Getting away with Murder

There are different laws in each state that allow citizens to protect themselves against a criminal. However, Florida’s law Stand your ground is giving todays citizens a right to kill. Every day we read about a new case where this law justifies the killing of another person. This law was made up to protect criminals and people who choose to kill when they could have easily avoided the whole situation. Shoot first and ask questions later should have been the name of this law. Walking home from the convenient store, playing your music in your car at a gas station, or even going to the movies and asking someone to keep it down has become a scary task. How is it possible that you run the risk of getting shot or killed by doing these everyday normal tasks and the person responsible for your death gets off Scott free with no repercussion for their actions? Having the right to protect yourself when you are seriously in harm’s way is necessary, but useless acts of violence is what todays people are doing and justifying it in court with the Stand your Ground law. This is turning innocent people into targets for angry individuals to take their frustrations or dislikes out on. I want to have the right to walk down the street with a hoodie on and not fear for my life. Gun laws have been restricted over the U.S since the Sandy Hook shootings; however Florida still hasn’t caught up with these actions and still provides an out for over zelles gun toting outlaws. In this paper I will cover a few cases that show how the Stand your Ground law is just a way of getting away with murder and not providing the protection it should for rightful citizens to protect themselves against real criminals.
The definition of the stand your ground law is “A person who is not engaged in an unlawful activity and who is attacked in any other place where he or she has a right to be has no duty to retreat and has the right to stand his or her ground and meet force with force, including deadly force if he or she reasonably believes it is necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm to himself or herself or another or to prevent the commission of a forcible felony.” This means that you have the right to defend yourself if you are somewhere you have the right to be at and feel as if your life is in danger. Now let’s talk about some cases that this law has been used in that do not meet this definition.
George Zimmerman vs the state of Florida, Zimmerman pleads not guilty because he was using self-defense under the stand your ground law. This took place on February 26, 2012, Trayvon Martin was walking home to his father’s fiancée’s house where he was staying, he was coming from a convenience store where he purchased a drink and skittles candy. Mr. Zimmerman was doing his volunteer job of neighborhood watch when he saw Trevon and called the 911 for a suspicious person alert. Mr. Zimmerman was told by the 911 operator that someone will be out and not to pursue the suspect, however Zimmerman did not listen to the dispatcher and continue to get out of his car. When Trayvon Martin noticed that Zimmerman was following him some words were exchanged and a physical altercation began. At that point Zimmerman reached for his gun and shot Trayvon Martin leaving him dead at the scene. Zimmerman had few injuries when he was examined, which would lead me to think that he was the aggressor in this incident also he instigated the argument by following Trevon after the police had told him to not pursue and let them handle the suspect. As the case went on the prosecutors didn’t use the race card saying that Zimmerman was racist, however they did say that Zimmerman profiled Trayvon and prejudged him when he said “those fucking punks’” while on the phone with the 911 dispatcher. Assistant state Attorney John Guy said “Zimmerman didn’t shoot Trayvon because he had to, but because he wanted too, that’s the bottom line.” George Zimmerman’s side of the story as to what happened that night was the account the jury could hear since he was the only living witness, which is bias. He claims that Trayvon jumped out of the bushes and begin to punch him the face and slam his head against the concrete sidewalk when Zimmerman was walking back to his car. His story just didn’t match the wounds that he received when he was examined. So, with that breakdown of the case, did Zimmerman’s actions fall under the Stand your ground law? No, and this is why, 1) Zimmerman was told to stay in his car by the 911 dispatcher, 2) Trayvon did not instigate an altercation according to others that testified. Mr. Zimmerman could have walked away from this incident with no problems and wait on law enforcement as they directed him. Instead, he chooses to confront a 17 year old boy that was just walking home from the gas station after having a craving for candy. How is this standing your ground? Does this law give you the right to start an altercation and then defend yourself with deadly force? That is what seems to be the ongoing issue lately when this law is being used in courts to defend murders.

Michael Dunn is another example of the stand your ground law being miss used. He pulled up in a public convenience store and was extremely bothered by a group of teenagers that were parked next to him blaring loud rap music in their truck. Mr. Dunn confronted the group by pulling out a pistol. He shot four times and hit Jordan Davis, the 17 year old young man sitting in the back seat, once in the back and twice in the leg. The driver of the truck panicked and pulled off quickly, however Mr. Dunn continued to fire his 9mm gun totaling 10 shots after the police collected the shells, nine holes in the truck. Mr. Dunn testified in court that he felt threatened when he thought he saw the young man in the backseat of the truck pull out a shotgun or a lead pipe, this is why he drew his weapon and began firing. When the police searched the vehicle there was no signs of a weapon of any sort, no gun powder residue on any of the victim’s body or clothing. “I thought I was going to be killed” Mr. Dunn testified. However, his story changed numerous times when the police had initially questioned him in regards to what happed. The juries consist of a majority of white men and woman and only, one Hispanic man, two black women and one Asian American woman. Not one black man was on this jury. The jurors had a hard time coming to an agreement on the verdict. They at one point was dead locked on what to charge him with, and if his self-defense claim made sense. Juror #8 told CNN that “I was honestly convinced that he was in self-defense until he chased the car down and started shooting more.” He then stated that “second degree murder charge would have been more accurate.” Juror #4 felt that Dunn should have been found guilty of a murder charge because she thought that he had other options other than pulling out his weapon. She suggested that he could “roll your window up, ignore the taunting, put your car in reverse, back up to the front of the store, and move a parking spot over.” These are all smart things that should have been done at the time of the confrontation with Dunn and these 4 black men at the convenience store. So how can a jury find Mr. Dunn not guilty of murder when he clearly had options to retreat and using deadly force to protect himself in this instance? One of the reasons for these relaxed changes in this law is because of Marion Hammer, a lobbyist and longtime member of National Rifle Association that pushed for Florida's Stand Your Ground law in 2005. She wanted to expand the law to give citizens the right use deadly force if they feel threatened instead of avoiding deadly force. Florida legislatures didn’t want to show that they had a backbone and allowed her to convince them to change the stipulations in this ridiculous law. This law allows citizens to avoid Florida’s 10-20-life mandatory sentence.
A different case that should have allowed this law to be used was the Marissa Alexander case. In 2012, a woman named Marissa Alexander was sentenced to 20 years for firing a warning shot in a wall to get her abusive husband who was threatening to kill her away from her. She made several attempts to get away from her aggressor, but in the end the only thing she could of done to protect herself was pull out her firearm. Alexander has never been arrested and had a clean criminal record previous to this event. The courts threw out the stand your ground defense saying that she was endangering her husband and children’s life by firing a warning shot at his direction into a wall. She was found guilty for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. This case is just one that goes to prove that the stand your ground law does not actually protect the citizens that actually do stand their ground and make an effort not to use deadly force first. In Alexander’s case the stand your ground law would have protected her from using deadly force to keep her attacker away; however she wasn’t able to use it. This makes absolutely no sense. However, if she would have actually killed him with that shot she most likely wouldn’t be sitting in jail serving an absurd sentence of 20 years.
To look at this law from another point of view, the law was made to protect citizens that actually are in harm’s way. In a case of a good guy vs bad guy situation this law would be the perfect defense. Also according to Rep. Dennis Baxley he believes, “We’ve had a dramatic drop in violent crime since this law (‘stand your ground’) has been in effect.” Many look at this law as a way to intimidate criminals in to not wanting to commit violent acts against others. But according to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement’s crime statistics and various other news reports about violent crime in Florida, the crime rate was declining before this law took effect. Crime actually dropped 12% from 2000 to 2005. So, there is no merit to what Baxley is saying about his precious law. When surfing the web trying to find cases were this law actually made sense and the killing or harm done justified the crime; I was unsuccessful. I had no luck finding such a case. This only proves my point that this law is unjust and a ridiculous way for people to get away with murder.
In conclusion to my point, the stand your ground law would be a great defense for the right situation. However more and more people are using this law as a shield to commit murder. There is already legal protection for self- defense cases. There should be an obligation to retreat, like there was before this law passed. You should have to make a good effort to not have to use deadly force and if that doesn’t work than be all means “Stand your Ground.” Pulling a gun or knife out, doesn’t always have to be your first reaction when faced with possible harm. That only turns you into the aggressor and not the victim anymore. In Trayvon’s case he was put in harm’s way when Zimmerman decided to follow him home. He tried to protect himself, however a gun trumps a fist any day. In most stand your ground cases I read about they all had a chance to walk away and let law enforcement do their job, but instead they choose to start confrontations. Could this be because this law is giving them a get out of jail free pass? I think if you know there will be no repercussions to your actions then why not test the waters and get your barrel a little dirty. The state of Florida needs to re-evaluate this law immediately or eventually there will be no need for law enforcement, because murder has become legal.
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Work cited: http://www.miamiherald.com/2014/02/22/3953095/fred-grimm-dunn-case-highlights.html#storylink=cpy http://www.tampabay.com/blogs/state/stand-your-ground-is-in-the-news-again-because-of-course-its-in-the-news/2161009
http://www.politifact.com/florida/statements/2012/mar/23/dennis-baxley/crime-rates-florida-have-dropped-stand-your-ground/