Stand Your Ground Laws

Someone asked about stand your ground laws. I couldn't give an immediate answer, it's one of those things I had to think on for a while. I think a stand your ground law could work, but(like any law) it needs to be properly interpreted by prosecutors and judges.

The example on the news, Trayvon Martin is NOT under any sane interpretation a case of self defense. The person who killed him, George Zimmerman's only claim was that Martin "looked suspicious" (this is sometimes referred to as walking while black-NYC's stop and frisk works off of this principal). There wasn't even an initial confrontation, from all accounts Zimmerman chased after Martin, who of course ran from someone screaming at him for no reason. Even if they started fighting after that the aggressor clearly was Zimmerman, so under the stand your ground law it would have been Martin who had the right to shoot Zimmerman, not the other way around.

EDIT
Conflicting reports have since come in, it is possible there was an initial confrontation and that Trayvon was not run down. Even so, this is STILL a poor case to present an argument against stand your ground, as SYG didn't apply here!
Zimmerman shot Martin when Martin was on top of him. He was pinned down so at that time he had no option of retreat.

Chasing someone down for no reason and shooting them is pretty clearly murder; failure to prosecute in a case like has more to do with a racist/corrupt/inept police force than anything else.

This case is what a stand your ground law is SUPPOSED to prevent, prosecution of someone who is confronting an actual criminal. The public outcry did get the case dropped, but they had wanted to prosecute a guy who didn't even shoot or kill anyone, he just punched out a junkie who was trying to rip him off, and that was AFTER the guy took a swing at him.

So to sum it up stand your ground is like most laws, an honest judiciary can make it work, but it will fail under a corrupt one. Then again if the judiciary and the cops are corrupt you are in pretty deep shit overall; congrats you now live in a banana republic.