re: #308 palomino

The article claims that SYG couldn’t have had anything to do with the verdict because Dunn was found guilty on three counts of attempted murder.

Not necessarily true. If the jury believed Dunn thought Davis had a gun, they might be stuck on his count alone. Whereas they would have little trouble finding Dunn guilty of attempted murder for indiscriminately shooting at three people who didn’t have guns.

And, since SYG is simply a specific form of self-defense, it’s hard to cleanly separate the two as the author does.

The problem with SYG is that it makes everyone with a gun a cop. All they have to say to a Grand Jury (GJ) is “I feared for my life.” This is why it is so difficult to get an indictment against a police officer from a GJ. How can you definitively determine that the statement is a lie?

Likewise, when a SYG statute is on the books, it puts the onus on a jury to make a determination of whether “I feared for my life” is factual, or not factual. Given that the victim is taking a dirt bath, how is that possible? You are demanding that they read the mind of the shooter.

I see infinite possibilities for the mafia hit man, the casual racist, and the committed White Supremacist to invoke his “fear” as justification for what would be, in a State without such blindingly stupid legislation, stone cold murder.