Homeless Man Stabs Students, Claims He was Defending His Box 'Home' Under the Castle Doctrine

Can a box be considered a "home" and defended with deadly force under New York's castle doctrine?

A judge in New York will decide exactly that in a case involving a homeless man who stabbed two college students after they kicked the boxes he sleeps in on the East Side.​

Homeless Man Stabs Students, Claims He was Defending His Box 'Home' Under the Castle Doctrine - GunsAmerica Digest


Not sure exactly how I feel about this one.

My instinct would be to only extend partial coverage of the Castle Doctrine, whatever that would look like, to his cardboard box.

 

The rationale behind the Castle Doctrine is designed to give the person that lives there the benefit of the doubt in the case of a physical confrontation situation arising. I don't see a reason why that same sort of reasoning should not apply in this case, if it can be proved the homeless man was minding his own business and those men approached the box to disturb it. Other than the psychological concept of a barrier that is involved in the mind of the alleged attacker.

The way I see it, the rights of two different parties kind of overlap into the same area in this case. It was the man's home, but he does not own the property beneath it, it was in a public place, and there is very little buffer space separating his sleeping area from the outside, compared to the traditional imagined situation of a house with a yard.

Another factor in this specific story is the homeless man also chose to camp his cardboard box near an area with a nightlife where there would be a lot of people drinking alcohol.
In my personal opinion, I believe that also strengthens the "public area" argument. If these men were just carousing down and having fun, the expectation can not as strongly be on them to respect the sleeping area of another person, as if it were a house.
So intentionality (on the part of the students who kicked the box) would be a huge factor here, to show evidence of that.

 

A mans box is his castle.

 

If you live in a tent, it's your home. If you live in your car, it's your home. Your home is anywhere you live inside whatever it is.

That said, if you run out of your home and run an invader down attacking the invader, the castle doctrine does not apply. Defending your castle means defending your castle.

 

I want the home insecure and homeless to have more protections. So yeah, it's a home. He had every right to defend himself and his home.