George Zimmerman - Florida Unarmed Teen Shooting

[Norsesmithy]

If pick fights with people means taunts or being annoying, then you are right, the other person doesn't have any right to put your life into danger, no matter how annoying or puerile you are.

But if picking fights means throwing punches, pushing and shoving, or other behaviors classified as assault, then no.

Basically if you are within your rights to be where you are and do what you are doing, you are still entitled to defend yourself if attacked. Now, if you aren't in a stand your ground state, it's entirely possible that you might have a duty to retreat, but assuming that retreat is not practical or you've exhausted that possibility, your right to self defense is still extant.

[jshuberg]

According to your logic, I can go out and pick fights with people, confident in the knowledge that if I start getting my ass kicked, I can shoot the other guy with no criminal or civil risk.

Not at all. There are 4 requirements here in MN that need to be satisfied in order for lethal force in self defense to be justified:

1) In immediate threat of great bodily harm or death
2) A reluctant participant in the violence
3) No lesser force will do to eliminate the threat
4) A duty to retreat from the threat if possible

In your scenario above, even if 'stand your ground' existed in MN and #4 were removed, you still fail the other 3.

By picking a fight, you have willingly entered into a violent encounter.
An ass-kicking is unlikely to pass the test of 'great bodily harm', which is defined as suffering a permanent loss of functionality of a body part. Broken bones and lacerations do not justify the use of deadly force.
It is unlikely that lethal force was the least amount of force necessary to prevent an ass kicking.

I know this is simply a hypothetical scenario, and we can go back and forth on particulars, but it is unlikely that removing the duty to retreat would turn a murderer into a victim, as it is likely one of the remaining 3 conditions would show the individual to have been the bad guy.

[Heffay]

According to your logic, I can go out and pick fights with people, confident in the knowledge that if I start getting my ass kicked, I can shoot the other guy with no criminal or civil risk.

Not at all. There are 4 requirements here in MN that need to be satisfied in order for lethal force in self defense to be justified:

1) In immediate threat of great bodily harm or death
2) A reluctant participant in the violence
3) No lesser force will do to eliminate the threat
4) A duty to retreat from the threat if possible

In your scenario above, even if 'stand your ground' existed in MN and #4 were removed, you still fail the other 3.

By picking a fight, you have willingly entered into a violent encounter.
An ass-kicking is unlikely to pass the test of 'great bodily harm', which is defined as suffering a permanent loss of functionality of a body part. Broken bones and lacerations do not justify the use of deadly force.
It is unlikely that lethal force was the least amount of force necessary to prevent an ass kicking.

I know this is simply a hypothetical scenario, and we can go back and forth on particulars, but it is unlikely that removing the duty to retreat would turn a murderer into a victim, as it is likely one of the remaining 3 conditions would show the individual to have been the bad guy.

It seems like we've gone through all this already and are arguing in circles. That's all from case law, not actually written down in the stand your ground law that was brought up in MN. I would like to see it be part of the stand your ground law before I stand behind the law.

There have been other cases discussed where an aggressor found himself in over his head and used stand your ground to defend himself legally. That's not standing your ground. That's looking for trouble, and someone shouldn't have the same legal protections if they go looking for trouble.

Oh, and an ass-kicking is definitely grounds for self defense. There have been numerous cases of people dying from a single punch.

[connsolo]

Didn't this Zimmerman guy botch 2 and 3?

[Heffay]

Didn't this Zimmerman guy botch 2 and 3?

Not in Florida.

[Norsesmithy]

Didn't this Zimmerman guy botch 2 and 3?

Arguable.

If he was about his lawful business when Treyvon struck him, IE not trying to start a fight with the kid, he's good on #2 (there is no rule against his identifying where a suspicious person went, he was utterly within his rights to do so), and if you've got a younger and stronger person above you beating in your face, that's good for #3.

Every year a couple of people die, just in our state alone, from being punched in the face once. When someone stronger or more skilled than you hits you like they mean it, it eminently reasonable to fear great bodily harm or death.

Assuming that, 1. Zimmerman was attacked by Martin, and 2. Martin achieved the upper hand in the physical confrontation before the introduction of the firearm, this was a good shoot. Not a "feels good" shoot, just a legal and justifiable one.

[jshuberg]

I call BS!

Were that true, we'd be having jet fighters crash all the time.

All men and women in combat would freeze and die in place.

Hell, I'd be dead already! (Thanks for reminding me to check the obits for my name again today)

Too bad it ruins the rest of your argument.

I think you misunderstand. What I stated is that the fight or flight response is entirely instinctual. It is not based on higher level thought processes. Not that everyone who finds themself in a lethal force encounter will fall apart.

Read the books by Col. David Grossman and others on the subject. People without defensive or combat training will often times panic or freeze up, some will run, some will fight. People who have trained enough to program their subconscious with how to react to a threat will react according to their training. For example, there has been at least one documented incident where police officers were killed in a gun fight, and it was discovered afterward that they were emptying the spent casings from their revolvers into their shirt pockets (policing their brass) in the middle of the street during the shootout. The reason is that is how they trained, emptying their brass into their pockets. There are literally hundreds of incidents where military or law enforcement personnel have put their lives at risk by duplicating flawed training, that they never would have done if they were in fact 'thinking rationally' during the incident.

How a person reacts is obviously going to differ greatly from person to person, so it's hard to make general statements, but people who have dedicated their careers to studying how people react during a lethal force encounter all state that higher level rational thought goes bye-bye and instinct and training kick in.

My point is that if a person uses lethal force to defend themself in an otherwise legal self defense situation, they should not be made into criminals by the courts simply because they failed to recognize an avenue of retreat rather than fight back.

[jshuberg]

Oh, and an ass-kicking is definitely grounds for self defense. There have been numerous cases of people dying from a single punch.

True, but it might be a really hard sell to a jury.

[Heffay]

Oh, and an ass-kicking is definitely grounds for self defense. There have been numerous cases of people dying from a single punch.

True, but it might be a really hard sell to a jury.

Stand your ground law means it will never make it to a jury.

[tman]

I think you misunderstand. What I stated is that the fight or flight response is entirely instinctual. It is not based on higher level thought processes. Not that everyone who finds themself in a lethal force encounter will fall apart.

Read the books by Col. David Grossman and others on the subject. People without defensive or combat training will often times panic or freeze up, some will run, some will fight. People who have trained enough to program their subconscious with how to react to a threat will react according to their training. For example, there has been at least one documented incident where police officers were killed in a gun fight, and it was discovered afterward that they were emptying the spent casings from their revolvers into their shirt pockets (policing their brass) in the middle of the street during the shootout. The reason is that is how they trained, emptying their brass into their pockets. There are literally hundreds of incidents where military or law enforcement personnel have put their lives at risk by duplicating flawed training, that they never would have done if they were in fact 'thinking rationally' during the incident.

How a person reacts is obviously going to differ greatly from person to person, so it's hard to make general statements...

I think you've blown your argument here by saying "flight, fight, or freeze" isn't absoloute and can be trained out of people.

[jshuberg]

Stand your ground law means it will never make it to a jury.

All stand your ground does is remove the requirement of retreat prior to defending yourself with deadly force. If it can be shown that any of the other 3 conditions were not satisfied, you will go before a jury. 'Stand your ground' is not a defense to being the aggressor, or to overreacting to a situation, etc. This is the misconception that is being propagated in the press right now, and why decided to chime in on the discussion.

[tman]

Here's an interesting commentary in today's WASHINGTON TIMES

The assertion that Florida law allows shooting whenever someone believes it to be necessary is a flat-out lie. The actual law of Florida is that “a person is justified in the use of deadly force” if “(1) He or she reasonably believes that such force is necessary to prevent imminent death or great bodily harm to himself or herself or another or to prevent the imminent commission of a forcible felony” (Florida Statutes, Section 776.012).

The second part of the law provides special provisions for self-defense against violent home invaders or carjackers. Neither of those is relevant to the Zimmerman case.

[tazdevil]

Not at all. There are 4 requirements here in MN that need to be satisfied in order for lethal force in self defense to be justified:

1) In immediate threat of great bodily harm or death
2) A reluctant participant in the violence
3) No lesser force will do to eliminate the threat
4) A duty to retreat from the threat if possible

In your scenario above, even if 'stand your ground' existed in MN and #4 were removed, you still fail the other 3.

By picking a fight, you have willingly entered into a violent encounter.
An ass-kicking is unlikely to pass the test of 'great bodily harm', which is defined as suffering a permanent loss of functionality of a body part. Broken bones and lacerations do not justify the use of deadly force.
It is unlikely that lethal force was the least amount of force necessary to prevent an ass kicking.

I know this is simply a hypothetical scenario, and we can go back and forth on particulars, but it is unlikely that removing the duty to retreat would turn a murderer into a victim, as it is likely one of the remaining 3 conditions would show the individual to have been the bad guy.

The ass kicking could pass the test of great bodily harm when you add the potential for head injuries, blunt force chest trauma, and some broken bones can lead to death or serious inkiry (femur fractures severing the femoral artery=very bad day, and maybe last day). With that in mind, the use of deadly force comes back into play.

[jdege]

Oh, and an ass-kicking is definitely grounds for self defense. There have been numerous cases of people dying from a single punch.

True, but it might be a really hard sell to a jury.

I'm not so sure.

The question isn't what the person intends, but what a reasonable person would perceive.

The guy who's beating on you may only intend to beat you unconscious. But how reasonable would be your expectation that he would stop there, given than he's already engaged in a felony assault?

[maxjam]

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