Its the same in Sweden. THe law sais, you are only allowed to use as much force as neccesary to save your self. That means if you hit a person and he is down for a couple of seconds so that you can escape then it is self defence. You are not allowed to kill someone nomatter the purpose of the offender.
I can agree with this to some degree, there are situations where you have no witnesses and its only word against word. If you kill someone in a situation like that, why should anyone belive you? Because your a good man? Bulls**t, everyone lies. The law is no easy thing. Lawbreakers are bad, but that does not give you the right to take his life.
You know what pisses me off? Not long ago i read about a guy that saved a woman from a car accident in US. During the process the woman lost all felling in her legs and is now paralyzed. If the guy had choosen to not act as fast as he did she would have been burned alive. The sad part is that she sued him because shes paralyzed today. She wanted him to leave her so that the rescue crew could save her. Funny thing is her car was all burned down when they arrivd.