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New Orleans Police are searching for a pair of men who carjacked two women and a 3-year-old girl as they were getting into their vehicle in the Marigny neighborhood Saturday night. The robbery occurred in the 500 block of Marigny Street about 8:30 p.m., according to authorities. The women had just returned to their parked car and were in the process of putting the toddler and their belongings in the vehicle. Two men approached, one armed with a pistol, authorities said. The robbers ordered the driver to give up her watch and the vehicle, a white, 2007 Jeep Compass. The...

A man who was brutally stabbed by Brooklyn subway slasher Maksim Gelman two years ago had his negligence case against the city dismissed in court yesterday, despite the fact that two transit officers had locked themselves in a motorman's car only a few feet from him at the time of the attack. Gelman stabbed Joseph Lozito in the face, neck, hands and head on an uptown 3 train in February 2011, after fatally stabbing four people and injuring three others in a 28-hour period. Lozito, a father of two and an avid martial arts fan, was able to tackle Gelman...

A majority of Americans support controversial “stand your ground” laws, according to a new poll, but their views are sharply divided along racial lines. Voters back the self-defense laws 53 percent to 40 percent, according to a new poll from Quinnipiac, but when broken down by race, black and white voters have opposite views. White voters support such laws in their state 57 percent to 37 percent, while black voters oppose the laws 57 percent to 37 percent. Hispanic voters are split, with 44 percent supporting the laws and 43 percent opposing. With “stand your ground” laws a popular target...

Feels like a surprise after so much media angst over the role of “Stand Your Ground” in Zimmerman’s acquittal — which was close to zero, by the way — but this isn’t a surprise really. Thirty-one states have SYG laws or a limited variation on them, the “Castle Doctrine” that limits SYG to your own home. Go figure that a majority of voters would endorse them when asked. White voters support “Stand Your Ground” laws 57 – 37 percent while black voters are opposed 57 – 37 percent. Men support these laws 62 – 34 percent while women are divided...

HOUSTON – A man in the Museum District who refused to be a repeat robbery victim fought back Thursday. He put one suspect in the hospital, another in jail. The victim was smoking a cigarette in front of the Caroline Collective on Caroline near Rosedale around 7 a.m. Three suspects tried to rob him at gunpoint. But after being held up at the same location three weeks ago, the victim was ready this time. He reached into his SUV and pulled out a large-caliber handgun. The man fired several times, wounding two of the suspects.

TALLAHASSEE -- Gov. Rick Scott on Wednesday accused Rev. Jesse Jackson of insulting Floridians with a series of reckless and divisive statements about the state and its “stand your ground” self-defense law.While visiting the state Capitol Tuesday, Jackson talked about efforts to repeal the law and used the phrase “Selma of our time” — a reference to civil rights marches in Alabama that helped prompt change in the 1960s.In a July 18 exchange on CNN, Jackson talked about an economic boycott to “isolate Florida as a kind of apartheid state given this whole stand your ground laws.” Scott denounced both...

George Zimmerman was acquitted because of the flawed, unnecessary Florida Stand Your Ground law. It gives entirely too much latitude to the killer to use deadly force. Trayvon Martin was walking home from a store carrying Skittles when he was followed by Zimmerman. A fight developed and Martin was shot through the heart. Wrong assumptions were made that caused death. This is a bad law fiercely lobbied for by the National Rifle Association in 23 Republican legislatures, including Tennessee’s. Their goal is to fearfully arm the citizenry against a perceived government takeover of their guns and freedom. This is political...

On Monday morning, a robber walked into an Atlanta Waffle House and pointed a gun at patrons. The crook was wearing a bandana and hoodie, according to reports. Everyone in the restaurant undoubtably saw their lives flash before their eyes. That is, until one Waffle House patron pulled out his own gun and fired at the bandit. The suspect is Ashton Macafee, 20. After entering the Waffle House, he screamed. “Nobody move and open the cash register!” The incident happened around 2am in south Fulton County. The man who fired back at Macafee, and likely saved the lives of some...

In a recent article I called for economic sanctions against Florida to compel business and political leaders in that state to change the “Stand Your Ground Law” that provided the basis for the acquittal of George Zimmerman in the murder of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin. There are times when there is a convergence of ideas, a meeting of minds, such that a particular strategy has the potential to galvanize a movement. This appears to be one of those times. The idea of boycotting Florida is not a Ron Daniels idea or Institute of the Black World 21st Century (IBW) call. Rather,...

TALLAHASSEE - Florida Gov. Rick Scott sharply criticized Jesse Jackson on Wednesday over comments he made this week while joining a Capitol protest. Jackson spent time with a group upset with the verdict in the George Zimmerman trial. They've refused to leave the Capitol until Scott calls a special session and asks legislators to overhaul the state's "stand your ground" self-defense laws. Scott has refused the request. Jackson, the veteran activist, criticized Florida as the "Selma of our time," referred to it as the "Apartheid State" and made a comparison of Scott to former Alabama Gov. George Wallace. Selma, Ala.,...

Stand Your Ground laws have become a racial issue in the aftermath of the not guilty . President Obama and Attorney General Holder have weighed in, linking race and these laws. On ABC News' "This Week," radio talk show host Travis Smiley declared what many think: "It appears to me, and I think many other persons in this country that you can in fact stand your ground unless you are a black man." And they seem to have some evidence of this, now that the Tampa Bay Times has reviewed Florida's court cases to find “defendants claiming ‘stand your ground’...

In Part I, BPR’s Lauren Sukin and Thomas Nath debated the legal underpinnings of the Zimmerman verdict and critiqued both the prosecutors and the Florida Stand Your Ground Law. In Part II, Sukin and Nath delve into the social ramifications of the verdict and its effect on American life. Lauren: Let’s transition away from whether or not Zimmerman is guilty, but the reality that he has been proclaimed innocent. What do you think will happen now? Thomas: I’d definitely anticipate him having to enter some sort of protection program. Lauren: He had been wearing a bulletproof vest during the trial,...

Today Sybrina Fulton, Trayvon Martin's mother, said she believed Florida's "stand your ground" self-defense law "assisted the person who killed my son to get away with murder." She did not explain how, which is hardly surprising, since George Zimmerman's defense was not based on the absence of a duty to retreat for people attacked in public places. Rather, it was a classic self-defense claim that could have been successful in any state. Fulton nevertheless insists "we have to change these laws so people don't get away with murder." It is not hard to understand why a grieving mother might want...

Hard cases make bad law and even worse fodder for the chattering classes. Most of the so-called lessons of George Zimmerman’s acquittal on charges of murdering Trayvon Martin amount to educational malpractice. • There is no war on black men, at least not by white men. Last year, the Scripps-Howard News Service studied half a million homicide reports and found that killings of black victims by white attackers have actually dropped over the past 30 years, from 4,745 during the 1980s to 4,380 during the first decade of the 2000s. There were nearly twice as many white victims killed by...

Rick Ross dropped a new song today, "I Wonder Why," in which he ponders his life. On the track, Ross wonders why his brother is incarcerated and why his ambition continues to push him forward. The MMG honcho also indirectly references slain Trayvon Martin and the incident which led to his death in Rozay's home state of Florida.(PROFANE-AUDIO-AT-LINK)"Now I'm being followed by some creepy ass cracker," Ross raps, a seemingly thinly-veiled reference to vigilante George Zimmerman following Travyon. "Stand your ground! Stand your ground! You gotta stand your ground!" Ross cries. Zimmerman stood behind Florida's controversial Stand Your Ground law...

The mother of Trayvon Martin said Monday that she believed Florida’s Stand Your Ground law played a role in her son’s shooting death, but she wasn’t ready to support a boycott of the state for not changing the self-defense law. “The thing about this law is I just think it assisted the person who killed my son to get away with murder,” Sybrina Fulton, the mother of the 17-year-old from Miami Gardens, said at a National Bar Association event in Miami Beach. “I think we have to change these laws so people don’t get away with murder,” she said, adding...

...he thought was breaking into home In a story some are already saying bears resemblance to the Trayvon Martin case, a homeowner in New Orleans has been arrested and charged with attempted second-degree murder after he shot an unarmed teen after he says he thought the boy was trying to break into his home. 14-year-old Marshall Coulter is in critical condition after being shot in the head by 33-year-old Merritt Landry at around 2 am Friday morning. Police, the New Orleans Times-Picayune reports, said that the teen was shot near Landry’s car. Friends told the outlet that Landry’s car was...

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- Just about 24 hours ago, a local man didn't know if he would be leaving the Duval County Courthouse a free man. He faced three years in prison on an aggravated assault charge. His attorney said he simply stood his ground. And Thursday, a jury agreed. The charge stemmed from a May 2011 confrontation in the parking lot of the Jacksonville Beach Pier. A local man was left beaten and bloody after a fist fight. He pulled his gun and was arrested. But his attorney, Lee Lockett, says that should have never happened. "My client was simply...

The Florida Department of Law Enforcement was inundated with hundreds of phone calls Saturday after a group of protesters outside Gov. Rick Scott's office tweeted that Capitol Police were denying them food and water and urged people to call the agency in protest. The FDLE denied the allegations and asked the media not to republish the phone numbers put out by the protest group Dream Defenders. FDLE officials said some of those phone numbers are used by law enforcement agencies throughout the state to request Amber Alerts and crime scene or investigative help. Phillip Agnew, the Dream Defenders leader, said...

A 14-year-old boy remained in critical condition Friday after being shot in the head by a homeowner who said he thought the teen was trying to break into his house. But police said the teen was unarmed and did not pose an "imminent threat" when he was shot and have charged the owner with attempted second-degree murder. The family of Marshall Coulter said the teenager could move only the right side of his body a little, but not the left. Doctors told the family that if Coulter survives, he would likely be severely brain damaged. Coulter's family acknowledged the teen's...