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State Attorney pans expected Stand Your Ground change, placing burden on prosecutors

Palm Beach County's State Attorney used strong words this week, opposing proposed changes to the state's Stand Your Ground law.

A bill in Tallahassee would shift the burden of proof in these cases to prosecutors. While similar legislation failed last year, the proposal passed the State Senate last week, and appears headed for approval in the House.

The case of Rijkard Jean-Baptiste is a local example of how the law currently plays out.

Jean-Baptiste had two murder charges against him dismissed late last year. He had been charged with murder in the fatal shootings of two teenagers, ages 16 and 17, at a Sweet 16 party at Riviera Beach's old Newcomb Hall.

Jean-Baptiste insisted he fired in self-defense, and took his claim of immunity under the states Stand Your Ground law to a judge. The judge agreed with Jean-Baptiste, and threw out the charges.

At the present time, its up to defendants like Jean-Baptiste, and their lawyers to prove their Stand Your Ground claims.

Under the legislation now in Tallahassee, the burden would shift to prosecutors, and to the typical evidence standard-- beyond a reasonable doubt.

Palm Beach County's top prosecutor, State Attorney David Aronberg, said he fears the change will end up helping those it shouldnt.

"Stand Your Ground was supposed to allow people to protect their family and their loved ones, not give gang members a free pass for murder," said Aronberg.

State Attorney Aronberg said hes dubbed the bill the Gang Members Protection Act.

"Any defendant would be able to say, Hey I shot this guy, because I was scared for my life," said Aronberg.

Then it's up to us to somehow, before trial, prove beyond a reasonable doubt, that in his mind, he wasn't scared, Aronberg continued. And that is so hard to prove."

But backers in the legislature say prosecutors have always had the burden of proof in criminal cases, and this simply clarifies it's prosecutors who should have the burden in a Stand Your Ground hearing.

"These hearings usually took a few hours," said veteran West Palm Beach criminal defense attorney Gregg Lerman. He said the legislation, if approved, would create the need for what amounts to a second trial, prolonging such cases.

"They're going to have basically a full-blown, nonjury trial, where they have to lay out all their cards to a judge, and prove to a judge beyond a reasonable doubt," said Lerman.

However, another West Palm Beach defense attorney, Michael Salnick, said he did not expect a big impact on the system.

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State Attorney pans expected Stand Your Ground change, placing ... - WPEC

On March 10, a judge ruled that ex-Tampa police officer Curtis Reeves could not claim immunity under Florida's "Stand Your Ground" law for fatally shooting an unarmed man in a movie theater.

Five days later, the Florida Senate approved legislation that could make it much easier for such trigger-happy Floridians to go free after provoking a violent confrontation. Ain't life great in the Gunshine State?

Stand Your Ground, which the Legislature and then-Gov. Jeb Bush forced on Florida in 2005 as a favor to the National Rifle Association, removed any responsibility to retreat for someone who "reasonably believes" that he or she is in danger. Criminal defendants, however, still must persuade a judge that they are entitled to immunity if they claim it under Stand Your Ground.

Senate Bill 128 would shift that burden to the prosecution. Defendants could file a written motion, laying out the supposed facts of their claim. "The court shall (emphasis mine) grant the motion after a pretrial hearing," the legislation reads, "unless the state proves beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant is not immune."

Bernie McCabe has been the state attorney for Pinellas and Pasco counties since 1993. His office charged Reeves with second-degree murder for shooting Chad Oulson in a theater north of Tampa. Reeves got mad at Oulson for texting during the previews. After Reeves kept it up, Oulson swore at him and turned around to push Reeves' popcorn into his face, at which point Reeves drew his .38 and fired.

In an interview, McCabe said SB 128 would make such cases "totally topsy-turvy. We would have to disprove a negative. This is kind of unexplored territory."

Fortunately, McCabe's prosecutors could use video to undercut Reeves' version of events. He claimed that Oulson was coming at him, but Oulson is not even in the frame when Reeves shoots. Judge Susan Barthle found Reeves' testimony to be "significantly at odds with the physical evidence and other witness testimony. . .The logical conclusion is that he was trying to justify his actions after the fact." Reeves will appeal.

If the House passes SB 128 and Gov. Rick Scott signs it, expect many more such attempts. "I don't know why a defense lawyer wouldn't use it in almost every case," McCabe said. "It's a free shot. The defendant only has to file an unsworn, written motion. He has no skin in the game at that point."

Reeves' lawyers and is family portrayed the 27-year police veteran as a frail 71-year-old who feared for his life that January afternoon in 2014. Stand Your Ground, though, has helped people far less sympathetic than Reeves Under the law, the Tampa Bay Times reported, drug dealers and gang members have benefited.

Reeves could have moved. He could have obeyed the ban on guns in the theater. With even less reason to avoid confrontation, more violence will follow if Stand Your Ground gets stronger.

This new attempt to weaken public safety apparently arose from a 2015 Florida Supreme Court ruling that the defendant bears the burden of proof in Stand Your Ground claims. In dissent, Justice Charles Canady wrote that the decision "substantially curtails the benefit of the immunity from trial conferred by the Legislature under the Stand Your Ground law."

The case involved a man named Jared Bretherick in a sadly typical Florida story. A man cut off the Bretherick family's car, blocking their lane, then got out and approached. Bretherick's father brandished a holstered pistol, and the man retreated. Jared Bretherick took the gun, went to the truck, aimed the weapon at the man told him to move the vehicle or get shot.

As the Florida Supreme Court noted, all five state appellate courts had agreed that defendants have the burden to prove Stand Your Claims based on a "preponderance of the evidence." That's the lower standard for trials in civil courts. SB 128, however, would impose the higher "beyond a reasonable doubt" standard on the prosecution.

If this change passes, McCabe said, Stand Your Ground claims could become so common that defense lawyers who don't file one could be accused of ineffective representation. McCabe and the other 19 state attorneys oppose SB 128, but their opposition likely won't matter.

"This is what the NRA wants," McCabe sighed. "Enough said."

Randy Schultz's email address is randy@bocamag.com

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Toughen 'Stand Your Ground'? Expect more violence | Opinion - Sun Sentinel

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He suggests this has happened as a result of the contention that private gun ownership is the ultimate check against tyranny.

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Hayes writes:

The Second Amendment, its most strenuous defenders like to tell us, is the ultimate check against tyranny.The argument is that an armed populace keeps oppression at bay, but its practical effect has been the opposite.If the people are always armed enough to threaten the states control, then the states monopoly on violence is forever in question and the state therefore acts more often than not as if it were putting down an insurrection as opposed to enforcing the law.

Note the assertion that an armed populace threatens the states monopoly on violence. Hayes misses the fact that this is exactly what the Founding Fathers wanted. The Founderswanted to ensure that the central government could not overreach and run roughshod over the citizenry.

See James Madisons Federalist 46, where it is evident that the advantage of being armed is one which Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation. Moreover, the purpose of the armsas described by Madisonis to enable the people to band together and repel a tyranny.

Madison wrote, Extravagant as the supposition is, let it however be made. Let a regular army, fully equal to the resources of the country, be formed; and let it be entirely at the devotion of the federal government; still it would not be going too far to say, that the State governments, with the people on their side, would be able to repel the danger.

He makes the same point in other ways in Federalist 46, but what is applicable here is that Hayes and others who criticize strenuous defenders who say the Second Amendment is the ultimate check against tyranny miss the fact that this contention was nurtured by Madison. For those who disagreewhether they were disagreeing in 1788 or now, in 2017Madison invites them to look at the lessons the British regular army learned when it tried to expand the Crowns power over armed colonists formed into militias.

Rather than deal with these realities of American history and the documents that so clearly state the Founders intentions, Hayes tries to undercut the benefit of an armed populace by suggesting that Saddam Hussein was able to hold power, although Iraq had one of the highest rates of gun ownership in the world. Hayes does not mention that Iraq also had a dictatorship which only allowed the best guns to go those loyal to the dictator.

Slatereported this by summarizing the Washington Posts Anthony Shadid regarding Iraqs gun policy prior to the U.S. invasion of that country in 2003: [Iraqi] gun stores can sell only hunting rifles and pistols. But AK-47s, the weapon of choice, are provided to millions of members of the ruling Baath Party and allied militias such as the one known as Saddams Fedayeen.

The Chicago Tribunemade the same point shortly after U.S. forces toppled Saddam Husseins regime:

Under Husseins tough policies, most Iraqis did not have access to guns. His military, however, had a hodgepodge of weapons bought from Russia and the Eastern Bloc nations and taken in wars with Iran and Kuwait. Many were old and in miserable shape, but the Republican Guard received modern equipment.

After U.S. troops took control of Baghdad, looters and thieves grabbed tens of thousands of weapons from government arsenals, Americans estimate. Remnants of Husseins forces apparently collected the best guns and artillery hidden before the war.

Madisons point still stands. A well-armed populace at the outset is a hindrance to the formation of a dictatorship and a check on tyranny from within.

AWR Hawkins is the Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and host of Bullets with AWR Hawkins, a Breitbart News podcast. He is also the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.

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Chris Hayes: 2nd Amendment Defenders Spurred 'Arms Race' Between Citizens and Cops - Breitbart News

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The European Union already backs Libyas government with 200 million worth of support to tackle people smugglers who provide the unseaworthy craft which carry thousands of migrants north into the waiting arms of European coastguards and volunteer rescue missions but now the country is requesting more.

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Libyas fragile, UN-backed unity government has now asked for an additional 800 million worth of equipment for their patrol efforts including ships, helicopters, off-road vehicles, and radar. The Italian government is already providing Libya with ten patrol craft, to be delivered before the summer.

TheLibya HeraldreportsLibyan Prime Minister Fayez al-Sarrajflew to Rome with a shopping list of demands, including the call for more money and equipment,in the wake of some 20,000 having made the crossing this year alone. An estimated 3,000 migrants were rescued in the Mediterranean in just the past weekend.

The new agreement struck Monday with Italy and other European nations agreeing to help Libya patrol her coastand keep the smuggler boats from setting off was short on actual detail or a plan to improve the situation, but instead showed a will, said the Italian interior minister. Democratic party minister Marco Minniti said of the meeting:

Naturally we havent resolved the problem because its clear no one has the definitive solution to the problem in their pockets.

But we have common will. And this common will has a common objective: to not chase or suffer illegal migration but govern it.

Austrian interior ministerWolfgang Sobotka praised the movement with Libya, telling press:We have to do everything we can to stop the illegal migration across the Mediterranean, reportsKronen Zeitung.

The spending of British and European money in Libya has come under considerable criticism this year, as the poor conditions of migrant camps set up in the country courted criticism. Future spending may see camps established in other North African nations.

While a not insignificant amount of money, the 800 million now discussed will be dwarfed by coming European contributions if a new African Marshall Plan, an aid package designed to boost African nations, is put into place. President of the European Parliament Antonio Tajani said if the bloc doesnt start pumping cash into the continent immediately, 20 million Africans are going to come to Europe in the coming years.

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Migrant Crisis Summit: Libya Demands 800 Million to Stop Smuggler Boats - Breitbart News

Somali refugee Abdulaziz says he is "suffocating" in an overcrowded camp on the Greek island of Lesbos, where he shares a tent with a dozen other Africans.

The 30-something resident of the Moria camp had been hoping to reach Germany when he set off on his journey, but instead is stuck on this Greek island off Turkey's western coast waiting for his asylum claim to process.

"It's like a prison here. ... I'm suffocating," said Abdulaziz who has been languishing in the camp for the past eight months.

"There is always someone screaming, always fights," said Abdulaziz, who was injured in the leg while fleeing from Turkish police.

He is just one of the thousands of migrants and refugees stranded on Greek islands a year after Turkey signed a landmark agreement with the European Union to substantially reduce migrant flows.

Ankara and Brussels forged the deal on March 18, 2016.

In the agreement, which took effect two days later, Ankara pledged to take back all illegal migrants landing in Greece in order to help stem migrant flows to the EU.

The deal helped put the brakes on a massive influx of migrants and refugees, especially from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, which had mushroomed into a combustible political and social issue in Europe.

Turkey's pledge, in exchange for more aid, visa-free travel and the speeding up of Ankara's long-stalled EU accession talks, was also aimed at deterring migrants from making the perilous sea crossing in the first place, knowing they could be sent back.

Some 1,183 migrants were returned to Turkey in the year ending in January, Greek police figures show.

But, along with a series of border closures in the Balkans and eastern Europe last year, the EU-Turkey deal has transformed the Greek islands into vast holding pens for refugees and migrants.

Many of the camps are overcrowded and there are frequent clashes, with those inside tired of the long wait for asylum papers and fearful of being returned to Turkey.

On Lesbos, there are nearly 5,000 people in camps nominally built to hold 3,500, according to government figures.

The Greek immigration ministry has refused to permit large-scale relocation from the islands to the mainland, fearing that such a move could jeopardise the EU-Turkey agreement that has helped stem further arrivals to the continent.

Conditions at Moria, a camp that has long been plagued by poor living standards and overcrowding, have improved, said Achilleas Tzemos, a field coordinator with Doctors Without Borders (MSF).

The relocation of the most vulnerable, including unaccompanied migrant children and torture victims, has accelerated with at least 10,000 moved elsewhere, according to the UNHCR. But those who stay suffer with uncertainty at the very least.

"Not knowing what awaits them subjects them to a great deal of fear," Tzemos said.

According to MSF there has been a "sharp increase" in self-mutilations and suicide attempts.

The United Nations children's agency on Friday said the EU-Turkey agreement had increased suffering notably among children, despite curbing migrants flows.

"While there has been a major decrease in the overall numbers of children on the move into Europe since last March, there has been an increase in the threats and distress refugee and migrant children endure," UNICEF's migrant crisis coordinator Afshan Khan said in a statement.

In the past year, 851 people whose asylum claims were rejected or who simply gave up, were returned to Turkey, according to Greek police figures.

Even people entitled to international protection gave up, lawyers said, because they didn't understand the procedural mechanisms, or because they needed to escape the misery of the camps.

"Information is essential" for refugees, said Philip Worthington, a project coordinator at the European Lawyers association in Lesbos.

During one asylum interview, he said an Iraqi exile highlighted his qualities as a truck driver rather than the persecutions he suffered because of his Christian religion.

The EU is starting to cope with the situation, which refugees' rights organisations have criticised as a humanitarian scandal.

Rising tensions between residents and migrants, media images of flimsy tents crushed under heavy snow falls, and the deaths of three migrants at the Moria camp in January, for reasons still unclear, have galvanised Greek authorities.

The war of words between the EU and Turkey over the migrant deal has escalated in recent days after Ankara blasted Germany and the Netherlands for preventing Turkish ministers from campaigning ahead of a key April referendum.

The EU said it expects Turkey to honor the deal after Ankara threatened to bin it.

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The EU migrant deal with Turkey has turned Greek islands into open-air prisons - PRI