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Stand Your Ground

Discussion in 'BBS Hangout: Debate & Discussion' started by rocketsjudoka, Mar 22, 2012.

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  1. Bandwagoner

    Bandwagoner Contributing Member

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    You are wrong on the first statement. I don't know what to tell you. I guess do some reading on it but first deal with these for yourself:

     
  2. FranchiseBlade

    FranchiseBlade Contributing Member
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    An unintentional death isn't accidental? It sounded like what you were describing was an accidental death (that it wasn't the intention)
     
  3. Bandwagoner

    Bandwagoner Contributing Member

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    I can shoot you in the leg on purpose without intent to kill, it isn't accidental if it hits your artery and you bleed out. I can pop you in the head with a riot gun loaded with less than lethal ammo, if you die it isn't accidental. Why not read some yourself instead of muck up this thread?
     
    #83 Bandwagoner, Mar 23, 2012
    Last edited: Mar 23, 2012
  4. FranchiseBlade

    FranchiseBlade Contributing Member
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    The death is accidental. The charge in court may not be "accidental homicide". Why don't you read a dictionary with the word "accidental" in it. Unintentional is accidental.

    Unless you intend to kill the person a death is unintentional.
     
  5. Rocket River

    Rocket River Member

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    <iframe width="420" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/AKKqLl_ZEEY" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

    hhhmmm . . . is this it?

    Rocket River
     
  6. rocketsjudoka

    rocketsjudoka Contributing Member
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    I had stated that several times in this thread before that post.


    not "as soon as possible" but if possible.

    Retreat laws only come into play when deadly force is otherwise justified, we agree on this.

    Justification of deadly force come when the situation has gone WAY WRONG, we seem to disagree here because you are taking liberties with "reasonable person" that in practice are not valid and won't work IMO. [/quote]

    Once again though that term is a subjective term you seem to agree by the fact that you add "IMO" at the end of this instance.

    I fully agree with your analysis but where we differ is that you feel that having to explain why you didn't retreat is an unreasonable burden. I think anytime that deadly force is used whoever does it should be prepared to justify fully why they didn't consider retreat. Obviously there are situations where retreat is not the safest course. I will say in general that most dangerous situations retreat is the safest course for a variety of reasons.

    Again you are looking at this as after the incident in regard to prosecution. I am looking at it as how does this relate to the thought process when approaching the incident. The danger that I see is that people think that since the law says "stand your ground" they don't consider possible retreat.

    And have you considered at all that Stand Your Ground may unintentionally be contributing to getting to that point? In the other thread someone brought up a case in FL where two men were arguing at a playground. One man pulled a gun and the other tried to go for it. In the ensuing scuffle the man who went for the gun was shot. The guy who pulled the gun argued based on Stand Your Ground that he pulled the gun because he feared the other man would attack him and he didn't need to retreat. In that case then the law affected his thinking rather than thinking that if he thought the other guy was a threat he should've backed off. At the same time though for the guy who got shot. If that was his thought process Is it possible that the guy went for the gun because he felt that he was entitled to stand his ground and try to disarm the man rather than just backing off?
     
  7. rocketsjudoka

    rocketsjudoka Contributing Member
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    Defend myself in a court of law yes I would if that happened here in Minnesota and I would expect that. That said though under Minnesota's current law that is a retreat law still wouldn't prevent me from taking the guy down since it would be clear to show that I couldn't retreat since the assailant had a grip on me. Stand Your Ground doesn't matter except for that after the fact I had to explain why I couldn't retreat.

    Keep in mind even under Stand Your Ground you would still have to account for why you used deadly force in the first place.

    Also I just noticed in your previous thread you ask if retreating goes against most instinct and is dangerous. It doesn't as we have a fight or flight response and in most cases an animal will run away rather than fight. Also extricating yourself out of a dangerous situation is almost always better than staying in it. As I frequently state a bar or street isn't a dojo or ring since there are many variables that come into play in any self-defense situation. For example using the situation you describe. If I can take the person holding me down on his butt once that has happened it would be in my interest to get away from him as fast as possible. Now I could stay and engage in in ground or pound, put a submission move on him or etc.. but what if he has friends who see me putting a Kimura on him and they jump on me. The best thing in the situation you describe for my own safety is once I take the guy down so he doesn't have a hold on me is to get the HELL OUT OF THERE. In other words retreat.
     
    #87 rocketsjudoka, Mar 23, 2012
    Last edited: Mar 23, 2012
  8. Bandwagoner

    Bandwagoner Contributing Member

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    Right, you take him down and then escape. That was meant to be a part of the situation I described. It isn't outside the realm of possibility you do it in an extremely violent way, he doesn't expect it or isn't able to prepare for it coming, and he suffers massive head trauma or broken neck or whatever and dies. It could be argued that you should/could have just ran without knocking him down. And accounting for it later doesn't mean explaining to the police or your lawyer, it would possibly/probably mean going to a grand jury. Which real world means 20K or so in fees, and a very real chance of doing time. If a few witnesses saw it and testify that he only had a loose grip, or had you at arms length, it might be hard to show that putting him down was reasonable. Even if those same witnesses pegged him as totally at fault and the aggressor AND serving you with blows to the head.

    Anyways, hypothetical.

    I think our main difference is you believe these laws change people behavior in a negative way. I don't think they do and I base that on most people are probably ignorant of the law, and during an actual deadly situation they are running on pure fight/flight. I had no idea Texas changed until I renewed my CHL a couple of years ago, and I am usually current on this kind of info.

    I would say this Zimmerman guy is probably knowledgeable on the law, but my (uninformed) opinion is he was probably the aggressor so it doesn't apply to him.
     
  9. Bandwagoner

    Bandwagoner Contributing Member

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    I think we have our debate squared away, if so can you explain why retreat is safer in most situations? Are you talking about some conflict resolution towards someone perhaps with a weapon or do you mean an actual 100% fight it is better to GTFO?

    If someone is trying to stab you it seems turning and running leaves you pretty wide open and your attacker will have a head start because he didn't have to turn around
    If someone is hitting you, you will likely be out of it or dazed and the attacker will have massive adrenaline flowing.
    Obviously if someone is just threatening you with a club or knife it would be better to diffuse/calm them and GTFO but if actively attacking I don't see the advantage. Just curious.
     
  10. FranchiseBlade

    FranchiseBlade Contributing Member
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    I don't think saving 20K and the hassle of having to appear before a jury is too much to ask when someone has lost their life.
     
  11. Nook

    Nook Member

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    He does not have any proof because ultimately there isn't any. He likes to throw sensation blanket statements out. It is too bad because it diverts from actual examples of discrimination and undermines the topic.
     
  12. Nook

    Nook Member

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    How can you believe it is good or horrible without knowing the circumstances and merits of each case? Someone could flip it around and say it is horrible that innocent people were being incarcerated.
     
  13. Rocket River

    Rocket River Member

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    [​IMG]

    Stand your ground in its purest form

    Rocket River
     
  14. bloop

    bloop Member

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    Zimmerman's case isn't about Stand Your Ground.

    Blacks who have a problem with this have a problem not because of the statutes of Stand Your Ground but the idea that the a non-black killed a black kid and got off. To be clear it's not because a guy defended himself with deadly force but because the person who died was black and the person who killed him was (in their eyes) white.

    They have a problem with police bias, that they let him off because he was white, not because of stand your ground.

    I've read that Zimmerman had a broken nose and severe bleeding from the back of his head. But according to these witnesses Zimmerman was the aggressor and was on top of the kid when they found him after they heard the gunshot. http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/crime/2012/03/19/bts-florida-martin-teen-shooting-witnesses.wkmg Keep in mind that neither of these white girls saw the fight. But they agree on what they saw in the aftermath of the fight. Zimmerman was on top and the kid was face down.

    It's very possible that the boy got violent and attacked Zimmerman. He might have even broken Zimmerman's nose and slammed his head. However no provision of Stand Your Ground allows you to shoot a kid once the immediate threat is over. For example you can't shoot a kid just because he got violent and even hurt you then got up and started to walk away. You have to be in danger.

    Also as it's been widely reported, refusing to excuse yourself from the situation as soon as the opportunity exists negates any Stand Your Ground protection and there's audio evidence of Zimmerman refusing to do this.

    This case isn't about Stand Your Ground. It's about a black kid being killed by a non-black and 45 million African Americans sympathizing with him. Last time I posted about this a couple weeks ago the facts weren't out but honestly from the evidence now available it's clearly not self-defense. So Stand your ground is irrelevant.

    FWIW you need provisions like Stand Your Ground in the US. Especially in rural areas, out West etc... you guys who've lived in metro areas all your lives would be clueless about that...
     
  15. Raven

    Raven Member

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    Stand your ground is suppose to protect self defense shooters from politically motivated prosecutors. What strikes me, though, is why this story is getting so much attention when the story involving the white kid being set on fire by a bunch of black kids received so little.
     
  16. FranchiseBlade

    FranchiseBlade Contributing Member
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    Because I think anybody who kills someone needs to measure up to the toughest and strictest standards in a court of law before that homicide is determined to be justifiable.

    Road rage battles, and shooting dozens of bullets into a car doesn't match those standards for me.
     
  17. rocketsjudoka

    rocketsjudoka Contributing Member
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    This is an article from the NYT summarizing the Zimmerman Martin case up to this point. Most of the info in here has already been brought up in the "Trayvon Martin" thread but wanted to bring up something in the article regarding the affect that the Stand Your Ground law has had in FL.

    http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/46922042/ns/us_news-the_new_york_times/#.T3mbgNmfhI0

    [rquoter]Sanford police have said that once Mr. Zimmerman declared that he had shot Trayvon in the chest in self-defense, they were barred from arresting him by the state’s now-famous Stand Your Ground law, the broadest protection of self-defense in the country. It immediately requires law enforcement officials to prove that a suspect did not act in self-defense, and sets the case on a slow track.

    Angela B. Corey, the state attorney for the Jacksonville area who has been appointed special prosecutor in the Trayvon Martin case, said that the controversial 2005 law has changed the rules for prosecutors. Making arrests, filing charges and securing convictions are more difficult and time consuming. Now, she said, “There is a different standard.”

    Ms. Corey said her office has handled hundreds of these self-defense cases — at least three or four every month. The law constantly challenges the authorities, with people citing it for everything from bar fights to road rage. “We’ve lost Stand Your Ground motions that in my experience showed the shooter should not have shot,” she said. “Stand Your Ground needs a second look.” [/rquoter]

    A couple of things I take away from here. If FL's Stand Your Ground law bars police from arresting someone who claims self-defense can that defense be used in all cases where someone was killed? Lets say police are called to a domestic disturbance and they find they a husband standing over the body of his wife, a knife in his hand. He has no visible wounds and she is unarmed but he claims self-defense. Can that man be arrested or if once the self-defense claim is made the police are required to let him go pending further investigation?

    The Stand Your Ground law also sounds like it is being claimed in many instances where self-defense may not apply. What I worries me about this is what does that do to the psychology of people. This law could be encouraging people to engage in and / or remain in violent situations which otherwise they might not have been.
     
  18. rocketsjudoka

    rocketsjudoka Contributing Member
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    I'm sorry I missed this but in all of the Trayvon Martin threads flying around didn't check back on this one until today.

    That in the situation you describe I greatly injure the other person or kill them and perhaps others don't see it that way. As both of us though realize though is that most self-defense laws are based upon reasonable person standards. Even under Stand Your Ground my actions would still need to be shown as reasonable. While perhaps I wouldn't have to argue why I didn't retreat in the first place the actions that I did to lead to that result should be explained.

    Again the problem I see with Stand Your Ground in your hypothetical though is if I have taken the guy down and then proceed to beat on him further. If it is reasonable at that point for me to escape Stand Your Ground would seem to indicate that I can just stay there. As I said that is a bad idea for reasons other than the law but to me it strikes me as the law is silent upon whether I choose to stay or not.

    See the article I just posted and it appears like there is some evidence that Stand Your Ground is being applied much more often according to prosecutors. I will agree without some more investigation we don't know how much people are aware of that law but it likely is having some affect.

    Very likely.
     
  19. rocketsjudoka

    rocketsjudoka Contributing Member
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    I am talking about avoidance and escape. Stand Your Ground basically states if you are under threat you are under no legal obligation to retreat. I think that everyone should consider retreat as the first option. As I have said before a fight, or any other physical conflict is very unpredictable and you should minimize the amount of variables by just getting out of there.

    Obviously there are situations where you can't get out of there and that is where the reasonable person standard applies to retreat. As stated above though given how many things can't be predicted and can go wrong it is better to avoid the conflict if you can.

    Diffusing / de-escalating I include as avoidance.
     
  20. T_Man

    T_Man Contributing Member

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    Hey Judoka,

    Happy to see that you are putting the discussion and focus on where it should be.. On the law and not about the individuals or race..

    This law leaves a lot of loop holes and it needs to be adjusted.. I get what they were trying to do, but someone really dropped the ball on this one.

    T_Man
     

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