German law & Martial arts Civil Code - BGB Keywords: Self defense, emergency, self help

In extracts, reduced to the relevant paragraphs and sections for the martial artist

Division 6

Exercise of rights, self-defence, self-help

Section 227 Self-defence against persons

(1)An act required for self-defence is not unlawful.

(2)Self-defence is the defence required to ward off a present unlawful assault on oneself or another.

Section 228 Necessity

A person who damages or destroys a thing belonging to another in order to ward off from himself or from another a danger threatened by the thing does not act unlawfully if the damage or destruction is necessary to ward off the danger and the damage is not out of proportion to the danger. If the person acting in this manner caused the danger, he is obliged to pay damages.

Section 229 Self-help

A person who, for the purpose of self-help, removes, destroys or damages a thing, or a person who, for the purpose of self-help, arrests an obliged person who is suspected of flight, or overcomes the resistance to an act of an obliged person who has a duty to tolerate that act, does not act unlawfully if help cannot be obtained from the authorities in good time and there is a danger, without immediate intervention, that the realisation of the claim will be prevented or be considerably more difficult.

Section 230 Limits of self-help

(1)Self-help may not extend further than is necessary to ward off the danger.

(2)In the case where things are removed, then, unless execution of judgment is being effected, a writ of attachment is to be sought.

(3)In the case of the arrest of the person obliged, unless he is set free again, an application for his preventive custody is to be filed with the local court [Amtsgericht] in whose district the arrest took place; the person obliged is to be presented to the court without undue delay.

Section 231 Self-help by mistake

If a person does any of the acts described in section 229 in the mistaken assumption that the requirements necessary to exclude unlawfulness are satisfied, he is obliged to pay damages to the other party, even if the mistake does not result from negligence.

Source: Civil Code (BGB) / juris GmbH