can some one get in trouble or is it against the law if someone is in need of help desperately and they refuse?

i was watching this survival thing on animal planet where these 2 divers were diving some where in hawaii and one of them gets stabbed or bitten in the chest by a weird named animal like a croc. needle nose fish or something and then they get to shore and the diver needed help to get his dying friend in his truck to go to the hospital cause he was large and muscular and heavy but he goes to the raod and no cars were coming and there werent any houses aorund then he remembered seeing one house and then he sees someone inside watching tv and he's there banging on the door and saying help help my friend needs real help and the guy was a jerk and just glances at him and watches tv the guy was like can you at least call the police for me but the guy just kept watching tv like refusing to have any part in it and couldn't care less if the guy died

Comments

8 Responses to “can some one get in trouble or is it against the law if someone is in need of help desperately and they refuse?”
  1. rowlfe says:
    May 21, 2010 at 9:19 am

    Sorry to be the bearer of BAD NEWS, but you can NOT compel someone to be a "good Samaritan" by law. What HAS been done is to shield a good Samaritan if they DO act in the best interest and FAIL in their effort. Believe it or not, people who rendered aid were sued for "wrongful death" in civil courts for failing to save the person through their efforts at things like CPR. It makes NO difference that the injured party was already dead or that they would died regardless, hence the law protecting anyone giving ANY form of aid from a wrongful death civil suit. Bottom line: I do NOT have to answer a knock on my front door and you can NOT compel me by law to do so. OK, so this is a morally wrong thing to do, NOT render aid when you know aid is needed, but you can NOT mandate this by LAW.

    Case on point: me and my next door neighbor. I am letting my little plot of land revert to an urban wilderness. We live in a forest, where they simply cleared room for roads and foundations and left the rest of the trees BE. I am letting the pine needles accumulate. Why should I pick up after god? I did not make those needles fall, god did! So, I do not sweep my driveway as my next door neighbor does and he takes issue with this. He has over the past 5 years actually called the police, the county sheriff actually since we live in an unincorporated area of the county. By my doorbell button is a professionally made plaque. Number one is this: NO appointment=NO answer. Number two is this: NO warrant=NO entry. Number three: Uninvited entry may be met with lethal force. And finally number four: Pine needles are an act of god. Unwashed does not mean inoperable.

    With this posted in plain sight next to my doorbell, I no longer answer a knock on my front door. If you want to contact me, you will find out how and what you should do without me having to give you instructions. Police included. Bring a warrant or leave me alone. Otherwise, I have NO need to acknowledge your presence at my door. The last item, number 4, is aimed at the county who tried to get me to use water to wash my old Ford 250 pickup truck which sits and is currently gathering pine needles while I am overhauling an engine in the garage to replace the engine now in the truck (which DOES work) in the near future. It seems the county has a law which says any vehicle must be moved every 72 hours even if on private property. I challenged this law when they attempted to get me to move it or lose it or pay a huge fine of $536 per DAY not moved, and won. I have been exempted from having to move my truck every 72 hours as long as it remains on my side of the property line. However, my neighbor is still very angry that I am "bringing down property values" in the neighborhood because I have pine needles on my driveway and on my truck. The man is simply unreasonable. Sill, there are laws which are illegal which are on the books which make what I am doing a crime by not washing or moving the pickup truck I am working on! So, the point of this is this: even if morally the RIGHT thing to do, you can not by law compel compliance. My neighbor is right in his thinking that I should clean up the pine needles like everyone else in my neighborhood does. My problem is with this being a forest which we moved in to! Why NOT let the forest floor revert to what it WAS before man carved out space in the forest that was here before?

    It is not a nice thing to do, refuse to render aid, but it is completely legal to do nothing.

  2. singleboy652 says:
    May 21, 2010 at 9:19 am

    I don’t think so, they should but they dont.

  3. Kathryn says:
    May 21, 2010 at 9:19 am

    By law no, morally its up to them.

    mschvs_6…: There is now a law that when a good Samaritan helps someone by administering CPR and they hurt the person, like break a rib, that they cant be sued, the law had decided that if someone is helping them, they are doing just that and have not intention to hurt them therefore they can no longer be sued.

    It common to break someones ribs or sternum during CPR. Bones heal, but the person can become a vegetable if the brain goes without oxygen for over 7mins.

  4. garfieldfan says:
    May 21, 2010 at 9:19 am

    No, in fact there are many laws that are made to protect Good Samaritans and yet they are getting sued up the wazoo for trying to save people’s lives. Certainly some reform needs to take place.

  5. Anna says:
    May 21, 2010 at 9:19 am

    people normally help people in need of help but its not against the law not to help

  6. mschvs_65 says:
    May 21, 2010 at 9:19 am

    There should be a law, but there is not. There was a very famous case where a woman was raped and murder outside an apartment building and many, many, people saw it happening and did NOTHING. It’s used as an example in psychology classes everywhere. It’s so sad, but there are no laws requiring people to help. The sad thing is, if you stop to help someone …say along side the road. Maybe they are in cardiac arrest and you do CPR. If you break their rib, they can actually sue you for injuring them! CRAZY! The laws are wrong, just wrong.

  7. hotwheels122287 says:
    May 21, 2010 at 9:19 am

    legally no one has any obligation to help someone in need, morally its pretty screwed up…

  8. evilattorney says:
    May 21, 2010 at 9:19 am

    The guy in the house had no duty to do anything. In fact, this type of thing is often used as a ruse for criminals to get entry to a home.