Oakland police (tomdiaz.com)

For Immediate Release

FSA President, Sheriff Grady Judd, today announced, “The right to self-defense is well-established in law.  The Florida Sheriffs confirmed this position by voting unanimously, at the 2013 Florida Sheriffs Association Summer Conference, to support the Stand Your Ground law as it is currently written.  Our current judicial system is comprised of multiple checks and balances to ensure fair and equitable application of all laws, including Stand Your Ground.”

“A person who is not engaged in an unlawful activity, and who is attacked in any other place where he or she has a right to be has no duty to retreat and has the right to stand his or her ground and meet force with force, including deadly force if he or she reasonably believes it is necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm to himself or herself or another or to prevent the commission of a forcible felony.” F.S. §776.013(3) [h/t SS]

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74 COMMENTS

  1. OMG wait you mean California doesn’t have a duty to retreat, yippee They got something right!

    • well, considering it is impossible to get a license to carry in most county, i don’t think it is overly generous of them to allow you to use your fist and not back down.

    • The problem is that in Cali, the thugs can sue you if they survive or their families if they don’t.

      • Where the fear of law mandates inaction to injustice, through fear of wrongful vengeance, from that of “legal” unrighteousness, the result is the increased inhibition of those actions of righteous indignation.

    • @Dan Silverman. Not only is California a SYG state, they also explicitly allow you to pursue your assailant if it is necessary for your safety.

      To give credit where due, I learned that factoid from Andrew Branca Esq. over at legalinsurrection.com

      -bsd

      • Ya,good luck with that,California pees on the 2nd amendment like it doesn’t exist.Kamala Harris needs to go to JAIL for Treason against the constitution and the Bill of Rights except she’s too stupid to know they even exist!

    • Uh, how does the Florida Sheriffs Assoc. SYG stance apply to Californistan?
      Am I missing something in this article? I don’t see where Cali was mentioned.
      It’s a yippee! for Florida, sure, but I don’t think Cali has a SYG law on the books.

      • “I don’t think Cali has a SYG law on the books”

        It’s in the jury instructions and 60-year-old case law.

        CALCRIM 3470 says, in relevant part:
        A defendant is not required to retreat. He or she is entitled to stand his or her ground and defend himself or herself and, if reasonably necessary, to pursue an assailant until the danger of (death/bodily injury/__________ (insert crime)) has passed. This is so even if safety could have been achieved by retreating.

        The jury instructions reference an authority for that: People v. Hughes 107 Cal. App. 2d 487. In that 1951 case, the jury was instructed:
        A person who has been attacked and who is exercising his right of lawful self-defense is not required to retreat, and he may not only stand his ground and defend himself against the attack but may also pursue his assailant until he has secured himself from danger if that course appears to him, and would appear to a reasonable person in the same situation, to be reasonably and apparently necessary; and this is his right even though he might more easily have gained safety by withdrawing from the scene
        The appellate court quoted those instructions and said of them “These instructions fully and fairly advised the jury of the law applicable to that phase of appellant’s defense, viz., that he was assaulted by the victim first. They contain a clear and correct statement of the rights of appellant to defend himself under the circumstances which he claimed existed at the time of the encounter between himself and the complainant.”

        • Wow – for California, we can go all the back to 1897! A 1940 case (People v. Kinowaki, 39 Cal. App. 2d 376) has this gem:

          In People v. Newcomer, 118 Cal. 263, 273 [50 P. 405], it is held that, “when a man without fault himself is suddenly attacked in a way that puts life or bodily safety at imminent hazard, he is not compelled to fly or to consider the proposition of flying, but may stand his ground and defend himself to the extent of taking the life of the assailant, if that be reasonably necessary”.

          People v. Newcomer was in 1897.

        • I was both right and wrong at the same time. A rare moment to be sure. Cali doesn’t have a written SYG law, but recognizes SYG nonetheless. Who’d have thunk? Thank you for sussing that out.
          I stand corrected.

      • Cali has Castle Doctrine and SYG via 125+ years of court precedent. The issue in Cali is getting sued by injured perp or surviving family members in civil court. I used to live in SoCal.

  3. Not sure where that map comes from, but it’s wrong about Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania has long had “castle doctrine”, and a few years ago we passed an “expanded castle doctrine” law that was Stand Your Ground in all but name.. it eliminated the duty to retreat anywhere one has a lawful right to be.

    • Ah good… I may move from NJ to PA some time… want to make sure I’m heading in the right direction!

  4. Not sure where this map got its info, but NH has no duty to retreat, either inside the home or out, and our SYG law just withstood a challenge by a Democratic full-court press to repeal it.

  5. I want to know what they mean by “limitations on deadly force inside the home”. They have my state listed as such, but I can’t find much I would call a limitation in the code.

  7. The “duty to retreat” is total bullshit. First off, it may make you vulnerable be exposing yourself. Plus, a 50 year old guy is going to be at a disadvantage trying to outrun a 20 year old wide receiver much less a bullet. On top of that, I will not be leaving my lady behind.

    • To be fair, states with a duty to retreat only require you to retreat if that retreat is safe. If retreating keeps you or others in danger then even those states allow self defense.

      However, if you could retreat safely and don’t, then you lose self defense as an affirmative defense to assault if you are so charged.

      That means that if burglars come to your house and don’t see you and there is no one else in the house, AND you can easily leave the house without being seen or putting yourself in danger, then you must leave the house. And the burglars can run amok after you leave, and you have to hope the police show up in time. But that safe retreat must be possible. “Stand you ground” just eliminates the obligation to retreat, even if it is possible to do so safely.

      • How the hell would a prosecutor know all that anyway?

        I think this is a good example of not talking to the cops after a defensive incident, without a lawyer, of course.

      • To be fair? Are you serious? Who gets to decide when it is “safe” to retreat in a place out side the home or “safe to hide” inside the home? Therein lies the problem Florida had a self defense common law long before 2005 776.013 aka “Castle Doctrine +SYG.” However, there were too many overzealous prosecutors and LEO that were expecting people to run through busy intersections to avoid armed carjackers or jumping out a window and leaving wives and daughters behind with attackers. Plus, there was situations with criminals or their families being able to sue.

        • That I’m explaining how the law is supposed to work is in no way intended to mean that I think there is anything good about the law. But if we’re going to be discussing it, we should at least understand it.

          If you can’t retreat safely, then there is no duty to retreat.

          • O.k. My point is that is the way it was in Florida prior to 2005 and it was being abused by overzealous prosecutors. Remember the example I used regarding a guy being carjacked by armed carjackers? He was expected to run a red light at a busy intersection in Orlando. That was even with it being a classic self defense case under hence, “The Castle Doctrine & SYG.”

        • Remember, I was referring to the “safe retreat” comment and I don’t think the man being required to run a red light at a busy intersection to get away from armed jackers was a “safe” way to retreat.

    • Actually MI has reasonable gun laws in all but requiring the pistol purchase permit, but thats gone to. Just that your sherriffs office gets a little card with seller buyer, model, manufacture, cal. We have had open carry for years, its easy to get the ccw/cpl. And private sales of long guns are easy.

  12. funny, LEO appointed by mayors say one thing, sherriffs say another. Even in maryland. whats up with that?

  13. That this is controversial shows the level of mush for brains our culture has devolved to. You don’t have to run or get beaten half conscious before defending yourself. How revolutionary.

  15. FSA is a very anti gun rights organization. They were against shall-issue concealed carrry in 1987. They were against “stand your ground” before they were before it, they through a fit when licensed open carry was proposed, against campus carry, and the list goes on. Oh, they’ll tell you how much they support the second amendment, but in reality they actively work against freedom at every turn. They were even against the anti-drone legislation that passed this last session. They are a bunch of criminals.

  16. More prof that Sheriffs have peoples support and support the people. City Police are hacks who brown nose the liberal mayor.

    • At least the chiefs/commissioners are, politicians first and foremost. Why you will see the chiefs supporting whatever the mayor wants them too, but many rank-and-file not always agreeing.

    • Yes, MA has a Castle Doctrine, but it’s very limited and has no immunity against arrest or civil suits. The only reason MA has no duty to retreat in your own home is because the twits in Boston figured out that jumping out a 30 story window just wouldn’t cut it.

      • The reason MA has a castle doctrine is because Ed King, the last good Governor of that benighted commonwealth, pushed the legislation through in the early 1980s.

      • My fist thoughts too. Even Hollywood actors usually salute better than these guys. My Drill Sargent would have dropped the lot of them for push-ups.

      • Got one, a third of the way up from the bottom, and two-thirds of the way from left to right. Don’t know who taught him to salute, Schultz or Klink.

        Couldn’t understand CO as a state where you had no duty to retreat outside, but inside was circumstantial.

  19. I wouldn’t put too much stock in this epiphany. The vote was a “unanimous” VERBAL vote of the attendees at their conference. Believe me, there are Florida Sheriffs who truly believe in individual gun rights, including mine in N FL. But, there are many of them who pay lip service in “supporting the second amendment” for what that’s worth and will turn around in a nanosecond and do whatever they can to limit individual freedoms when it comes to firearms. I doubt very seriously that those expressed their opinion in that verbal vote. It’s similar to their proclamation last year that the FSA supports the second amendment while at the same time, some Sheriffs were partnering up with the gun-grabber crowd in PSA’s and other propaganda that was contrary to that position.

  21. Am I the only one wondering why we care what the cops think about this? Isn’t that a dangerous practice? So if next time the cops think we should suspend the fifth amendment, should their opinions still be important?

    These are the people that “we” decided to arm in order to enforce the laws we enact. It seems inappropriate for them them to tell us which laws they like or don’t like.

    I know I’m dreaming, but I would prefer the police stay out of politics.

    • Does make it harder for the anits to claim that law enforcement is no their side. Not that they hesitate to tell bold-faced lies anyway, though.

  22. I don’t need a stand your ground law, and I sit on juries… your right to self preservation trumps any law….

    • Right. No law says otherwise. The duty to retreat is only if you can do so without risk to yourself, so you can still defend yourself if necessary. Those states that require you to retreat do not say you have to die or even be injured, you can always resist that. But these states say that if you can leave a confrontation or danger without risk to yourself, then you must do so. These states believe that your property or possessions are not worth defending. I don’t agree with them, but that’s the law in those places. They never require you to submit to personal danger or risk.

      • As we’ve seen recently, even in states that do have favorable self-defense laws, it always seems to come down to the DA.

      • The problem is that some jurisdictions in some states haven’t always agreed exactly when it is safe to retreat. That is why Florida came up with 776.013 and signed it into law in 2005. It curtailed the power of overzealous DA’s like the witch Angela Corey and some goof balls in SE Florida.

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