Signs and stickers warning that anybody who messes with the owner’s vehicle or house could end up catching some lead are popular in Wyoming’s gun culture.
But experts say there’s a chance such signs could be a liability if the owner ever is involved in a defensive shooting that ends up in court.
Those signs also can be an open invitation for gun thieves.
In any criminal or civil legal case that might stem from a shooting, there’s a chance such a sign could be used as evidence of previous intent on the shooter’s part, University of Wyoming law professor George Mocsary told Cowboy State Daily.
Messages such as “Trespassers will be shot. Survivors will be shot again” frequently have an element of dark humor wrapped in a warning.
Jason Crotteau, who runs the Riverton-based Wyoming Tactical shooters’ training company, said he has a few signs like that in his home as novelty items.
They’re not, however, posted outside as a general warning to the public, he said.
“They go in the gun room,” he told Cowboy State Daily. "They go in the bar. It’s not a ‘take-it-seriously’ sort of thing."
Crotteau said he wouldn’t hang those signs on his property boundaries because, “That could open the door to litigation."
‘A Really Close Case’
Such signs in and of themselves likely can’t be used against a defensive shooter in court, Ryan Semerad, a trial attorney at Fuller & Semerad in Casper, told Cowboy State Daily.
“You have the freedom of speech,” he said. Those tongue-in-cheek warnings "can be funny and just expressing your personality.”
"Private property" must also be posted in order for criminal trespass charges to be filed, and whether the signs have “harsh messaging” is irrelevant, he added.
A judge or jury in a post-shooting case will scrutinize the defensive shooter’s conduct leading up to and during the incident, but probably won’t be concerned with a supposedly threatening sign as an indication someone is just itching to shoot someone.
However, “in a really close case” where a shooter’s conduct is in question, a prosecutor might cite an allegedly threatening sign to nudge the needle toward a conviction, he said.
Mocsary said such signs in and of themselves don’t establish liability or that a shooting might have been unlawful.
“But it is a bad fact,” he added.
“If a shooting occurs, a prosecutor or plaintiff’s lawyer would likely try to use the sign as evidence that the shooter had previously contemplated using deadly force against trespassers, or that the shooting was not a spontaneous, reasonable act of self-defense,” he said.
The outcome would still come down to the rules of evidence, he added, such as “whether it is being offered for a permissible purpose such as intent, motive, plan, or absence of mistake."
Encouraging Theft?
A prosecutor might use a “trespassers will be shot” sign as leverage if the shooting was “questionable” in regard to whether it was truly justified, former peace officer Frank Groth told Cowboy State Daily.
“In a questionable use of force case, a prosecutor might look at that sign and say, ‘Predisposition to violence,’” said Groth, a firearms trainer living in Campbell County.
However, he doesn’t favor such signs for another reason — he thinks they could attract thieves.
Putting such signs in a home’s window or on a vehicle could broadcast the fact that the owner has firearms, Groth said.
So, thieves might just wait until the owner isn’t around to open fire on them, break in and search for guns to steal, he said.
In Wyoming’s remote rural areas, it might not matter so much, he said. But such signs might not be a good idea in large communities such as Cheyenne or Gillette.
“It’s not what I would do,” he said. "And if somebody’s asking me for advice, I would say, ‘Don’t do that. Don’t put out a sign like that.’ It just makes your house a target for thieves."
Offering a different view, Semerad said signs with warning messages can sometimes discourage theft.
“It’s a little bit of security theater,” he said. “The appearance of a threat is usually enough to deter people.”
Locking doors is also effective against thieves, he said.
Semerad recalled a rash of gun thefts from vehicles in Casper, where “nearly all the guns stolen were taken from unlocked vehicles."
Contact Mark Heinz at mark@cowboystatedaily.com
Mark Heinz can be reached at mark@cowboystatedaily.com.
