Years ago, in a blog that doesn’t even exist anymore, I wrote an article about the then relatively new phenomenon of “stand your ground” laws. The crux was that these new statutes ultimately push the legal system toward a perverted form of trial by combat, introducing a new means of summarily dispensing with lethal gun violence if the perpetrator can cobble together some semblance of a self-defense claim. Before even getting to the strictures of a trial, the “winner” of a deadly altercation can just say they felt threatened and the victim is no longer there to suggest otherwise.
The years since have only strengthened this argument. Assuming the shooter wasn’t Black.
"[W]hen they tell the jury that the law allows crossing state lines with an assault rifle and gunning down people in the streets, it’s not easy to win a conviction."
And when you make such an egregious misrepresentation of fact it becomes impossible to believe anything else you say.