Drizzt
Member
(FL) New law can't guarantee that calling a shooting self-defense makes it so
After his adult son shot a man in the leg Wednesday and sheriff's investigators took his son to jail, James Loudon had many questions.
Some were about the details of the shooting, which he and his construction worker son say was self-defense. Loudon, a retiree from Chicago, didn't see the shooting but he thinks he knows most of those details now.
His remaining questions are mostly about a new Florida law. It was advertised as expanding the right to use firearms and deadly force when people think they are threatened with illegal violence.
Loudon hopes that law, lauded by the governor and backed by the National Rifle Association, will protect his son. He hopes the law, combined with witness accounts, will lead prosecutors to drop the aggravated battery charge listed in the Sarasota County Sheriff's Office arrest report.
But at the same time, he told me he also fears that the law might have encouraged his son to shoot when maybe he didn't really have to.
"I don't think he would have been quite as anxious to pull the gun" were it not for that law, Loudon told me.
His son -- James Victor Loudon, 36 – has a concealed firearm permit. The father says his son was also well aware of the new law, which allows potential victims of violence to use deadly force if in fear in situations where state law previously required an attempt to retreat if possible.
That evening, the younger Loudon had gone to help his teenage stepdaughter change a tire. The man he shot was the same man his stepdaughter believed had slashed the tire.
Witnesses confirmed that the man, 19-year-old Andrew James Vavrik, was driving by and yelling obscenities while the tire change was going on. When Vavrik passed by again and then stopped nearby, the younger Loudon approached his car. According to Loudon's lawyer, he never got closer than 10 or 15 feet away, and intended only to urge Vavrik to stay around to talk to law officers who had already been called.
Vavrik later told investigators that Loudon first threatened to kill him and then, without provocation, shot through Vavrik's car door, hitting him in the leg. But Loudon's lawyer, Fred Mercurio, says Loudon made no threat and never showed his concealed handgun until Vavrik intentionally drove his car at him. Loudon got out of the way, drew his gun and fired, Mercurio says.
So Mercurio has hopes that charges will be dropped and that Vavrik could soon be the one charged.
http://www.heraldtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050710/COLUMNIST36/507100447
Unfortunately, what it often comes down to is, even in a righteous shoot, count on the initial arrest....
After his adult son shot a man in the leg Wednesday and sheriff's investigators took his son to jail, James Loudon had many questions.
Some were about the details of the shooting, which he and his construction worker son say was self-defense. Loudon, a retiree from Chicago, didn't see the shooting but he thinks he knows most of those details now.
His remaining questions are mostly about a new Florida law. It was advertised as expanding the right to use firearms and deadly force when people think they are threatened with illegal violence.
Loudon hopes that law, lauded by the governor and backed by the National Rifle Association, will protect his son. He hopes the law, combined with witness accounts, will lead prosecutors to drop the aggravated battery charge listed in the Sarasota County Sheriff's Office arrest report.
But at the same time, he told me he also fears that the law might have encouraged his son to shoot when maybe he didn't really have to.
"I don't think he would have been quite as anxious to pull the gun" were it not for that law, Loudon told me.
His son -- James Victor Loudon, 36 – has a concealed firearm permit. The father says his son was also well aware of the new law, which allows potential victims of violence to use deadly force if in fear in situations where state law previously required an attempt to retreat if possible.
That evening, the younger Loudon had gone to help his teenage stepdaughter change a tire. The man he shot was the same man his stepdaughter believed had slashed the tire.
Witnesses confirmed that the man, 19-year-old Andrew James Vavrik, was driving by and yelling obscenities while the tire change was going on. When Vavrik passed by again and then stopped nearby, the younger Loudon approached his car. According to Loudon's lawyer, he never got closer than 10 or 15 feet away, and intended only to urge Vavrik to stay around to talk to law officers who had already been called.
Vavrik later told investigators that Loudon first threatened to kill him and then, without provocation, shot through Vavrik's car door, hitting him in the leg. But Loudon's lawyer, Fred Mercurio, says Loudon made no threat and never showed his concealed handgun until Vavrik intentionally drove his car at him. Loudon got out of the way, drew his gun and fired, Mercurio says.
So Mercurio has hopes that charges will be dropped and that Vavrik could soon be the one charged.
http://www.heraldtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050710/COLUMNIST36/507100447
Unfortunately, what it often comes down to is, even in a righteous shoot, count on the initial arrest....