Posted on 03/22/2012 9:33:34 PM PDT by Tailgunner Joe
A Democratic state representative introduced a proposal Thursday to eliminate parts of South Carolina’s “stand your ground law” self-defense law, citing the slaying of a black Florida teenager.
The proposal is not expected to go far. Self-defense is an accepted right in South Carolina, and Republicans control both the state House and Senate.
But state Rep. Bakari Sellers, D-Bamberg, said parts of the self-defense law need to be scrapped before it results in a killing similar to that of Florida teenager Trayvon Martin.
Last month, Martin was shot and killed while walking home from the store. The man who says he shot Martin has not been charged with in connection with the incident because Florida law prevents prosecutions in certain self-defense cases. The case has attracted national scrutiny because, in part, Martin was black and the man who shot him, George Zimmerman, is white.
Sellers, who is black, said he is afraid something similar could happen in South Carolina.
South Carolina’s law, like Florida’s, says if someone is attacked in a place where “they have a right to be,” then the person being attacked “has no duty to retreat and has the right to stand his ground to prevent death or great bodily injury.”
The law commonly is referred to as a “stand your ground” law.
“I’m 6 feet, 5 inches (tall),” Sellers said Thursday. “I decide to go jogging – with a hoodie on – down any street in South Carolina with a water bottle in my pocket. I mean, I’m running beside a couple, I don’t want anybody to think I’m running up on you.”
But, Sellers added, “You have a 6 foot, 5 inch African-American male running at you with a water bottle, that’s the wild, wild West. That’s not the society we should be living in.”
The S.C. law offers similar self-defense protections for people in their homes. Sellers’ bill would leave that portion of the law in place.
Sellers’ bill has been assigned to the House Judiciary Committee. Attempts to reach that committee’s chairman, state Rep. Jim Harrison, R-Columbia, for comment on the bill Thursday were unsuccessful.
Lawmakers approved South Carolina’s “stand your ground law” in 2006. The year before, a security guard at the Cornell Arms in Columbia was charged with murder in connection with the shooting death of a 24-year-old who was visiting the apartment complex.
The security guard claimed self-defense, saying the victim had attacked him. A jury convicted the guard of manslaughter and a judge sentenced him to 16 years in prison. But, last year, the state Supreme Court overturned that decision and set the former security guard free.
The defense attorney in that case, Jack Swerling, said Thursday that he does not favor throwing out South Carolina’s “stand your ground” law. But he said he would like to see it amended to better define the language dealing with the place where someone claiming self-defense “has a right to be.”
“You have to put people on more notice of what that means so you don’t have this wild West mentality that people think they can exercise this right anywhere,” Swerling said.
Who didn’t see this coming?
A full, frontal assault against self-defense laws!
Next you know, using a gun to shoot someone sitting on your chest, beating your face in with their fists, will be illegal.
Has anyone been arrested for illegal use of stand your Ground?
Any convictions?
Uh, I believe Mr. Zimmerman is Hispanic.
And so it begins......
since Zimmerman doesn’t sound like an Hispanic name, the MSM is pushing the story that he was white, and that this was a white killing a black in this case.
Facts don’t matter when you have a template, as the MSM does, to fit your stories into. There’s a narrative to be pushed, and they are pushing it.
Al Sharpton has weighed in. Even Michael Moore decided to weigh in. The liberals have decided this is their new cause celebre.
Front and center was CNN's sob story about how the attacker was supposedly such a good family man, with a tearful wife and heartbroken daughter.
The left really hates the idea of self-defense.
Blacks consider Hispanics to be “White.”
Usual knee jerk response. Suggest legislation without all the facts ...
Really wish people would quit getting their tricots in such a bind until we hear all the sides of the story. In the meantime, I fear this is going to get real ugly.
Hispanics were considered white until they decided they weren’t getting their share of the loot.
If I want to put my life at risk all I have to do is call a Spanish coworker Hispanic.
Guy is a criminal defense lawyer. He is afraid that he will be losing clients!
Don’t you see what they did there?
“”The case has attracted national scrutiny because, in part, ... George Zimmerman, is white.”
Techically, most Hispanics are, in part, white. Creative reporting to the rescue!
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