Stunning Report: "Stand Your Ground" Laws Responsible for 500-700 Homicides Per year

[Carl N. Brown]

As I read the Tennessee statutes and had them explained to me, the no duty to retreat if you are where you have a right to be (SYG) only applies if the classic self defense test also applies: would a reasonable person be in fear of imminent death or greivous bodily harm from an attacker with the ability and opportunity to put life and limb in immediate jeopardy. It does not apply to cases of "mutual combat" where the one claiming SYG instigated or escalated the situation, or was perpetrating or attempting to perpetrate a felony.

A case where a claim of "SYG" was made under questioned circumstances discussed here:
http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=662591
THR > Social Situations > Strategies, Tactics and Training > Retired Firefighter Shoots Neighbor, Claims Self-Defense

 

[gym]

As mentioned stand your ground is only a term used in the explanation of the castle doctrine. It can not be used by an illegal gun holder as a means of defending a felonius act.Nor anyone other than a homeowner who is legally permitted to have a weapon. A felon can't claim protection, or protection under the castle doctrine, since they are not supposed to have a gun, this is common sense.
The press has been harping on the SYG, teminology as though it is a seperate law. It's not, it's merely an explanation of your right to SYG during an intrusion by a person or persons who are commiting an illegal act. Like criminal tresspass, or robbery. Not a repo man who has a legal paper stating he can take posession of your car because you stopped paying the payments.
Unfortunatelly it has take on a life of it's own, and even my cousin in Chicago emailed me asking, "what the heck is this "SYG law" you guys have down there", I sent him a copy of the Castle Doctrine, it was self explanitory. I don't see how it could be responsible for any deaths since it's being called something it isn't in most states.

 

[HoosierQ]

Funny how threads go isn't it

 

[Stevie-Ray]

I'm glad that as a society we have graduated past chopping off thieves hands and gone straight to executions.

Sent using Tapatalk 2

I'm also glad liberals have graduated from labeling somebody that will shoot you in the back for your wallet a thief rather than a murderer.

Sent using my keyboard.

 

[zxcvbob]

In fact, they say the response of criminals to the idea that the victim may be armed is to arm themselves as well, turning what otherwise would have been burglaries and robberies into homicides.

By that logic, the police should be unarmed.

 

[Canfield]

Working papers are like first draft Mss.

This is often not true in economics because it can take years to publish a paper. There are plenty of unpublished working papers in economics that are more carefully done than published papers in other fields.

That said, this paper is clearly preliminary and not very impressive. What's been said already on the thread about the definition of "justifiable homicide" and the combining of different laws into one category is true, and the paper discusses both points.

It's clear from reading the paper that something is going on in their data that they're not accounting for. Not only are the not finding a deterrent effect on burglary and robbery, they often find a statistically significant increase. It also looks like the more mild forms of the laws, which do not extend "SYG" out of the home, are associated with a larger increase in homicide. These results are odd, not consistent with the story they tell, and suggest something else is driving the results.

My money is on omitted variable bias or a single state (maybe two) driving the results.

[Edit: The fact that they don't weigh the estimates by state population is also problem. Violent crime rates in Alabama, for example, are much more volatile than they are for Texas. More weight should be placed on observations from Texas because it's several time larger than Alabama and variation in its crime rates are less likely driven by random chance.]

 

[Pilot]

The anti-gun left is using the Trayvon Martin case and made up statistics to try to force states to enact "Duty to Retreat" laws through political political/public outcry. Pure and simple.

 

[mgkdrgn]

http://radio.woai.com/cc-common/mainheadlines3.html?feed=119078&article=10192072#ixzz1xa585bIn

Here's the part that's really a doozer. :banghead:

Quote:
<snip>

"While castle doctrine law may well have benefits to those protecting themselves in self-defense (meaning the individual cases where a person uses a weapon to deter a specific crime), there is no evidence that the law provides positive spillovers by deterring crime more generally," they say.

I would say the several hundred dirtbags that got "returned to the earth" are pretty well "deterred".

 

[sansone]

The anti-gun left is using the Trayvon Martin case and made up statistics to try to force states to enact "Duty to Retreat" laws through political political/public outcry. Pure and simple.

this is MHO as well. My proximity to the martin case has placed me closer to the frying pan than I like. Opinions are hot at school too where my wife teaches. We are glad school has closed for summer break

 

[Skribs]

Personally, I don't even understand why it's a public debate about whether or not you should have the right to defend yourself (guns or no guns). If you don't want to defend yourself, that's fine. But if you try to make it illegal to defend yourself, then society is lost.

 

[C0untZer0]

I think they've also missed the boat on criminals arming themselves.

In Illinois we have a charge of being caught with "burglary tools". Very difficult to prove that charge.

Home invaders often will carry a 14" or 12" flathead screwdriver that has been filed razor sharp. When used for stabbing, it will kill or disable someone almost as well as any knife, but if you're caught with one, it's relatively easy to avoid a weapons charge. The worst you would get would be a burglary tool charge - which is also relatively easy to beat.

Criminals are already armed, it's just not showing up in a statistic that these researchers can get at.

 

[Neverwinter]

I'm also glad liberals have graduated from labeling somebody that will shoot you in the back for your wallet a thief rather than a murderer.

Among your liberal friends, how many of them express that sentiment? Most of them? Few of them? Inquiring minds want to know.

Then again, a gun does little against an assassination-robbery.

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[FIVETWOSEVEN]

I think lax enforcement of texting while driving laws causes far more deaths then SYG laws.

 

[Jeff White]

In Illinois we have a charge of being caught with "burglary tools". Very difficult to prove that charge.

We convict people of that all the time here.

Home invaders often will carry a 14" or 12" flathead screwdriver that has been filed razor sharp. When used for stabbing, it will kill or disable someone almost as well as any knife, but if you're caught with one, it's relatively easy to avoid a weapons charge. The worst you would get would be a burglary tool charge - which is also relatively easy to beat.

I have gotten UUW convictions for screwdrivers, tire irons, a piece of plaster cast....They key thing in the Illinois UUW law is "intent". If you can prove the criminal intended to use it as a weapon when he had it you can convict him on it.

 

[Dave Workman]

Down in Texas...don't they have a term..."He needed killin'?"

At least some of the people shot in SYG situations definitely have it coming. I did a book with Alan Gottlieb a few years ago: AMERICA FIGHTS BACK: Armed Self-Defense in a Violent Age" (still available) that punched a lot of holes in the myth of SYG as a formula for murder.

As many of you know (because you're regular readers of my screed) there is a boost in self-defense killings, but I contend this is NOT because the law makes it easier to murder people, but that the law makes it harder to prosecute law-abiding citizens who have justifiably shot someone.

I have no sympathy for anyone who hides behind SYG to explain a needless killing.
I have no sympathy for anyone who gets justifiably plugged by some poor sap he was trying to rob, assault and/or murder.

 

[C0untZer0]

I think the convictions for burglary tools in Ilinois is part being caught in the act of burglarizing in conjunction with physical evidence of a break-in, and part plea deals - just my opinion.


I'm just saying that the data that these researchers have that seems to indicate that criminals are only now arming themselves in response to SYG laws is unreliable data.

Specifically the report examines "Whether criminals respond to the laws by being more likely use a gun when committing robbery and assault."

Their report doesn't take into account that sticking a sharpened screwdriver to someone's throat is the same as sticking a knife to their throat or putting a gun to their head.

The report is so flawed. They discount the use of all other weapons and only count guns. Does it matter if someone is sexually assaulted at knifepoint instead of gun point?

What if sexual assaults go down by a significant percentage and armed sexuall assault as a whole goes down after adoption of SYG laws, but the percentage of sexuall assaults committed with a gun go up? Well it gets interpreted by this report as criminals upping their armament in response to "Castle Doctrine" or SYG.

 

[Hugo]

Justifiable homicide (self-defense) is certainly not the same thing as murder. What idiot reporter wrote (and idiot editor approved?) this biased junk?

 

[eye5600]

IANAL. One way a object can become a burglary tool is by linking possession with context. For example, you can carry a crowbar down the sidewalk, but when you trespass with crowbar it may become a burglary tool. Burglars know the ins and outs. In a book on the Massachusetts Brinks robbery, it's described that when the key guy was casing the joint, he left his screwdriver behind, so if he was caught trespassing, it wouldn't have brought extra charge.

A problem with SYG is that it means less in court than some folks think, so they may be inclined to go to "active defense" too soon, and get in trouble. I'm sure your basic SD courses will be starting to emphasize that.

I second the comment from "zxcvbob". It's really hypocritical for LEOs to complain about citizens arming for self defense when they've used every excuse in the book to arm up.

 

[Hugo]

Also the "burglary tools" definition depends on the time of day, clothing, exact location, etc...

Walking home from work at 5:35 PM with a toolbox in hand wearing jeans and a work shirt? Probably not a criminal.

Behind a store at 2 AM with tools and bolt cutters wearing all black clothing and mask? Pretty likely there for burglary.

Police have been seeing this junk for well over 100+ years and they are not stupid. I think Police training became widespread, formal and "good" about 100 years ago. Coincidentally, so did literacy.

Occasionally (sadly), a crooked cop might unjustly charge someone they just don't like or have a personal issue with. That's an ancient social problem.

 

[MedWheeler]

kcshooter (re: post 49.)
True, Florida does not permit the invocation of "SYG" protection when the defender is/was committing a forcible felony, but the laws' protections are frequently brought into play in many states in cases in which other crimes are/were being committed by the defender. These can include sale/purchase of illegal drugs, illegal gang activity, or even the unlawful carrying of a firearm. None of those is a forcible felony.

 

[SharpsDressedMan]

OK. Let's throw in citizens arrest, a perfectly legal exercise that citizens of my state,
Ohio, have with the same authority as police officers on felonies. I believe a citzen could go from victim to citizen effecting an arrest on the alleged FELON assaulting him. This throws a completely new twist, and legal hassle, on what might have been stand your ground. Of course, you have to have the INTENT to arrest, be able to articulate your actions in court, and possibly have been ABLE to attempt or effect what would later be viewed as a legitimate arrest. All serious points, but also an option to some, and possibly even civic DUTY, depending on how serious the situation would be (would you try to arrest or detain someone that was about to seriously harm or kill another, or yourself, if you didn't HAVE to shoot them? What if they were likely to harm another right after that?).

 

[Carl N. Brown]

...they say the response of criminals to the idea that the victim may be armed is to arm themselves as well, turning what otherwise would have been burglaries and robberies into homicides

"They" say a lot of things. Back in the 1970s, a couple of city detectives told me that their experience was, if there was a successful robbery in our town, it would be quickly followed by repeats or copycats, but if a robber was shot, there would be a quietus on robbery for months. Obviously not an outbreak of robbers armed in response turning burglaries and robberies into homicides, but a significant stop that lasted until the lesson faded.

I find a lot of the hypotheticals raised by anti-self-defense and anti-gun academics to be totally whacko. The Zimrings and Donohues want to set policy on what they can imagine, not on what happens.

 

[sonick808]

Did they count every claim of self-defense used by gang members while they're out banging ? probably

 

[Deanimator]

A homicide means a human was killed.

The killings of Rheinhardt Hydrich and Osama bin Laden were "homicides".

Anti-gunners always leave out the question of "justifiable", but then that's what dishonest people do.

 

[Double Naught Spy]

Nowhere in this country that I'm aware of can you lawfully kill another human being for stealing.

This happens in Texas with some regularity. There are conditions that apply, but lethal force can be used to stop theft without there being any threat to the shooter, loved ones, or others who aren't the one being shot.