to carry weapons.