Stand Your Ground laws, enacted in perhaps as many as 15 states, possibly more, have also been called "Make My Day" and "Shoot First" laws. They have been promoted by that bastion of personal rights and liberties, the NRA, and ALEC, the purveyor of so much conservatively-oriented legislative language.
Ostensibly, Florida's statute is why on the night George killed Trayvon, the prosecuting attorney decided not to press charges or even to detain the shooter after a custodial interview.
Below the gentle decoration, the Florida law, some background and a proposal.
Stand Your Ground statutes vary. Some states limit them to defending one's home. In that respect, they modified a common law doctrine (judge-made, as opposed to legislative act) that you could not use deadly force even in your own home unless you felt under threat of imminent harm or death. Essentially, the statutes created a presumption of threat simply from the circumstance of being in someone else's home or car.
The Florida law is not so limited. Section 776.013 (3) provides:
A person who is not engaged in an unlawful activity and who is attacked in any other place where he or she has a right to be has no duty to retreat and has the right to stand his or her ground and meet force with force, including deadly force if he or she 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.
(
Note: The title above this language says "home protection" but the title is not the law. The phrase "any other place" refers to a preceding section on dwellings, residences and occupied vehicles.)
And Florida law goes the next step farther - a giant step farther, in my view - in implementing this provision:
A person who uses force as permitted in [the section quoted above] is justified in using such force and is immune from criminal prosecution and civil action for the use of such force ... As used in this subsection, the term "criminal prosecution" includes arresting, detaining in custody, and charging or prosecuting the defendant.
So, not only is defending yourself with a deadly weapon a defense to be raised
if you are charged, but it becomes a strong shield from being held responsible at the get go. In this respect, Florida's process seems extraordinarily lenient. In most states, a police officer who so much as pulls a gun is officially questioned about it. And if the officer should fire the weapon, he or she is relieved of it and typically faces a detailed inquiry into the circumstances. Under Florida's statute, a shooter who is in a place "where he or she has a right to be" would seem to trump a potential victim who has an equally strong right to be there and not retreat.
Florida courts apply the statute to warrant a hearing in advance of trial and separate from it, to determine how solid the case is for a Stand Your Ground defense. Given how determinative the Florida law sounds, it may not be a bad idea to find out early how lax gun laws and broad brush defenses apply to the particular case.
The lead House sponsor of the Florida statute, State Representative and Chair of the Criminal Justice Subcommittee, Dennis Baxley, suggested to NPR's Neil Conan (on Talk of the Nation, March 26, 2012) that the law did not apply to George Zimmerman's defense:
"[I]if you carefully read the statute, which most of the critics have not, and read the legislative analysis, there's nothing in this statute that authorizes you to pursue or confront other people. If anything, this law would have protected the victim in this case; it could have."
Rep. Baxley may be correct. But, which one was the victim under the presumptions of the Florida statute - George or Trayvon? Gun-carrying self-appointed community-watch vigilantes who walk around their communities at night in the rain may not accept that they are not supposed to "pursue or confront" someone they believe doesn't belong where they are. After all, pursuing and confronting is what neighborhood watchmen do. Should they call the police? Yup, that's what the signs in many such communities say, and what the 911 tape shows George did, and then George was advised to the effect that George need not follow Trayvon. What happened next is certainly a question of fact for a jury to decide.
A Proposal for a Think Twice Law. So I propose an amendment to every Stand Your Ground statute that goes beyond one's home or vehicle.
If you are carrying a gun - lawfully or otherwise - and you kill somebody, there is also a presumption that you pre-meditated using your weapon.
This approach seems wholly consistent with the principal rationale for allowing guns and gun-carries in the first place: defense of self and loved ones. Carry a gun or have it close enough to use and by definition, you intend to use it to hurt or kill someone. Presume that, and the courts - as with the defense of Stand Your Ground - can sort the facts out later but with the added possibility of a First Degree murder charge if justified by the facts of each case.