Thanks, Stand Your Ground! No homicide charges for teen who shot, killed man

[thucythucy]

161. "What difference between your scenario..."

One difference is that without STG it becomes that much more difficult for you to pull off a "legal" murder. I happen to think our society should make murder as difficult as possible, and that when murders occur they should be investigated and, where possible, prosecuted.

As for your scenario, you have your wife as a witness. As for the rest of it, the "trial by media" etc., that may or may not happen, depending on the details. I doubt though that under those circumstances you'd be convicted of manslaughter, not if your wife testifies. If Zimmerman can get off on basically the same excuse without witnesses by raising a reasonable doubt in the minds of the jurors, I doubt very much you'd be convicted under similar circumstances and with a witness corraborating your story.

And I think any "DA running for Senate next fall..." would be unlikely to prosecute a case of a husband defending his wife from a possible rape. Not unless he or she wants to commit political suicide.

As for the "dead end street" scenario, we're now talking premeditated murder, which involves more planning, not to mention way more effort, than the almost random shooting/hate crime I described. As I said, murder should be difficult, and there shouldn't be a get out of jail free loophole written into the law. If someone actually sets out to murder you, wouldn't you prefer the presumption of the law be on your side, and not on the side of the murderer? How often do you walk alone, without a witness in sight, past dead end streets? How long would your potential murderer have to case you out before being presented with such an opportunity?

And I notice you didn't actually answer my question. I'm to assume then, that there is nothing in SYG that prevents my scenario from becoming fact? It seems to me this is, in fact, precisely what happened in the Zimmerman case, and seems bound to happen in others. And from your response, it seems you know this as well.