Attorney Says Indiana’s Castle Doctrine Language Too Confusing After Teen Client Sentenced to Prison

A 17-year-old in Indiana has been sentenced to 15 years in prison after pleading guilty to voluntary manslaughter, but his attorney is pointing the finger at the Indiana legislature when it comes to his client’s incarceration. 

Gabriel Hernandez was 15 in August, 2023, when his mom woke up to the sound of her doorbell camera alerting her to motion outside her home in Indianapolis. After spotting a man on the camera, she called out for her son’s help. 

“Dude got a ski mask, hoodie checking every car in the neighborhood…” he reportedly told detectives during his confession. His mother stated she was awakened by the camera notification and felt scared enough to call for her son.

As the situation unfolded, Hernandez retrieved his mother’s gun and shot the man, who was eventually identified as [18-year-old Terry] Ross, through a window.

Hernandez allegedly fired two shots at Ross. The first shot prompted the masked man to flee, but as he turned to run, a second shot rang out. Ross was later found by police but died from his injuries. 

According to court documents, surveillance footage confirmed Ross was searching through Hernandez’s mother’s vehicle and attempting to access others in the vicinity. However, investigators noted that at no point was the victim seen trying to enter a residence or appearing to be armed.

In other words, while Ross posed a threat to the family’s property, at that point he had not demonstrated he was a threat to Hernandez, his mom, or anyone else inside their home. That alone would seem to negate a self-defense claim, but Josiah Swinney, who represented Hernandez’s in court, contends Indiana’s Castle Doctrine language could allow for shootings like this to be deemed justified. 

As a lawyer who has represented the State of Indiana and defendants, misunderstanding your rights is where I see the highest percentage of tragedy. I blame the legislature more than the Courts. Our State representatives like to tout strong rights to protect yourself in Indiana. To be sure, the Castle Doctrine states that no person “in this state shall be placed in legal jeopardy” for the use of reasonable force if needed to “protect the person’s dwelling or curtilage.” Curtilage is defined differently from case to case, but Hoosiers only learn whether their decision to use force is reasonable at a trial. This is the definition of legal jeopardy. The Castle Doctrine has a confusing title, and we presented an affidavit from firearms instructors showing that this confusion is an epidemic.

Should the car parked at the Hernandez home have been considered part of the curtilage? Arguably, yes, but even then Indiana law doesn’t automatically give the green light to using lethal force to stop a car burglar. Lethal force might be reasonable, but it depends on the circumstances. 

Was it reasonable for Hernandez to believe that lethal force was necessary to “prevent or terminate the other person’s unlawful entry of or attack on the person’s dwelling” or curtilage? It sounds like neither the teen or his mom verbally confronted the car burglar, yelling at him to get away or shouting that they’d called police. Simply alerting Ross to their presence, and their knowledge of his activities, might have prompted him to run away without the need to fire a shot, and I’m not sure that a jury would have found the teen’s actions to be a reasonable or proportionate response to Ross’s car burglary. 

Even if that first shot could be deemed justified, though, it’s more difficult to argue that Hernandez used reasonable force when he fired a second time after Ross had turned around and started to run away. Whatever confusion might exist over Indiana’s Castle Doctrine language, the law is pretty clear that deadly force can’t be used when the threat to person or property has subsided.

As for Swinnett’s argument that the legislature has failed to properly define “reasonable force”, I’m not sure that any state lays out in statute specific examples of reasonable versus unreasonable or excessive force. Generally speaking, reasonable force is defined as the minimum amount of physical force “appropriate and necessary” to protect yourself or others, and in some states, property as well. 

In situations like this, where no direct or immediate threat of personal harm is present, I’d say it’s best to err on the side of caution. Whatever was in Hernandez’s mother’s car, I’m sure she would agree protecting it from being stolen wasn’t worth her son spending fifteen years (or even 7 1/2 if he gets credit for good behavior) behind bars.

I suppose lawmakers could go back and make it explicitly clear that deadly force is not considered reasonable when protecting an unoccupied dwelling or motor vehicle (or, conversely, that the use of deadly force is reasonable in those circumstances), but I don’t think there’s any way the legislature could come up with an exhaustive list of what “reasonable force” looks like under a wide variety of circumstances. And honestly, based on the description of Hernandez’s actions that night, I doubt any additional clarity in the Castle Doctrine statute would lead a judge or jury to believe that second shot was reasonable or justified.