[wyager]

I personally would be terrified to stop a thief in CA, because I suspect that the way CA laws are written, I would be crucified in court for daring to defend property, and most likely I would end up with an assault conviction or something. I'd be hesitant to take that risk even for my own property.

[ergocoder]

It isn't worth it.

I wouldn't intervene if my stuff isn't like 1M USD or something.

Spending time going to court justifying whether you use the exact appropriate amount of force to stop the incident (who would have time to think that through??) is just really wasteful and psychologically damaging.

[adrianN]

I would be terrified to stop a thief anywhere in the US, because I assume that they have a gun and will just shoot me. I don't own stuff that is worth the risk.

[kQq9oHeAz6wLLS]

This will be unpopular, but have you ever heard the phrase "an armed society is a polite society"? Just as you're afraid to stop someone committing a crime because they might be armed (wait, I thought there were strict gun control laws, how can they be armed?! You mean criminals don't obey laws?! /s), an attacker will be hesitant to assault you if they think you are armed.

[adrianN]

The statistics about death-by-gun for the US that I've heard seem to indicate that this theory doesn't translate very well to practice.

[kQq9oHeAz6wLLS]

Oh, I dunno. 330+ million people, over that many guns in the US, and what percentage are gun deaths?