Jump to content
Join the Unexplained Mysteries community today! It's free and setting up an account only takes a moment.
- Sign In or Create Account -

Interesting Stand you Ground Case.


Gromdor

Recommended Posts

 

You're right, it is an interesting case. Especially interesting are the comments at the end of the article ...... some of them from friends and family of the deceased.

I would like to read more about what happened in the weeks/months leading up to the shooting ..... why it came to this.

Hard to see how he can claim 'Stand your Ground' though.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think this man was afraid of a confrontation man to man so he took vigilante justice against his neighbors. If this has been going on for over a month as the article says then it is obvious that there was a lot of talk and not a lot of action since no arrests have been made that I read about. This would imply that there have been no assaults in the entire month of whatever was happening with these people. Knuckle up as I would say. That is all that should have come of this but unfortunately most men are not men anymore.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I feel sympathy for the guy's situation but it sounds like he murdered them. It raises an interesting point though. If a person is being threatened regularly - they and their family - at what point do they have a right to end it? Must they remain hypervigilant indefinitely? Do they owe a duty to the law to remain under threat indefinitely? I may have missed it but I don't think he tried a legal path prior to going off. The laws have become strange and tend to favor the criminal in many instances. I would have at least tried for an injunction against them first. I carry and if threatened with harm, injury or death I guess I'm "not much of a man" either, because I don't plan to tote a beating just because some a-hole decides he doesn't like the way I look, smell, speak... I personally think that idiots who provoke total strangers deserve everything they receive. Whatever happened to live and let live?

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'd like to know more about the incident, but on the surface it doesn't seem like stand your ground to me.

STG would be if he were, say, cutting his grass and these three guys attacked him. STG is not hunting them down and shooting them while they're grilling burgers.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think the man snapped and went postal on them. So I don't think SYG is gonna work in this case. But it does show you why bullying an individual is a bad idea these days, you just never know who you're really dealing with.

Edit : Typo

Edited by Purifier
  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

In the hours before the shooting, the men called him names, and said “Come on boys. We’re going to get him. We’re going to get him, all three of us.”

Florida law allows people to use deadly force to protect against “imminent death or…prevent the imminent commission of a forcible felony.”

He has a valid argument for invoking Florida's SYG law. Saying that, if he can show they were at least were involved in criminal damage during this dispute it would strengthen his case.

You might disagree, but that is because the SYG law is ridiculous, not that the defendent hasn't a right to invoke it.

Edited by Leonardo
Link to comment
Share on other sites

You might disagree, but that is because the SYG law is ridiculous, not that the defendent hasn't a right to invoke it.

it is not ridiculos, using if when you p***ed off at someone is. syg is direct opposite to duty to retreat, but you neet to be in dager to syg, even if 3 drunk neigbours talk trash it does not mean they are going after you, they have been doing it for months and didn't even try to attack. . pretty much clear they are trash talkers.

i hope they lock him up and throw away the keys, he makes syg look bad, as if it was license to kill.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This is a preemptive strike. It's vigilantism/murder. He may have prevented his own future demise but this is murder. He may have felt the threats were imminent but they really weren't. He should've just kept his gun on his person and waited for the threateners to make their move. I'm sure he was scared but he broke the law and went postal. No stand your ground case here.

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I remember a REAL syg in Pensacola Florida a couple decades ago. It was bizarre. Guy hears his neighbors (brothers I think) fighting in their front yard next door. Real donnybrook. He steps outside and fires his 9 mm in the air, yelling stop. The 3 guys who were fighting turn on him and chase him into his house. THEN into his bedroom...THEN back him into a closet. He killed all 3 and the grand jury refused to press charges. He caused their deaths but was still technically innocent due to their stupidity.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This is a preemptive strike. It's vigilantism/murder. He may have prevented his own future demise but this is murder. He may have felt the threats were imminent but they really weren't. He should've just kept his gun on his person and waited for the threateners to make their move. I'm sure he was scared but he broke the law and went postal. No stand your ground case here.

I'm not sure; if he hadn't used his gun they might have taken it from him and shot him. This is a problem with having a gun -- it creates a situation where you have no choice but use it. He didn't, however, have to kill them, but I suspect in the emotions of the moment this can be understood.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

Perhaps it makes a difference to how you act if you feel your family is being threatened not just you yourself. If he was a single man living on his own he may well have waited until they came to him wielding weapons before using his own.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This is a problem with having a gun -- it creates a situation where you have no choice but use it.

no it isn't a problem, it is an illusion strongly believed by someone that has no gun. no one takes away a gun that is pointed at them, (may be in 0,0001% cases it happens) you watched a lot of movies and believe it is real. you have no clue what it is to have a gun and to use it for protection, you are not in a position to tell us what it is like to have one. especially since hard evidence prove it, and show in 8 out of 10 cases just presence of the gun stopped an assault. with no shots fired.

Edited by aztek
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm not sure; if he hadn't used his gun they might have taken it from him and shot him. This is a problem with having a gun -- it creates a situation where you have no choice but use it. He didn't, however, have to kill them, but I suspect in the emotions of the moment this can be understood.

Creating a situation where you have no choice... I see your point of view if this were a home invasion or even a spontaneous brawl.

But if he hadn't done this

Officials say Woodward snuck up on a Labor Day barbecue and opened fire at about 12:30 a.m. on Sept. 3, 2012. Police arrived and found Gary Lee Hembree, Roger Picior and Bruce Timothy Blake all had been shot. Hembree and Picior died of their injuries. Blake, who was hit 11 times, survived.
the situation wouldn't have risen. He made a sneak attack so there was also no situation in which they'd have taken it from him. I mean, he shot one guy 11 times. This dude created the situation and was in complete control the whole time.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I can understand that he may have been enraged about his family being threatened and if he was willing to face any jail time, which apparently he was, he could've really made a clear point to the aholes next door and brandished the gun and threatened them. That would make most people think he's psycho enough to back off. He shouldn't have did what he did even if those he shot were the lowest of low lifes. He could've also issued a restraining order against them.

Besides the loss of lives, the other most unfortunate thing about this is that he is invoking stand your ground. Even if syg isn't ultimately presented in court he already made headlines and he said it. It's unfortunate because now the media will run amuck with I told you so's and white Florida redneck/gun associations with zero regard for the common sense we are speaking of. They have the keywords and will disregard any and all fact reporting and just make this another syg fiasco. Why not? They, and the president, did it with Zimmerman when syg was never an issue. It was only an early consideration but it stuck and never went away.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, there are two reasons why I think this might be a valid SYG. Firstly, there is a documented history of altercations between these people. He also tried to get an injunction against one of the men. This tells me that there is something going on that made the man feel justifiably threatened.

The second reason is that the SYG law is a step up from self-defense laws. It allows you to go on the offence against a threat. You don't need SYG to shoot an axe-wielding maniac in your house- that's what the normal self defense laws are for.

That all being said, I think this guy realized the law and said to himself, " I'm not going to wait for them guys to do something to me and I don't care if it's all talk. They gave me enough reason to legally shoot them and I am going to."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, there are two reasons why I think this might be a valid SYG. Firstly, there is a documented history of altercations between these people. He also tried to get an injunction against one of the men. This tells me that there is something going on that made the man feel justifiably threatened.

The second reason is that the SYG law is a step up from self-defense laws. It allows you to go on the offence against a threat. You don't need SYG to shoot an axe-wielding maniac in your house- that's what the normal self defense laws are for.

That all being said, I think this guy realized the law and said to himself, " I'm not going to wait for them guys to do something to me and I don't care if it's all talk. They gave me enough reason to legally shoot them and I am going to."

C'mon man, that's wrong. He "snuck up" on them and unloaded. Not just wanting shots either. He shot one guy 11 times who somehow managed to live. I think everybody understands what it's like to feel vengeance and a need to just take care of business in one way or another but he wasn't standing any ground. He took a stance for sure and if I knew his full story there is a slim chance I might think he did the right thing. He'd have had to exhaust all legal procedures and those guys would have had to make some seriously serious and specific threats against his family but we don't live in a movie and you can't just do things like this. He could've simply secured his house for starters. Anybody can get a high tech security system for free these days so long as they sign up for relatively affordable monthy payments although the multi-year contracts kind of suck there is a lot of piece of mind knowing that the cops, firemen and ambulance will show up real fast if you aren't home. All my security breaches have been false alarms but the responses were highly reassuring.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

That video footage of the shooting embedded in the article was shot through the shooters security/surveillance system. It's the small things like the fact that he had a security system that makes me think that there really was something going on that he viewed as a threat to himself and family. I agree with you that the way he did it was wrong.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.