Since the bus vignette and its Narrative seemed realistic to me, I thought Labaan might have some suggestions. He sounds like an interesting character.

As to shooting looters, that was part of the Detroit Riot - discussed as part of the COIN comes home thread. Ken White's unit did not find it necessary to shoot anyone, Went there, did that. "Shoot all the looters" is a good soundbite; so also "Shoot all irregular combatants".

As to the "fleeing felon" rule, some materials re: Tennessee v Garner are linked here, Tennessee v. Garner (part of the Astan ROE Change thread).

As to mutiny, I couldn't find any summary execution provisons in the Manual for Courts-Martial re: "mutiny" (searched all returns on the word). Obviously, during the active mutiny, we have a combat situation where "armed, hostile, shoot" would be a valid rule. Once the mutineers have surrendered, another story - see, Summary Execution.

True that Tony Waller was acquitted at his 1902 CM (for reasons that mostly avoided the merits); but in that case, there was more relative filth to cast at the flag grades (see J. Franklin Bell and Jacob H. Smith) than with the field and company grades who had to carry out the orders (dirty or not).

Within my own personal package of morals and ethics (and a vivid imagination), I could think of scenarios where my morals and ethics would allow summary actions (including executions) in sitations where "exigent circumstances" or "absolute necessity" exist. Others' morals and ethics would collide with mine. In general, discussing the extremes leads to extremes in discourse. In any event, "exigent circumstances" and "absolute necessity" are "jury nullification" arguments, which are thin reeds indeed. In Waller's case, they worked, but he never got to command the Corps.

Regards

Mike