Newly-minted DP Florida sends nice message to tourists

[Renard]

Floridainstalls 'Shoot first law'
People can meet 'force with force'

By JOHN-THOR DAHLBURG
Los Angeles Times
October 02. 2005 8:00AM

MIAMI - Welcome to Florida, the Sunshine State. But avoid unnecessary arguments with locals. As of yesterday, they may be more inclined to shoot you - or at least, in essence, that is the message from one national gun-control organization as a Florida law goes into effect empowering people who feel threatened in the street or anywhere else to use force, including a firearm, to protect themselves.

"It's unlike any supposed self-defense statute in America," said Peter Hamm, communications director for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. "It empowers people who are on edge and have violent tendencies to presume a situation is dangerous to them that may not be."

Proponents of the law, which was championed by the National Rifle Association, counter that it sends a message both to would-be assailants and innocent citizens that potential victims have the legal option of protecting themselves.

"Running away is a good way to get shot in the back . . . or otherwise harmed," said state Rep. Dennis Baxley, a prime sponsor of the law.

Under a legal concept derived from English Common Law, known as the "Castle Doctrine," people have long been held to have the right to stand their ground if attacked in their home. Baxley, a Republican from Ocala, said the new legislation extends the concept of a person's "castle" to one's personal space in a car or anywhere else he or she is entitled to be.
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"We want people to know that the law contains a presumption that they have the right to protect themselves," Baxley said.

Previously, under Florida law, people acting in self-defense outside their home or workplace were supposed to use any reasonable means at hand to escape the danger, including retreat. The new law says they can "meet force with force."

Last spring, the legislation sailed through the Florida House, 94-20, was unopposed in the state Senate and signed by Gov. Jeb Bush. That was despite opposition from some of the state's police chiefs and a tepid reaction from the Florida Sheriff's Association.

State Rep. Eleanor Sobel, one of the few lawmakers to vote no, said she was worried the law could turn the streets of Florida into a latter-day version of the Wild West.

"With this new law, people have an excuse to use guns and say it was in self-defense," said Sobel, a Hollywood Democrat.

It is an argument echoed by The Brady Campaign - named after former White House press secretary James Brady, who was wounded in the 1981 attempt on President Reagan's life.

The Brady Campaign argues that Florida's "Shoot First Law," as its foes have labeled it, threatens to make life in Florida not safer, but riskier.

To alert visitors and potential visitors, the organization is placing advertisements in newspapers in major markets for Florida's tourism industry, including Boston, Detroit and Britain.

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By JOHN-THOR DAHLBURG

Los Angeles Times

[El Presidente]

What a whacked out peninsula.

As long as no retirees or rednecks think I'm pulling out a 350 when I'm pulling out my Coppertone while on the beach, there shouldn't be a problem.