Wow, here's a state trying to return to rationality ...
New Hampshire House Votes to Repeal Stand Your Ground
by Deanna Pan, motherjones.com -- Mar. 28, 2013
By a slim five-vote margin, New Hampshire's House of Representatives yesterday passed a bill to repeal the state's Stand Your Ground law, the controversial self-defense statute that essentially allows anyone who feels threatened by someone else to shoot first rather than retreat.
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Meanwhile, study after study shows SYG laws don't deter crime and are associated with more murder and manslaughter. Between 2005 and 2010, justifiable homicides by civilians using firearms doubled in Stand Your Ground states, while falling or remaining the same in others. And they're not applied equally to white and black shooters, as MoJo's Hannah Levintova pointed out: "homicides involving white shooters and black victims are 11 times more likely to be deemed 'justifiable" than those where the scenario is reversed."
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That post as an interactive map that shows the States which have passed SYG Laws:
Here is the first study referenced in the previous NH returns to civility post:
Study: 'Stand your ground' laws don't deter crime, may lead to more murders
by Jessica Lipscomb, naplesnews.com -- July 13, 2012
"Stand your ground" laws do not deter crime and might actually cause an increase in murders and manslaughters, according to a June study out of Texas A&M University.
Researchers in College Station, Texas, looked at 21 states that in recent years expanded their so-called "stand your ground" or "castle doctrine" laws to places other than a person's home.
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The study found no evidence the laws deterred crimes like burglaries, robberies and aggravated assaults, and showed states that had adopted such laws saw a 7 percent to 9 percent increase in murders and manslaughters, compared to states without them.
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Here is the second study referenced in the intro NH story:
Stand Your Ground Laws, Homicides, and Injuries
Chandler B. McClellan, Erdal Tekin
NBER Working Paper No. 18187 -- Issued in June 2012
National Bureau of Economic Research
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In this paper, we use monthly data from the U.S. Vital Statistics to examine how Stand Your Ground laws affect homicides and firearm injuries. We identify the impact of these laws by exploiting variation in the effective date of these laws across states over time. Our results indicate that Stand Your Ground laws are associated with a significant increase in the number of homicides among whites, especially white males. According to our estimates, between 28 and 33 additional white males are killed each month as a result of these laws. We find no consistent evidence to suggest that these laws increase homicides among blacks.
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A little background info on the nber.org, who authored/promoted the last study:
National Bureau of Economic Research -- sourcewatch.org
Between 1985 and 2001, the organization received $9,963,301 in 73 grants from only four foundations:
John M. Olin Foundation, Inc.
Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation
Scaife Foundations (Sarah Mellon Scaife)
Smith Richardson Foundation
ie. some of the usual right-wing underwriters.
Here's the report that references the disturbing racial disparity that the current SYG laws have resulted in:
8 Months After Trayvon: "Stand Your Ground" Law Deemed Just Fine by Florida
by Hannah Levintova, motherjones.com -- Nov. 16, 2012
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The evidence to date indicates it is terrible public policy. Since the spreading of the law, multiple studies have found that Stand Your Ground laws:
-- don't deter crime
-- are associated with significant increases in homicides
-- are racially discriminatory -- homicides involving white shooters and black victims are 11 times more likely to be deemed "justifiable" than those where the scenario is reversed.
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More details on that "unequal effect" being inflicted by SYG laws.
Do Stand Your Ground Laws Worsen Racial Disparities?
by John Roman, metrotrends.org -- Aug 8, 2012
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Across the country, when the shooter is white and the victim is white, the percentage of shootings ruled justifiable is a little more than 11 percent. When the shooter is black and the victim is black, about 8 percent of homicides are ruled justifiable.
Now, when the shooter is white and the victim is black, the justifiable homicide rate is 34 percent. When the situation is reversed and the shooter is black and the victim is white, shootings are ruled to be justifiable in only slightly more than 3 percent of cases.
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Here are a few other studies showing the negative impacts of SYG laws:
Researchers Blow Some Holes in Stand Your Ground
by Adam Weinstein, motherjones.com -- Jun. 12, 2012
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The Texas A&M report, which looked at crime stats from 2000-2009, is perhaps the clearest evidence yet that the NRA's crowning legislative triumph has been a public-policy nightmare. On the heels of the Trayvon Martin killing -- in which shooter George Zimmerman initially claimed immunity from prosecution under Florida's landmark SYG law -- we here at MoJo crunched the numbers and found similarly disturbing trends. So did the Wall Street Journal. Just last weekend, the US Commission on Civil Rights announced it was investigating SYG, claiming there are "some indicators of racial bias" in the law's enforcement nationwide.
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That study references this one:
U.S. Commission On Civil Rights To Investigate ‘Stand Your Ground’ Laws For Racial Bias
by Judd Legum, thinkprogress.org -- Jun 10, 2012
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According to the Commission, there are “some indicators of racial bias” in how the laws have been implemented. From the release:
Data compiled by the Wall Street Journal shows a near-doubling of justifiable homicides from 2005-2011 in states where SYG [Stand Your Ground] has passed. Moreover, their data shows that while white killers of black victims comprises only 3.1% of all homicides, such cross-racial killing constitute 15.6% of justifiable homicides.
These disturbing stats leave me asking a few serious questions:
1) When will other States follow New Hampshire's lead, and vote to repeal these ill-conceived Stand Your Ground laws?
2) When will local law enforcement, demand more evidence -- instead of simply taking shooter's word on what actually happened, when another person died ... aka the growing list of SYG Victims, nationwide?