Calling 311 on someone blocking your driveway is mesira

First of all thank you for raising the question. This has come up a few times (“just running in for minchah (or for ‘krias ha’ Megillah’ or for a bottle of milk, a cream cheese sandwich, or a cup of coffee)”). Thank you also for requesting clear sources and no personal opinions.
I don’t know if the following is a good comparison, but want to out it out there. A frum traffic officer, whom I know personally, asked Rav Dovid Feinstein if it was permissible to write a parking ticket for someone you know is a Yid? He was told absolutely. I am quite sure he was told explicitly it was not considered mesirah. Perhaps calling the cops down is different than if the officer is there already. Perhaps, on the other hand, the mesira is the ticket.
Be that as it may, the question is an important one. If someone has clearer sources, please post as it is very relevant in Brooklyn.

I know Rabbi Shay Tahan says yes

What if that honest Jew illegally made his driveway wider to fit his obnoxious SUV?

People should learn hilchos mesirah in Shulchon Oruch before commenting; this is not something determined by feelings, but an actual halocho subject, just like hilchos shabbos.

If someone is causing you harm, e.g. by blocking your driveway, and you have made a reasonable attempt to get them to stop doing it and failed, you are permitted to call the cops, <i>so long</i> as your intention is not to have them punished but merely to have them stop the harm, e.g. by moving their car. So if 311 is going to send a tow truck you may call them, even though you know the person will also get a ticket. But if your <i>intention</i> is for them to get the ticket then it is mesirah and not permitted.

I have seen in the name of Rav Waldenberg Zt’l ad Rav Wosner Zt’l that mesira does not apply when the government acts legitimately

I see your ante, and i’ll raise you by 500 troll points:
Calling the police/ticket maids on someone sleeping in your bed is mesira.

If you wish to argue against this point, bring halachic arguments only. Not personal feelings or boich svaras.

The Halacha on mesira makes no exception permitting this type of mesira.

A while back, I called the cops because someone’s car alarm was going off at 3:00 am and would not turn off.

Silly me… I should have called a Bais Din.

Since this makes me a moser, and hence, eligible for the death penalty, please someone let me know when and where to show up for my execution.

The Wolf

This is not about calling 311 but about blocking others with your car. A over 30 of years ago I got called out of davening because Hatzoloh was at my hous treating a child who was injured. I couldn’t leave till the person blocking my car came and moved his car. The child had to wait at the hospital because the person who accompanied the child was his 16 old brother who was not authorized to give consent.
2 weeks prior to this child’s bar mitzvah,the same person blocked my car, so I told him that he has a chance in 2 weeks to ask mechilah from the child. He laughed at me. Life goes on and not 1 of his daughters found a shidduch. This man left this world in his 80’s without a grandchild.

its dine memonos…you cant call a bes din court to remove …how else will one get out of driveway

Joseph,

Your response to Milhouse is a strawman comment. You are concocting a ridiculous scenario of someone going to jail for blocking a driveway when we all know that is pretty much an impossibility. Blocking a driveway will result in a fine and possibly the inconvenience of being towed and resulting tow charges.

Still waiting for the name of a Posek who says that calling 311 for blocking a driveway is considered mesira.

Joseph,

Your response to me is a strawman comment. You are concocting a ridiculous scenario of someone being fined $35,000 for blocking a driveway when we all know that is pretty much an impossibility. Blocking a driveway will result in a fine ($95 in NYC) and possibly the inconvenience of being towed and resulting tow charges.

Still waiting for the name of a Posek who says that calling 311 for blocking a driveway is considered mesira.

I can’t take this stupidity any longer. Jail or 35000.00? Gimme a break.

Don’t be silly. You’re only chayev misa if you knew the alarm owner was a jew. I’m assuming you knew otherwise. If, on the other hand, you knew it was a jew and you called the cops anyway, then you’re out of luck. )-:

I can’t say for certain that the car belonged to a Jew, but the odds are well in favor that it was a Jew’s car, since the majority of people on my block are Jews.

And, besides, I’d do the same thing again in a heartbeat (call the cops at 3 am, and not call a Bais Din). I understand that that not only makes me a moser, but an unrepentant one who is a menace to the community.

The Wolf

In my humbleness, I think it makes a difference if the owner just wants the offending vehicle towed away, or to be fined. Gemarah (I think) and Halachah (I suppose too) permits to remove (at violator’s expense) something worgfully blocking you.
הממלא חצר חברו כדים, בעל החצר משבר ויוצא משבר

If it’s going to stay there and the intention is just to get even …. Don’t know.
Likewise if it’s going to stay there and his intention is to teach him a lesson… Good Shailah

Igros moshe choshen mishpat 1:92 allowed to work for the tax department even though you might have to report a yid cheating, since if you don’t work there a different guy will find the irregularity anyway. Here, too, it’s obvious to the whole world that a car is blocking a driveway.

Same, 1:8: ossur to masser a guy selling neveilos; one of the reasons is that we can’t say that beis din can’t take care of it. Can we say beis din can take care of this, right away? Other reasons to asser there are that punishment by goyishe court is more than beis din…is that true here?

shevet halevi yoreh deah 58. Noch a tax inspector. Muttar since owing the govt taxes is a legitimate choiv, als dina demalchusah, so no problem telling the govt. Ramoh says it’s bad anyway, like hashovas aveidah to a goy, but that doesn’t apply to tax man because it’s to the govt, not a nochri person. Is a fine like that? idk

teshuva of r. elyashiv brought in sefer devar sinai/she’eilos be’eretz hachayim 45,46—mutar to report theft to police since mesirah only applies where the goyim would treat him harshly, which is not shayech nowadays. Based on panim meiros 2:155. again, is nidon didan like a case of theft or not

Joseph, if you saw somebody taking out his phone to call 311 in such a situation, would you kill him? He’s publicly committing a serious aveirah.

Wolf: slaying a moser is only halachicly possible before he commits his craven deed; not afterwards.

I’ve already said that if the same thing were to happen again, I would do the same thing.

The Wolf

Joseph,
Is someone allowed to call 911 when he gets rear ended by you because you were blogging while driving?
Or is that mesira too?

Joseph, even if the penalty for blocking a driveway is harsh, I would say that al pi din, yes, you have the right to inform the government so long as your intention is merely to get the car moved, not to punish the offender. The fact that you know the offender will be punished as a result of your call is not your concern.

However midas chassidus (and Pareto optimality) in such a case would be to balance his huge loss against the small loss you suffer from being blocked in (or out of) your driveway, and not call, but pursue him in beis din for the loss he caused you.

Regarding a reasonable effort, technically as a matter of strict halocho I’m not sure this is even required, I don’t recall seeing it written down as a requirement, but hasechel nosenes, it stands to reason that it must be so; if he would have been willing to stop damaging you on his own, but you never gave him a chance to, then how can you justify getting him in trouble?

So what is a reasonable effort? First and most obviously, if it is at least as easy to call the driver as it is to call the cops, then it’s obvious that you must do so. But even if calling the cops is easier, it seems to me that so long as calling the guy and asking him to fix what he has done does not put a substantial burden on you, then you ought to do so. Obviously what is a substantial burden depends heavily on the circumstances, so you should probably call a rov and ask a shayla, just as you would in any other heavily fact-and-circumstance-dependent situation, such as kitchen or bedroom shaylos. That’s what a rov’s judgment is for.

Joeseph my rav says it’s okay, unless I know 100% the person is a yid.

Calling the cops won’t generally get the car away from the driveway any faster. Until the cops come, give the ticket, and then the tow truck coming, can take many hours. Chances are the car will be moved by then.

Better to just take a pocket knife and slash the tires than to call the cops.