Originally posted by Holden McGroin
So you think that if not for the post office, I'd never pick up my dry cleaning at the Korean laundry. Thank goodness for snail mail.
If a cop is on his way to the arson scene and decides instead to respond to the kidnapping, he is responding to a kidnapping, not the arson.
Mitigating circumstance is why we have jury trials.
There's a mis-communication somewhere.
The point is that, without the arsonist, in your example, the volunteer fighter does not get hurt. In my example, without the arsonist, the kidnapping victims do not get rescued nor does the family make it out of the Carbon Monoxide-filled home.
But for the arsonist, in your example, the firefighter remains intact, therefore the arsonist is liable for whatever does happen to the firefighter. The arsonist is not a direct cause of the injury, but indirect, and yet he is credited for the harm.
But for the arsonist, in my example, people are harmed or killed. Again, the arsonist is not a direct cause of the good deeds, but an indirect.
The question is: According to YOUR thinking, would the indirect positive effects of the arsonist even qualify as mitigating circumstances, or would the, according to your thinking, this information not even be worthy of submission to the jury? The guys
I just want to know if your theory works the same in both instances.