Quite obviously hardly anyone who has posted thus far has any knowledge of what the "Castle Doctrine" or a "Stand Your Ground" law is or means.

It also is obvious that nobody here is aware that the Florida Stand Your Ground Law had NOTHING TO DO WITH the trial of Zimmerman.

The Castle Doctrine originated in European law, and essentially said that every citizen in his own home is entitled to the same privacy and security as the prince in his castle.

"A Man's Home Is His Castle."

This principle is recognized in FOUR separate Clauses of the US Constitution, and in several US State Constitutions.

In several places, the Castle Doctrine was extended to make "defense of the home" a defense if force was used against an intruder. The BASIC reason for the original extensions was because several civil cases in which an intruder, injured by a homeowner during an unlawful intrusion, successfully sued the homeowners for their injuries. Notorious cases in Boston, New York City, and Philadelphia are commonly cited by legal historians.

Some of the extensions to the Castle Doctrine included "equal force" limitations, making it clear that one could use "deadly force" only to repel a "deadly threat," or ball bat against brick, etc. Others were less clear, but all that I've looked at include "appropriate force" terminology.

When the "ban them all" tribe managed to bring new Federal Laws into effect, it was necessary to produce clear regulations that essentially provided a "recipe book" for getting a "concealed carry" permit. Each state was required to produce their own laws regarding "concealed carry" but there were Federal standards intended to provide some uniformity. "Accessory provisions" such as the prohibition against buying ammunition outside one's own state, or having a gun repaired by a gunsmith "next door across the state line" forced many legitimate gun users who would not previously have considered "concealed carry" useful to get licensed. In addition, many who would not have even considered having a gun decided to get one "to prove they could."

Given that lots of people who otherwise wouldn't were now carrying concealed weapons, it was necessary to clarify how and where they could use them. While many of the "Stand Your Ground" laws previously said you can stand your ground at your front door, some but not all of the state statutes now permit you to "stand" anywhere you are legally permitted to be (with or without your gun).

Regardless of the specific language of an individual law, in order to invoke "immunity" under a Stand Your Ground law, it is generally necessary to show both that:

1. A reasonable person would have percieved an aggressor to be a real threat.

2. That the person invoking immunity did, in fact, perceive the aggressor to be a real threat.

This pretty much mandates that the person claiming immunity under a Stand Your Ground provision must take the stand at trial to permit examination of his/her "state of mind."

Only an attorney who was a complete IDIOT would have permitted Zimmerman to claim that immunity, based on his prior fantastic and conflicting statments alone.

At the instant when Martin walked in a direction away from Zimmerman, any claim of "immediate threat" was gone.

When Zimmerman left his vehicle and followed Martin, Zimmerman became the aggressor (stalker) and any reasonable (black) person in a strange (white) neighborhood would be justified in perceiving a threat. (It's unfortunate that the "black" and "white" have any bearing, and it's difficult to say how much effect they had.)

Martin would have been justified in claiming applicability of the Stand Your Ground statute, had he actually injured Zimmerman; but he was unfortunately unable to take the stand, so there was NO APPLICATION OF OR REFERENCE TO THAT STATUTE AT ANY TIME IN THE TRIAL.

As presented to the jury, the case was "two guys got into a fight and one of them is dead." The prosecuter did not even introduce "... because the other guy had a gun."

PERIOD.

John