copied and pasted from elsewhere
As of 2005, the law has been made clearer to show that self defence is perfectly legal.
The only time where a homeowner can be prosecuted for murder or manslaughter in relation to the death of an intruder is if they kill them outside (however, there was a case where a man killed his neghbour on the driveway to his house, claiming he thought he was an intruder, and was clared of any wrongdoing), where the prosecutor will argue that they should have locked the house to prevent the intruder from re entering; if they pummel the intruder to death with a baseball implement and continue doing it even when the intruder is on the ground unconscious and/or defenceless, at which point the prosecutor will argue they had removed the threat and were acting in a fenzied manner; or if they post-kill place a weapon near the intruder, which makes a harmless self defence action suddenly appear like it could be a pre meditated crime or something.
(Then the police will, obviously, check it wasn't the homeowner's wife's secret lover;and, you could be shocked to find this out, though blood splatter makes it VERY EASY to find out that an intruder was post mortem armed by the homeowner).
The reason the farmer in Norfolk got prosecuted for murder was because he shot the 17yo kid in the back when the intruder was fleeing the property. The brazilian guy who pummelled the intruder to death in 2008 was arrested for the fact he repeatedly struck the guy even after he'd disarmed the threat. The only reason the guy who was recently let off after killing an intruder was ever arrested and questionned in the first place was because he, again, had inflicted multiple wounds on the intruder in question; it, however, transpired that these were necessary, as his assailiant was on drugs and was not being affected by the lesser damaging wounds initially inflicted.
You can, and people have, killed an intruder in the United Kingdom.
With the exception of Texas, the laws are petty much the same in the United States. In California, they are actually harsher.
People here are misinformed about self defence laws and are very ignorant of it.
EDIT:
The farmer in Norfolk, Tony Martin, was also prosecuted because he used an illegally owned gun (his asperger syndrome meant he wasn't allowed to own anything more powerful than a rifle, and yet he used a military issued shotgun on the kid), and because after he shot the boy intruder, he drove around his farm in the car he didn't even possess a licence to drive, desperately searching for him so he could, in his own words, 'chlorinate the gene pool'.
I'm pretty sure that even most American juries would convict somebody as unstable and redneck as Tony Martin.
Usually, in most countries, once you have removed the threat (whether you've killed the intruder or incapacitated them is, actually, irrelevant) you can't use any more force than you already have.
So here's an example.
-A person awakes in the middle of the night in their home somewhere in the UK to find an intruder they hear downstairs; they grab something to hand, which can be anything ranging from a knife to a (legally held) gun. They go downstairs and, without even warning the intruder, kill them.
That is considered reasonable force and is legal under UK common law.
And here's an illegal example.
-A person discovers a burglary in progress; they grab a weapon and wound or kill the intruder. So far their actions have been legal; however, they now decide to teach the intruder a lesson. They kneel down next to the intruder, who is no longer a threat, and either carve their heart out, or repeatedly stab them.
That's illegal.
Source(s):
Reasonable Force is basically a Castle Doctrine; you would have to go extremely on the aggressive against an already incapacitated or fleeing intruder to be deemed criminally responsible for whatever you did.
In the UK, unlike Australia and Canada, there is no longer a 'duty to retreat'. If you are in a place you have a legal right in which to feel secure, such as your own property, or a property to which you have been legally invited, such as a friend's house to house sit or stay the night or whatever, you can do whatever it takes to defend in the instance of an intruder entering.
Contrary to the belief of ignorant Daily Mail propagandised hillbillies, the law here is very much on the side of the homeowner. As well it should.
Only people who become aggressors risk any chance of prosecution; and even then the prosecution is usually for manslaughter rather than murder in those cases.