Question from a viewer:
A person approaches the car you are in with a baseball bat.
A person approaches the car you are in with a baseball bat.
Answer by James Hiromasa:
Good one, and not uncommon anymore, unfortunately.
Good one, and not uncommon anymore, unfortunately.
Disclaimer: I am not an attorney, I don’t play one on TV, and none of this is legal advice. 
I have to start with the obvious: Drive away. But I know it’s not that simple. To effectively use this escape strategy you have to always make sure you are leaving a good gap between your car and the one in front of you. Of course, if there are barriers on the sides that also won’t be possible. Here’s the thing though…sidewalks and medians aren’t physical “barriers”, but they are mental ones because we don’t normally associate driving over these things as being acceptable.
The other reason to leave a gap is so you can build up “ramming speed” to hit and move the car that’s in front of you to get away, especially assuming it’s his.
Now, let’s get into it further…
Can you run him over? Maybe. You’d have to be able to articulate that you were in fear of serious bodily injury or death. If you are safely in your locked vehicle, and he’s beating on the font grill, you are not yet in danger necessarily yet. You could make an argument that you couldn’t escape and were a sitting duck, but that would be tough in today’s climate of anti-self-defense. But what if you can’t move your car? Are you able to get out of your car and escape? Colorado doesn’t have a true “duty to retreat” law but it will be looked at if you had opportunity to escape that way and didn’t take it.
Now, what if he’s immediately approaching the drivers side window (or passenger window if you have a soul in that seat)? Be hard to actually run him over at that angle assuming you waited to verify that’s his purpose. If you did get a good angle on him, you’d have to be really clear on why you knew he was coming for you.
Firearms? Same story but at least you can wait until he’s within range of striking your drivers or passengers window before presenting your firearm. This doesn’t mean you MUST shoot either. Most road rage’rs quickly find sanity when faced with a handgun. Feels to me you have a good case of ‘imminent’ when he has the bat and is close enough to striking YOU (not your grill). Probably not surprisingly I’ve run this scenario in my head many times especially when stopped at a light and people are around outside being aggressive and have access to blunt objects. Here is where I am NOT offering this advice, but saying “think” about this…if you have a firearm and you exit your vehicle early to point at him, you MIGHT be guilty of felony brandishing IF it doesn’t seem imminent that he is going to attack you. However, if you exit your vehicle to tell him to back off, the police have been called, and you just happen to be CLEARLY open carrying on your hip, then he may see the firearm but you’re not brandishing it. Do note that you can’t ‘unzip’ or lift your shirt to show it, then you’re intentional again. It would need to be clearly an open carry situation.
REMEMBER: You do not have a right to use deadly force to protect your possessions or property except under 18-1-704.5 Colorado’s make my day (castle doctrine) law.
Next thought: how is your baseball bat defense? You are legally justified in using appropriate force to defend your property (just not deadly force). So you do have a right to get out and physically stop him. But he has a bat, you do not. Of course it’s a grey line because if you get out to defend your car, and he swings at you, now you’re back in deadly force justified again…what a mess.
If you don’t get out, and he makes it to your drivers window, he may get a swing enough to break your window out, but not likely to have a good 2nd swing to hit you. If possible, slide over to the passenger seat and exit from that side and make your escape. If you can’t, or if you have a passenger to protect, you might try to time it just right so if he steps to the window/door from the side you can blast that door open into him and exit to put the door between you and him. Not ideal, because you’ll still have to defend against a baseball bat but given close quarters and limited swing room, you have a good chance of making it work for you.
Hopefully some of this helps!