What constitutes legitimate self-defense is what court must carefully consider

A 22-YEAR-OLD IN GUANXIAN COUNTY, East China's Shandong province, who stabbed to death one of the local gangsters sent by a loan shark to bully and threaten the man's mother after she failed to repay a high-interest loan, was sentenced to life imprisonment in February. People's Daily commented on Saturday:

What happened to the mother and son has sparked a heated debate over what constitutes legitimate self-defense. The son, witnessing his mother enduring unbearable humiliation including slapping and sexual harassment for more than an hour, eventually fought back with a fruit knife and injured four gangsters, one of whom died in hospital.

The court in the first trial ruled that the son's action was not legitimate self-defense, because the "debt collectors" were unarmed and the local police were present. The danger facing the mother and the son was limited and thus did not justify the son's violence.