Duty to retreat vs stand your ground and castle laws: Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater

[caseymoz]

94. That's the baby?

I'm willing to say people using self-defense should get more deference in investigations, but to make them immune from arrest, prosecution or civil complaint is a matter of giving some murderers "special rights." I mean, name any other situation that involves somebody killed where the only other party involved is immune to civil action. Certainly doesn't apply in vehicular deaths, and arguably there's less likely to be criminal intent in those cases than there is in shootings.

If shooting somebody isn't the last resort, which resort is it? One reason for making it acceptable only as the most extreme measure is that criminal intent becomes much harder to determine. With "reasonable doubt," there's going to be at least one person on a jury who sees Zimmerman in compliance with the letter of the law, if not its purpose.

Any way it happens, killing somebody should be a hassle, especially when it looks deliberate. You make it easier, and more people innocent and guilty, will get killed. Paranoia will rise, and stresses in society such as racial tensions just gets worse, leading to unrest and possibly to more people getting killed.

I'll stick by what I say until events prove me wrong. If I'm incorrect about everything else, trial will be a hung jury. Prosecutors and police chiefs warned about this before SYG was passed. So, I refer you to the experts, who weren't just pissing and moaning.

It's not like there were thousands of innocent self-defenders in prison. No, then it would resemble the War on Drugs, which they're not about to reform. What actually happened was a private think-tank, ALEC, a sort of conspiracy of corporations, wrote this law and passed it on a lawmaker for vote. It's McLegislation.