I , too, was told by Denver police to, “put the f***king camera down …I better not end up on Youtube or else” when taking pictures of a person in the street that had passed out. I am NOT a photographer and it was a cheap nonprofessional camera, I was standing on the sidewalk OUT of the way! I suppose even some police and firemen do not know the law.

Good luck to the girls and I hope they are OK physically and mentally. This is a court case all the way and I do hope they receive compensation for all they went through!

What does Illinois law say about your rights to get your property back from a thief? If you no longer have that right, then self governance is a thing of the past. In Texas, we have the right to use physical force to stop someone from robbing us.

“A person who is assaulted may use such reasonable force as may be necessary, or which at the time reasonably appears to be necessary, to protect himself or herself from bodily harm. An act of self-defense must ordinarily be proportionate to the threat. That is, if you believe a person is going to spit on you, depending upon the context it may be reasonable to push the person away, but it would not be reasonable to hit the person with a baseball bat.

A plaintiff may be expected to withdraw from the threat, if possible, before engaging in forcible resistance. However, if the plaintiff is in his own home and the defendant is not a member of the plaintiff’s household, a plaintiff will typically not be required to further withdraw from the threat once the plaintiff has retreated to his own home.”

I am not a lawyer, but it’s pretty clear that the ladies’ best move (stated previously by another commenter) would have been to withdraw, dial 911, file charges, and recover their cameras through the police.

Engaging physically with the HOB thugs only increased the possibility that they’d be injured or worse, and didn’t change the odds of recovering their cameras (and that apparently didn’t happen til the cops arrived, anyway?)

It might seem reasonable to fight back – but remember, these thugs had just (allegedly) criminally battered the women (and robbed them in some opinions here), and you never know what they might be packin’, especially in an urban street situation.

On the other hand, videotaping the action was entirely reasonable, to me – capture evidence, but get back so you don’t get hurt (or get charged for being involved in a melee, however unintentionally.)

If I was a passer by and actually saw him beating some girl like this without knowing anything about what was going on I would have stopped and he would have ended up in a hospital. Using the minimum force necessary to cripple him until he could be put into a court room would be my first priority.

People have a right to defend themselves from being attacked and robbed. The fact that she started “pushing and shoving the guard” is irrelevant as she had the right to do worse.