FL Governor Rick Scott provided plenty of fodder for ridicule last night, first by delaying the debate with a shit-fit over a fan and then with his bizarre debate performance. But his response to a question about Stand Your Ground and whether justice was served in the Trayvon Martin case deserves closer scrutiny. You can watch how both Crist and Scott responded here.
No, Crist didn’t say outright that the verdict was a miscarriage of justice; he said he wasn’t on the jury, so he couldn’t condemn the finding. But he did say there’s something wrong with Stand Your Ground and it needs to be changed. In this state, that’s a little bit brave.
Contrast Crist’s response with Scott’s. First Scott repeatedly invoked Trayvon Martin’s parents, using their first names as if they were all in the same quilting circle. And he acknowledged that “death is a tragic death,” which is certainly a unique perspective. But he said he wouldn’t change the law.
Ol’ Charlie is a bit of a weathercock…okay, he’s a regular turbine spinning fast enough to power Miami for the next decade. But that answer alone ought to be enough to inspire any Democrat worthy of the party affiliation to climb over razor wire, swim across gator-infested canals and traverse the giant python-ridden Everglades to vote for Crist.
Sondra
We have a bacterial problem here in Florida called Democratitis: the Democrats “worthy of the party affiliation” are those of us out here phonebanking, canvassing and turning somersaults trying to get out the vote.
Everyone else is a candidate and they are so afraid of their tails that not one of them is actually running as a proud Democrat. Forgetting who got them elected in the first place, they are now running ads saying they are proud independents, working across the aisle blah blah blah blegh…they are going to wonder why they don’t get re-elected when they can’t even inspire the base to stick a vote in the mail for the price of a stamp.
At least Charlie is everywhere. He is a wonderful campaigner who knows almost everyone he talks to and stands for a photo with everyone who can get close enough to ask. He always has a smile and a word and seems to never get tired.
Ask me when the last times I saw anyone else besides Maria Sachs working the crowd like that and I’ll tell you…maybe Labor Day?
I’m a trooper, but this is just sad.
Tommy
After the clips starting going around of the debate last night I went to CSPAN and watched almost the entire thing. I really only know Scott from news reports. Never seen that much video of him. He was kind of creepy.
Tommy
@Sondra: Same thing here in Southern Illinois. The Democratic in my district is talking about how great clean coal is. That he is working across the aisle. He is running against this guy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PhbRcDZiJJc
If ever there was a chance you could run as a liberal, I’d think Mike Bost would be the candidate you could do it against.
mdblanche
Aren’t those just the types of things people do every day in America’s wang?
Botsplainer
Grisham walks back the stupidity.
http://www.latimes.com/books/jacketcopy/la-et-jc-john-grisham-troubling-statements-about-child-porn-20141016-story.html
I have no idea what possible reason he would have to even go there. Its creepy.
Villago Delenda Est
To say that Scott is scum is to insult scum.
shelley
I know BJ doesn’t have control over the different ads that pop up, but I’m really tired of all the ‘fungus’ ones. First the toenails, now we have the ‘80% of people have this fungus on the brain!’
Brain fungus? Maybe they’re only refering to Rick Scott voters.
Tommy
@Botsplainer: WTF. WTF!!!!!
I might, might have seen some porn online. I can assure you I never got anywhere close to child porn. I am pretty sure you have to hit more than one or two wrong buttons to get there.
raven
@Botsplainer: My vast experience tells me you never doing anything when you are drinking that you didn’t already want to do when you were not.
RP
“Death is a tragic death” is right up there with “with notably rare exceptions…”
the Conster
@Botsplainer:
Privileged white guy thinks every other white guy’s privilege is sacred. IOW, a day that ends in y.
Botsplainer
I don’t know why Grisham would volunteer something like that. It’s like self-awareness left the house in that interview.
Mike J
Or you can be like what’s his name over at the girlie mag and let Crist’s lack of purity be more important than Scott’s pure evil.
gogol's wife
@Sondra:
I am so disgusted with the Democratic politicians all across the country. Why can’t they stand up and promote the good things the Democrats (with Obama at their head) have been doing? They are such cowards. I can’t believe we’re going to lose the Senate now.
Amir Khalid
Scott’s answer here is amazing for how he crams so many words into so little meaning. I got that he doesn’t believe in changing the SYG law, but I have no idea why.
Loneoak
Hey folks, this is me published in TPM just now.
polyorchnid octopunch
@Tommy: I work in anti-spam, anti-phish, and generalised internet security at a fairly high level. You’d be surprised how easy it can be to find yourself looking at something you really didn’t want to look at.
Really surprised. It can be a precursor to blackmail.
shelley
As profound an observation as “Nice day if it don’t rain.”
Tommy
@gogol’s wife: It blows my mind. I am in a blue dog district. But I talk to a ton of people and have done some door-to-door work for candidates. If you want to win in my district talk about education, lower taxes for the middle class, be pro-union, and stay away from the gun issue. We are good on those first three issues. But alas the guy running in my party talks about NONE of them.
Hal
@Botsplainer: Trying to figure out how an attorney with a passing knowledge of the criminal justice system thinks American prisons are filled with old white guys. If white men were arrested, charged and convicted at the same percentage levels as black and Hispanic men, white people would be marching in protest by the millions.
raven
@Loneoak: Well done!
Tommy
@polyorchnid octopunch: Well I disagree. I’ve been online since the late 80s. I often joke the Internet is like an onion, many layers. Most folks never get past the top layer. But there are so many more layers of just crazy and illegal shit out there. But it is my experience you have to go looking for it.
Now you mentioned you work with SPAM. OK I can somewhat agree on that point. I never give out my work email. Whenever I sign up for a newsletter or buy something I use my Gmail account. Somehow my work email got out and I am getting pounded with SPAM. Crazy stuff. I bet if I were to click through to some of that, who knows where I’d end up.
But again, not just a mouse click or two.
Belafon
@gogol’s wife: You sort of answered your own question, except with deciding cause an effect. Democrats don’t turn out to vote; Democratic candidates ultimately answer to those who vote. The question is: Are Democratic candidates spineless because Democratic voters don’t turn out to vote, or do Democratic voters not vote because Democratic candidates are spineless.
In my belief, it’s a bit of both, but I personally slightly blame voters more because they have the perfect example of how to fix the problem: The Tea Party still has Republicans scared to do what they want because they vote, not because they withhold their votes.
Gin & Tonic
@shelley: I dunno. Would Rick Scott’s death be a tragic death?
JPL
@Loneoak: Thanks for writing to Josh. Your post is informative and timely.
Violet
I did not get picked for the jury. Thank god. Was in first panel and voir dire took forever but they didn’t pick me. Criminal court. Trial could have lasted awhile so I’m glad I didn’t get picked.
another Holocene human
Thank you thank you thank you for posting this. That syg exchange was part of what I caught last night, Scott’s utterly dishonest racist nonsense about StL and T Martin’s parents was utterly infuriating and needs to be called out.
Just about everything he said was a calculated lie and Crist was beating him up.
Belafon
@Tommy: Are your emails some combination of first name, last name, or initials? If so, they have bots that just hunt for names until a match occurs.
gogol's wife
@Belafon:
I always vote, no matter how disgusted I am with them. But I’m in Connecticut, so we don’t have this problem so much — I can enthusiastically vote for my gov and senators and reps, now that Lieberman’s gone.
raven
@Violet: I always get picked for some reason. I know people in the DA’s offices, public defenders and all kinds of legal beagles but it never gets me off.
JPL
@Violet: At least you did your civic duty. Good job!
Last time I went to jury duty, they sent us home at noon. That was the day of the snow storm in Atlanta and it took me six and half hours to get home. When I received my 25 dollars in the mail, it seemed inadequate.
Loneoak
@raven:
Thanks! I desperately want to share it on fB, but obviously anonymity is crucial.
Tommy
@Loneoak: Your wife is an angel. Last year my mother was in the ICU for a month and the nurses were the most amazing people I’d ever met. They made an unbearable situation bearable. I am blessed my family member live into their 90s. I have not spent much if any time in a hospital. I just didn’t know all they did. How much of the care of my mother was in their hands.
aimai
@Botsplainer: It is creepy but its basically a very common experience people have–they know one person or one anecdote and they blow it out of proportion. They identify with one type of person –themselves–and when they see bad things happen to that kind of person they project it onto themselves and become anxious and defensive on behalf of “their own kind”–often without realizing it and without realizing how offensive and morally wrong it is. Grisham basically tells you so in the interview: “men like me” he says “older white guys” sometimes have bad things happen to them like they trip and fall into child pornography. Scary! If you are an older white guy who drinks and might surf looking for porn in what used to be the sanctuary of your home.
Its a pretty common problem this version of the compositional fallacy (IIRC).
geg6
@Botsplainer:
He apparently had a friend or a client or something who was convicted for having child porn. I believe he defended him in the case and the guy claimed to have come upon it by mistake. Riiiiiiiight. Now, I have no problem with Grisham defending the guy in court. That’s what lawyers are supposed to do. But it now seems, he actually believed that bullshit story.
It’s sad, too, because Grisham is one of the millionaires who is supposed to be on our (lefty) side.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@gogol’s wife: I’m in Colorado, where it looks increasingly like Cory Gardener is going to win based on one of the most dishonest campaigns I’ve ever seen, the fact that he seems like a reasonable “nice guy” in his TV ads, and very scary ads about ISIS! The first two kept him competitive, I have a depressing hunch that it’s the third that has moved him into a fairly solid five point lead. I’m sure the Ebola ads will be up by tomorrow evening. A story in the Denver Post the other day led off with a “lifelong Democrat” who is voting straight Republican this year because she’s tired of Obama’s “policies”. If she saw fit to tell the reporter which “policies” she’s tired of, the reporter didn’t see fit to include it in the story.
The ray of hope is that polls may be underweighting the Hispanic vote, and Gardener voted for the recent Steve King-Michelle Bachman embarrassment
polyorchnid octopunch
@Tommy: Hey, I’ve only been online since the early nineties… 92 or so. That said, I’m lead admin on a ten million user email system. Yeah, sometimes a click or two; you think you’re looking at a job offer and next thing you know you’re looking at the goatse man… not that the goatse man’s illegal, but people do point people at illegal stuff, to be followed up by further contact (using URL generated to uniquely identify the email it was sent to) to say “cough up your visa or we send the server logs of you looking at that to the cops”.
I’m not saying it’s common, nor am I saying that by far the vast majority of the child porn cases aren’t legit, because they are. But it does happen, and yep… a click or two can be all it takes.
You’d be astounded at the amount of criminality going on out there.
Steve from Antioch
Never mind the fact that Florida’s SYG law really didn’t play much of a role in the trial.
The shooter claimed he was being held down and his head was being pounded into the sidewalk while he feared for his life… And that is sufficient to support a traditional self-defense claim. Simply put, if you believe the shooters version, he could not retreat.
Botsplainer
@Hal:
He quit early, at about 35, IIRC. Wouldn’t have had much of a practice by then, and would have been first acquiring his truly useful trial skills.
You can see it in some of his books. His writing is solid, but it is clear to me that he just didn’t have some core legal skills or experiences ingrained yet.
Betty Cracker
@Loneoak: Is it okay with you if I front page it too? With proper attribution, of course?
Loneoak
@Betty Cracker:
Sure thing! Just get JC to apologize for calling those nurses assholes. ; )
Betty Cracker
@Steve from Antioch: Stand Your Ground was a factor in the Martin killing because it gave armed busybodies the green light to go out looking for trouble. I don’t believe Zimmerman’s bullshit story about what happened that night, but I do believe that by removing the duty to retreat, SYG put ordinary, unarmed citizens like Trayvon Martin at the mercy of paranoid ammosexuals like Zimmerman.
Tommy
@Loneoak:
Yes it is. But wish you could share it far and wide. I mentioned in another comment my mother was in the ICU for a month. She was taken to Deaconess Hospital in Evansville, Indiana. My brother and I did a lot of research into the place, because my mom’s condition was like something out of the TV show House. They thought they knew what was wrong and treated her, she got worse. This cycle happened over and over again.
Honestly, we are still not sure what was wrong with her.
In our research, we found it was one of the better hospitals in the nation. Even if they had a problem figuring out what was wrong with my mother, the level of care was staggering. I often say I want the level of care my mom had for everyone. Founded by a group of Protestant ministers (Germany immigrants) in the 1890s.
I am rambling, but my core point is that you can have a hospital, a good hospital, and it not be for profit.
Mike J
@Tommy:
Quick! Replace all her blood with bleach! If it doesn’t kill her it will be a 100% cure!
Botsplainer
The RawStory GamerGate thread is up to 585 “You’re a Doodyhead” and “Nuh-uh, YOU’RE the Doodyhead” comments.
Tommy
@polyorchnid octopunch: No I hear you. The amount of illegal stuff I could get into, with just a mouse click or two is staggering. I fell into a copyright scammer thing last year. I NEVER steal content. I got a letter from a law firm that said I had downloaded copyrighted porn. Said I needed to pay them money or they would take me to court and all the people around me would know I watch porn.
They messed with the wrong dude here cause I have this thing called Google and a lawyer. Oh and EFF. Found that the law firm was a scam. Court case after court case thrown out. When I called my lawyer, which is my dad’s best friend and sent him all the info, he said, and I quote “it will be fun to fuck with these people.”
Funny thing, case went away ….
Steve from Antioch
@Betty Cracker:
Like you, I don’t know whether on not the shooter was lying. My point was that stand your ground laws didn’t really figure in the trial.
It’s just speculation to believe that the shooter would have not have confronted Martin in the absence of the SYG law. After all, there isn’t exactly a shortage of criminals, a-holes, wannabe tough guys and vigilantes in states without SYG laws.
Violet
@JPL: 25 dollars? What kind of communist hell do you live in? Here in deepest darkest red state land we get $6. Or maybe it’s $7. I think it covers parking.
Corner Stone
@Tommy:
Do tell?
Corner Stone
@Violet: No doubt! I think it’s $6 but I always donate it so I’m not sure at the moment.
Violet
@Tommy: Isn’t your work email address on your work website? The bots will harvest it and send you stuff that way.
Anoniminous
@gogol’s wife: @Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Colorado doesn’t look good but there are two pick-up opportunities in Kentucky and Georgia.
I keep trying to remain upbeat but – jesusdamn – it’s hard.
Corner Stone
“So guys. It’s just you, and your honey.”
This woman drives me absolutely fucking bonkers.
Villago Delenda Est
@Gin & Tonic: Would Dick Cheney’s death be a tragic death? Yes, if it’s peacefully in his bed, and not by his neck being broken in a several foot drop.
Kathleen
@Loneoak: Excellent piece.
Tommy
@Steve from Antioch: Maybe I know a better class of people, but the gun owners I know, going to their gun is not the first option. 911 is. My friends and family members are not remotely liberals but you call the professionals. Sure if you break into their house and threaten their family, the gun will come out. But not sure I know a single person where they wish that to happen.
Tommy
@Corner Stone: Stealing content. Drugs. Sex. You name it.
brettvk
@Loneoak: That is brilliant. That needs to be broadcast nationwide. It needs to be frontpaged everywhere.
Karen in GA
@Botsplainer: I’ve been drunk quite a few times in my day. And when I’ve been drunk, I’ve been surrounded by other people who were drunk. Drunks talk about, and do, all sorts of dopey shit. I have never once — never once — seen or heard anyone show any interest in looking at kids as anything other than kids. Even the reaction to a teenager purposely trying to come off as older than she or she is wouldn’t be “Wow, pretty hot, too bad s/he’s so young” — it would be “Where’s that kid’s parents?”
The only way the subject of viewing child porn would come up would be if they were listing people they’d like to repeatedly punch in the throat.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Anoniminous: KS and SD are also wild cards. Apparently Roberts made an ass of himself last night, the kind of pettiness that just might turn weak voters off
Karen in GA
@Loneoak: Congrats on being published, and thanks for the insight (scary though it may be).
kindness
@Anoniminous: I’m concerned about Colorado but less scared than I was. Apparently polling in that state rarely records any Hispanics and they do vote now.
Tommy
@Karen in GA: I am 44 so I don’t think in the near future I will yell “get off my lawn.” But I often think and/or say “Where’s that kid’s parents?” At some level I am torn. I want that 14 year old to wear what she wants to wear. But on the other hand I often think, “your parents let you walk out dressed like that.”
Trollhattan
@Betty Cracker:
Back when the Martin case and eventual trial were going on, somebody–pretty sure it was here in comments–detailed how Florida jury instructions changed from before and after SYG passed. The takeaway: even in a non-SYG case it affects jury deliberations and yes, verdicts.
Betty Cracker
@Steve from Antioch: The jury instructions were specifically changed to remove the duty to retreat thanks to the SYG law. There’s no way it wasn’t a factor. Also, what statistics news reporters are able to cobble together do show an increase in so-called justifiable homicides thanks to SYG. I can’t get inside Zimmerman’s pea-brain that night, but his actions in the aftermath of the trial clearly demonstrate he’s the kind of nut who goes looking for trouble. And why not? He got away with murder once.
SatanicPanic
@Anoniminous: we’ll get it back in 2016
Violet
@Loneoak: Wow, that’s awesome! Thanks for writing in. I hope it gets covered everywhere.
Steve from Antioch
@Betty Cracker: Like I said, under the circumstances of the shooting – as stated by the shooter – that doesn’t matter because he was on his back at the time with no ability to retreat.
Long before SYG laws it yo were on your back being beaten with a reasonable fear of death or serious bodily injury, that was plenty to sustain a self-defense defense
Karen in GA
@Tommy: I’m 46. I think the same thing. The weird part is that most of my drinking was in my 20s, with people mostly in their 20s and 30s. The ones in their early 20s wanted nothing to do with teenaged anything at that point because they were so happy to put their own teen years behind them. The older the drunk, the more parental the perspective.
Tommy
@Betty Cracker: That is my understanding of the case. I get the Castle Doctrine. My house. I am not a gun owner myself, but if you came into my house I might find a bat to hit you. But STG outside of my house or my property, doesn’t that just basically break down to a duel.
Steve from Antioch
@Tommy:
I’m sure you know a better class of people than I do.
The only time I ever ever felt threatened enough to pull a gun (there was a guy yelling that he was going to kill me as he beat on my front door in the middle of the night) I got my shotgun out, went and got a phone, walked back to the bedroom dialing 911 and handed the phone to my wife.
Police came in 4 minutes, this was in San Francisco, so I didn’t have to decide whether or not to pull trigger b/c guy never made it into house.
Mnemosyne
@Violet:
Yay! Sometimes you can send off a pleasedontpickmepleasedontpickmepleasedontpickme vibe that the lawyers will pick up on.
Today is my last day to call in for jury duty — either I have to go in tomorrow, or I’m done for the year. We’ll see how it goes.
Anoniminous
Thanks for the perk-up.
Betty Cracker
@Steve from Antioch: I don’t think it’s that cut-and-dried. Jurors take all kinds of factors into consideration, including the jury instructions, which were changed by SYG to remove the duty to retreat.
The jurors may not have been convinced that Zimmerman’s story was 100% accurate, but they did think he had a right to follow the kid around since SYG basically expanded his living room into all public spaces. Before that change in the instructions, they might have convicted him on the basis of the fact that he could have waited for the goddamn cops instead of pursuing the kid if he thought he was suspicious.
Tommy
@Steve from Antioch: I hate I said I know a better class of people. Not really true. I just don’t know people that want to shoot somebody. You are that person. You got your gun to protect yourself and family and dialed 911. Person didn’t get in your house and it seems everything worked as it is supposed to work. Kudos.
Mnemosyne
@Steve from Antioch:
Not true at all. Florida’s “self-defense” law is now permeated by Stand Your Ground and it’s always winner takes all.
California has had “castle doctrine” and no duty to retreat for over 100 years, but you know what else we have? A provision that says that if you pick the fight, you are not allowed to claim self-defense … but in Florida, it doesn’t matter who started it, whoever is left standing gets to claim self-defense and walk away free.
That’s why it took two juries to convict Michael Dunn — under current Florida law, it’s almost impossible for a prosecutor to prove that the defendant didn’t feel threatened, and that’s all it takes to justify deadly force in Florida — your feelings.
SiubhanDuinne
@Sondra:
I met Charlie Crist back when he was a Republican and the Governor of Florida. Even then, he struck me as much more sensible and sane than his GOP gubernatorial colleagues (this was at a Southern Governors Association meeting somewhere), and he came across as a genuinely decent guy.
Bill Arnold
@Tommy:
Was this Prenda Law? Anyway, thank you for fighting whoever it was. Automated high-volume extortion is extremely scummy.
Violet
@Mnemosyne: I think it might have been that I gave the very definite impression that I was skeptical of law enforcement. I answered their questions honestly, which was something about have you had a bad experience with law enforcement. I have so I answered yes. They followed up and although I agreed I could set aside my experiences but I think I left them with an impression that I had a certain set of beliefs.
They also didn’t pick the guy who went back and forth multiple times about the 5th amendment and the defendant getting on the stand.
Tommy
@Bill Arnold: Yes it was.
Mnemosyne
@Steve from Antioch:
Not if you were the one who picked the fight, as Zimmermann was by his own admission that he was following Trayvon Martin.
Except in Florida, of course. In Florida, you can show up at your ex-wife’s house, kill her new boyfriend with the gun you brought with you, and walk away a free man because you felt threatened when your ex-wife’s boyfriend tried to defend himself in his own home.
WereBear
@polyorchnid octopunch: I took a psychology major in college in 2000. Even then, search engining a psych term brought up things.., I’d rather not see.
SiubhanDuinne
@Loneoak: Hey, congratulations! That’s terrific (if not exactly reassuring)!
Steve from Antioch
@Betty Cracker:
You’re right – this is subject to speculation on both sides.
That said, the jury instructions were a bit of a mess, but the pre SYG version would have probably just said that he had to take reasonable steps to retreat but that wouldn’t kick in until he felt threatened.
Again the shooters version, IIRC, is that he followed the kid (creepy, but no duty to retreat bc there was no confrontation) then turned around and was heading back to car when he was jumped, then pinned and beaten.
So question would not be whether or not he should retreated instead of following, it would have been, under pre SYG, whether he acted reasonably to retreat after he was confronted and could have simply said, hey guy got me down before I could do anything.
If shooter had said, I saw this guy coming for me so I drew my gun and assumed bladed stance and waited … Then SYG would have been linchpin of defense.
SiubhanDuinne
@WereBear:
Not just psych terms. Years ago I was trying to find some info about the Doris Day-Rex Harrison thriller Midnight Lace, and you wouldn’t believe what came up when I entered the film name into the search box! I still blush to recall it.
SiubhanDuinne
@Violet:
I’m glad for you. I’ve always been sorry I never got empaneled, but I sure wouldn’t have wanted to deal with serving on a jury while I was caring for my dad.
Mnemosyne
@Steve from Antioch:
Out of sheer curiosity, did Trayvon Martin have any right to defend himself against a strange guy who was following him in his car and then got out of the car to look for him, or was Martin’s skin tone too dusky for him to have that self-defense right?
Violet
@SiubhanDuinne: The judge told us the case probably wouldn’t last longer than two days but of course there’s no guarantee. I could probably have managed two days but at the moment I also don’t have any backup so I was nervous about it.
SiubhanDuinne
@Tommy:
Hahaha, I love that story!
SiubhanDuinne
@Anoniminous:
Latest poll, Michelle Nunn leads David Perdue by three points. Admittedly not a landslide, but it’s a nice northerly shift after weeks and weeks of dead ties. We’re trying hard to avoid a runoff.
Patrick
@Mnemosyne:
That’s the insanity of these SYG laws. Zimmerman was the attacker, but the argument is that he can claim the SYG as soon as Martin overpowered him (if that’s what happened). Why couldn’t then Martin claim the same BEFORE that when he was followed by this creep?
Betty Cracker
@Patrick: It is insane. Basically, whoever is left alive gets to claim SYG. I don’t believe Zimmerman’s account, but if Martin had jumped him and bashed his brains in on the sidewalk, Martin would have had every right since Zimmerman was an armed man stalking the unarmed Martin for no reason. Of course, the probability that Martin would have walked away scott-free are pretty damn low…due to other factors. But it’s a fucked up law, and it needs to change. Kudos to Crist for saying so.
TriassicSands
It must be tough being Rick Scott — getting through life with an IQ of 4 has got to be hard. Couple that with his obvious hearing problem — I’ve never yet heard him answer the actual question he was asked in an interview or debate — and it’s amazing the guy can get out of bed in the morning without assistance. I’d like to see a scientific study done to discover the relationship between being a moron and being a lying POS. In Scott’s case the correlation is perfect.
I guess the real question is whose voters are bigger idiots — those of Texas or Florida? Both states are embarrassments.
Mnemosyne
@Patrick:
It’s what drives me nuts about the Zimmermann acted in self-defense! argument. Even from the self-serving story that Zimmermann told, Martin was equally acting in his own self-defense against the weird guy who kept following him in his car.
But, again, that seems to be how Florida’s Stand Your Ground law works — two people get into a fight, and the person left standing gets to claim it was self-defense. At best, they’ve made dueling legal again.
Bill Arnold
@Tommy:
Did you read this decision (judge Wright)? (PDF, though tab says word document)
Starts with a Wrath of Khan quote, gets more amusing.
SamR
“Horatio, Governor Scott refused to go on stage because he didn’t want a fan at the base of the podium!”
“Looks like he had…[puts on sunglasses] cold feet.”
YEAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Patrick
@Mnemosyne:
What I fail to understand is why most Floridians seem to be just fine with legalized dueling. Go figure.
Violet
@Patrick: Because they don’t think of it that way. They think of it as “standing their ground”–if someone attacks them they can defend themselves. In their minds the person attacking them is a dangerous criminal and they need the right to defend themselves. So it’s all good. The scenario of “last person alive wins” doesn’t even cross their minds.
It’s going to take some cases of nice, white, male college students or maybe one of Florida’s many senior citizens minding their own business being hunted down by crazy white guy with gun to make this horrible law into the scandal it should be. A woman being hunted would get explained away as “domestic violence.” A person of color–obvious excuses. It’s going to have to be white on white violence and some clear cut case of a person being hunted for sport.
Corner Stone
@TriassicSands: No, you’re embarrassing! You’re the one who is embarrassing! You!
Corner Stone
@SamR: Love this so much.
“He wasn’t expecting to be met by…(sunglasses) a fan.”
Patrick
@Violet:
It is a sad state of affairs, isn’t it? I had thought about eventually retiring in Florida. Now I don’t even vacation there anymore.
mdblanche
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Maybe you’ll find this reassuring. It does mention that polling has underestimated Democrats in Colorado in the pat few cycles.
cckids
@Betty Cracker:
Also, several members of the jury mentioned it as an influence on the way they decided the case, so yeah, SYG impacted the trial.
Steve from Antioch
@Betty Cracker:
If someone is being followed, you think it’s acceptable for them to turn around and attack the follower? Really?
Steve from Antioch
@cckids:
Interesting. I read the jury instructions over on Kos, they were a mess. I read two stories in which jurors talked about being confused, mentioned that they discussed SYG bc it was mentioned in the instructions, but ultimately decided it did not apply.
I confess I lost interest and didn’t reason juror accounts after that, so you may well be right.
Betty Cracker
@Steve from Antioch: If some dude with a gun is following me around in the dark, I’d genuinely be in fear for my life, so according to Florida law, I’m legally entitled to whack the motherfucker.
gelfling545
@Violet: Dang, when I was divorcing a cop (bad experience with a law enforcement officer, indeed) it didn’t get me off jury duty. I get called every 7 years, as if they set an alarm. I just got my notice for this term on Friday.
steve from Antioch
@Betty Cracker:
Here’s the section from the Zimmerman trial that defines what one must believe to use deadly force:
“In deciding whether George Zimmerman was justified in the use of deadly force, you must judge him by the circumstances by which he was surrounded at the time the force was used. The danger facing George Zimmerman need not have been actual; however, to justify the use of deadly force, the appearance of danger must have been so real that a reasonably cautious and prudent person under the same circumstances would have believed that the danger could be avoided only through the use of that force. Based upon appearances, George Zimmerman must have actually believed that the danger was real.” (emphasis supplied)
Violet
@gelfling545: I didn’t get out of jury DUTY. I went and did the whole thing. I did not get selected for the jury. There is a difference. I did my duty. The lawyers didn’t pick me for their jury. Maybe my answers to their questions had nothing to do with it. But for whatever reason they didn’t pick me.
Betty Cracker
@steve from Antioch: I guaran-damn-tee you if I were being followed around in the dark by an armed man and I managed to get the jump on him, I’d waltz out of that courtroom scott-free, courtesy of SYG. Now, I wouldn’t do something like that because I’m not psychotic. I’d run, hide, call 911 and/or yell fire. But that damn law makes it too easy to kill people. It needs to change.
brantl
Christ is capable of being in touch with his conscience; Scott, is not.