“Reasonable” Fear Context

Too bad State Rep. Dennis Baxley (R-Ocala) had to cancel his Stand Your Ground-forum appearance at last week’s Tiger Bay Club of Tampa luncheon. As the prime sponsor of the controversial SYG statute in 2005, his role would have been to clarify legislative intent and take the lion’s share of incoming fire. So, no stop-the-presses stuff.

But Mark O’Mara, the increasingly high-profile, media-friendly attorney who represented George Zimmerman in the Trayvon Martin case, was there.

Some O’Mara outtakes:

* Inherent subjectivity and fluidity of “reasonableness” concept: “What happens in the last 10-15 seconds can matter most,” regardless of what has preceded it.

* “Emboldening.” Likely effect that possession of a weapon would have on those inserting themselves into a situation that could, in turn, escalate into a “reasonable” fear scenario that could, in further turn, culminate in a lethal-force tragedy.

* “Stand Your Ground” connotations: “It sounds good to those who want it to sound good. It’s visceral.” Yes, he could live with the phrase being eliminated, but, no, it wouldn’t change the law.

* Guns and society: “I don’t think the Founding Fathers had assault weapons in mind. … If we could reboot society, it would be better not to have so many (guns).”

* Racism and the Trayvon Martin killing: “No, you can’t say the (SYG) statute is racist. It’s the system. It’s biased. You can’t deny that.”

* Role of defense attorneys: “We’re the people you know over in the corner somewhere–until you need us.”

* Hypothetically, would he have defended Trayvon Martin had the teen responded to being followed with a confrontation that turned, say, a brick into a lethal weapon? “Yes. It’s what I do.”

No, nothing was settled except for further underscoring that we remain saddled with an awful statute that is Exhibit A for the law of unintended consequences: Where “Gunshine State” meets “Flori-duh.” Where an armed defendant can unreasonably–and ironically–initiate a context that escalates–without an obligation to back down–into the use of deadly force based on, what else, reasonable fear.

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