563.026. Justification generally.
You may not be guilty if you broke the law to stop something worse from happening.
In rare cases, doing something illegal might be allowed if it was truly necessary to prevent serious harm and the situation wasn’t your fault.
1. A person’s actions—except for class A felonies or murder—can be justified if:
- They were done to stop a serious and immediate danger,
- The threat wasn’t caused by the person’s own actions, and
- A reasonable person would agree that preventing the harm was more important than obeying the law that was broken.
2. Justification can’t be based only on personal opinions about whether a law is good or fair. If someone claims this defense, the court must first decide if the facts, if proven true, would legally count as justification.
3. Justification under this section is an affirmative defense, which means the defendant must raise and support it during trial.
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