by Susie
Oh, come on. Your law did exactly what it was intended to do: Give paranoid minority-hating gun nuts a ‘get out of jail free’ card:
Ironically, the author of FL’s ‘stand your ground’ law former Sen. Durell Peaden, thinks George Zimmerman should be arrested for Trayvon’s murder. From the CBSNews link:
The authors of Florida’s controversial “stand your ground” self-defense law say George Zimmerman should probably be arrested for shooting Trayvon Martin, reports the Miami Herald.
“He has no protection under my law,” former Sen. Durell Peaden told the newspaper.
Florida’s law, called “stand your ground” by supporters and “shoot first” by critics, was passed in 2005 and permits residents to use deadly force if they “reasonably believes it is necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm to himself or herself or another or to prevent the commission of a forcible felony.”
Traditionally, self-defense laws did not typically extend beyond a person’s home, but the Florida law, and at least 20 more passed across the country since them, allows a resident to “meet force with force” almost anywhere, including the street or a bar.
The author of the bill, an R and most likely a card-carrying NRA member to boot, has the blood of Trayvon on his hands as well and I hope that disgusting fuck sees Trayvon every time he closes his eyes at night. I googled him and he also has a law degree, so he knew better than to author such a bill and it’s implications when the rightwing nutjobs took full advantage of it.
Full disclosure, I own a handgun and have my entire adult life, but I do not support the NRA or the idiots at ALEC and their rightwing agendas. These types of bills make it open season on anyone the gun owner doesn’t like, it has nothing to do with ‘protecting’ the gun owner.
In defense of the author’s statement about his bill which was written in a way to easily misused, Zimmerman was not in any danger: He was in a vehicle, he was in contact with the police; he was told not to give chase. He had no “ground to stand on” in claiming self-defense.
He chose to be the aggressor — I would think that means he has lost any self-defense defense.
I mean, how can a “stand your ground” law be applicable when the shooter chose the ground, moved the ground, chose to chase a citizen doing nothing wrong, chose to get into some kind of verbal, then physical altercation (Zimmerman gave chase, he knocked the kid to the ground, he shot the kid).
And with all the taped statements and sounds, Zimmerman doesn’t have a leg to stand on.
Plus, and this is a sad aspect to this situation and to real life, the young man who was murdered is extremely photogenic, a real sweetheart of a handsome young man. High Q factor.
Dammit the Feds are already back tracking. The grand jury is going to be given a VERY expansive definition of perception behing closed doors and everybody is going to scurry away when the jury hands down no charges. I would love to see the twitter feed and e-mail traffic of the nut balloons at the NRA on this subject. I really suspect they relish the spectre of a race war because(despite all protests to the contrary) this is an open season on black males.