Court: Castle doctrine doesn’t apply outside apartment

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The state’s castle doctrine law does not apply in the case of a Sheboygan Falls man who shot intruders at his girlfriend’s apartment but also continued to shoot after the intruders fled, according to the District 2 Court of Appeals.

Charles Chew, 29, is serving a 30-month prison sentence following an altercation he had with Andrew Lee and Andreaius Lucas. According to the Court of Appeals’ published opinion, Chew lived in the apartment with his girlfriend, who also was seeing Lee. She later moved out, and sometime after that Lee and Lucas entered the apartment and attacked Chew, who fired his gun, shooting both men in the leg.

Lee and Lucas fled the apartment, according to the opinion, but Chew kept firing his weapon, hitting another building and a nearby car. Lee and Lucas were arrested and charged with substantial battery. Chew was charged with recklessly endangering safety by use of a dangerous weapon, based on the shots he fired after the pair fled the apartment.

At trial, Chew’s attorney requested that a jury instruction be given on the castle doctrine, which authorizes a dweller to use deadly force in self-defense if his or her attackers forcibly enter their home. However, Sheboygan County Circuit Judge Terence Bourke denied the request. Chew was convicted in March 2013.

The appeals court, in the opinion authored by Presiding Judge Lisa Neubauer, upheld the conviction. According to the opinion, in order for the castle doctrine to apply in this case, the assailants would have to be in the apartment, or at least on part of the property solely used by Chew. An apartment building’s parking lot, however, is used by everybody, according to the court.

“In fact, all the testimony is that Lee and Lucas were fleeing Chew’s apartment and were running across the parking lot when Chew fired the shots,” according to the opinion. “The parking lot is not part of Chew’s dwelling.”

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Joe Ehmann, supervisor of the State Public Defender’s appellate division, called the court’s decision a “little odd” because it did not take into consideration that the attack happened quickly and was still going on when Chew fired his gun into the parking lot.

“This is an ongoing, fairly short duration event, and allowing the state to parse this out in this way to eliminate the castle doctrine defense is a little troubling,” Ehmann said.

He said it’s likely the office will petition the Wisconsin Supreme Court to review the case, but that the office has not yet talked to Chew.

A message left at the state Attorney General’s office, which responded to Chew’s appeal, was not immediately returned.

The state’s castle doctrine law passed the Republican-controlled Legislature in 2011 and was signed by Gov. Scott Walker that year. Ehmann pointed out that the law is still fairly new and that the parameters of it will most likely be set in future court cases.

According to court records, Lee and Lucas pleaded no contest to substantial battery charges in January 2013 and entered into deferred prosecution agreements. Follow @eheisigWLJ