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TALLAHASSEE, Fla. --Lucy McBath is afraid many more people will die if Florida Gov. Rick Scott signs a bill making it harder to prosecute when people claim they commit violence in self-defense.

She already lost her son, an unarmed black teenager, when a white man angry over loud music and claiming self-defense fired 10 times at an SUV filled with teenagers.

The measure before Scott would effectively require a trial-before-a-trial whenever someone invokes self-defense, making prosecutors prove the suspect doesn't deserve immunity.

Scott hasn't revealed his intentions, but he's a National Rifle Association supporter, and this is an NRA priority.

"If it passes in Florida, then they take that same legislation and they push it on the legislative floors across the country," said McBath, whose 17-year-old son Jordan Davis was killed by Michael Dunn outside a Jacksonville convenience store in 2012.

Many states have long invoked "the castle doctrine," allowing people to use even deadly force to defend themselves in their own homes.

Florida changed that in 2005, so that even outside a home, a person has no duty to retreat and can "stand his or her ground" anywhere they are legally allowed to be. Other states followed suit, and "stand your ground" defenses became much more common in pre-trial immunity hearings and during trials.

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Michael Dunn, charged with fatally shooting a 17-year-old boy after an argument over loud music, says he thought he saw the barrel of a gun point...

The 2012 killing of unarmed teenager Trayvon Martin by neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman opened a debate about the limits of self-defense, and it hasn't let up since Zimmerman was acquitted of second-degree murder after jurors received instructions on Florida's "stand your ground" law.

Florida Republicans made this bill a priority after the state Supreme Court ruled in 2015 that the defendant has the burden of proof before trial. If Florida starts a national trend to shift that burden to prosecutors, it'll be just fine with Republican Rep. Bobby Payne, who sponsored the bill.

Only four of the 22 or more state "stand your ground" laws mention this burden of proof - in Alabama, Colorado, Georgia and South Carolina - and all place it on defendants.

"It's about following our right of innocent until proven guilty," Payne said. "It's about Fifth Amendment rights, it's about due process, it's about having a true immunity, for when folks really believe they're in imminent threat of great bodily harm or death, to defend themselves properly."

Jordan Davis and Michael Dunn

WTEV

Senators originally wanted prosecutors to prove "beyond a reasonable doubt" before trial that self-defense didn't justify a violent crime. The final legislation lowered the threshold to "clear and convincing" evidence.

Either way, it makes prosecuting violent crimes more difficult, experts say.

"I think there will be more false 'stand your ground' claims," said former Broward County prosecutor Gregg Rossman, who has tried 65 murder cases. The pre-trial hearings are "very much going to be like a mini-trial."

Proving a killer didn't act in self-defense when there are no living witnesses would be particularly hard, he said: "I worry the most about the one-on-one cases. You and I get into an argument and I shoot you. Who speaks for you?"

But public defenders say it should help people who were simply trying to defend themselves. Prosecutors often use the threat of minimum mandatory sentences to coerce people into accepting a plea deal even if their use of force was justified, said Stacy Scott, a public defender in Gainesville.

Trayvon Martin George Zimmerman

CBS/AP

"It's going to force them to deal more fairly with citizens who are charged with crimes, and will help our clients either get better plea offers or exonerate themselves earlier in the process so they don't have to wait until a jury trial and risk everything they have in order to litigate their case," Scott said.

McBath, who lives in Marietta, Georgia, believes the guilty will more likely escape convictions. It took two trials to convict her son's killer of murder.

"We're just one out of so many," she said. "Because we won our case, I honestly, honestly believe that's the reason why they're putting these additional measures into 'stand your ground.' "

Justifiable homicide claims have doubled on average in states that have passed "stand your ground" laws, said John Roman of the independent research organization NORC at the University of Chicago.

Also, whites who kill black people are 10 times more likely to win a "stand your ground" claim than blacks who kill whites, said Roman, who analyzed these cases while at the Urban Institute think tank.

Studies also show that white people are more likely to feel threatened by black people than the other way around, "and if you then add onto implicit bias the ability to use lethal force, it's reasonable then to expect that lethal force will be disproportionately applied to minorities," he said.

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Florida could pave new changes in controversial "stand your ground" laws - CBS News

Out Black Lives Matter co-founder Patrisse Cullors (rt) with Jonathan Perez and Immigrant Youth Coalition members. (Photo Karen Ocamb)

How many people here have been tear gassed? out ESPN/CNN contributor LZ Granderson asked the audience at the Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justices fourth annual Fueling the Frontlines Awards. The question might have seemed jarring at any other LGBT fundraiser. But this May 25 event at the NeueHouse in Hollywood was filled with frontline activists who instantly knew he was describing the demonstrations in Ferguson, Missouri after a white cop shot unarmed black 18-year old Michael Brown in August 2014.

Granderson noted that many asked what happens next? The audience knew that, too: a movement propelled by activists such as performance artist, freedom fighter and Fulbright scholar Patrisse Cullors, co-founder of Black Lives Matter, one of the most important organizations in the past 25-30 years, Granderson said.

#BlackLivesMatter was founded as a social media call to action by queer Black women Cullors, Alicia Garza and Opal Tometi in July 2013 after George Zimmerman was acquitted of killing 17-year old Trayvon Martin in Florida. BLM helped organize the protests in Ferguson.

Cullors accepted her Astraea award with a call-and-response by the late African American poet Lucille Clifton, ending with: Come celebrate with me that every day something has tried to kill me and has failed.

An Angelino, Cullors called out the LAPD and the L.A. Sheriffs Department for destroying black and brown families and then brought up five Immigrant Youth Coalition activists to issue an immediate call to action. Jonathan Perez choked up talking about how ICE came after their friend Claudia Ruedas mother, who they got out of detention. Then in retaliation, ICE came for Claudia, a beloved DACA-eligible college student. Nudged by Cullors and TransLatina Coalition founder Bamby Salcedo, the youth asked everyone to call 619-557-6117 and ask ICE San Diego field director Gregory Archambeault to grant Claudia Sarahi Rueda (A# 213-081-680) prosecutorial discretion and immediately release her to her family.

Astraea has always understood that the fight for LGBTQI equality is intersectional it requires fighting for black and brown rights, for migrant rights, economic rights and more, said Cullors. Im proud to be part of the resistance and ready to continue the fight.

Astraea also honored transgender activist/organizer Jennicet Gutierrez, co-founder of Familia: Trans Queer Liberation Movement; critically acclaimed Univision News anchor and journalist Jorge Ramos and his queer daughter Paola Ramos, former Deputy Director of Hispanic Media for Hillary for America; and out Oscar-winning producer Bruce Cohen, a major marriage equality advocate and Executive Producer of ABCs historical LGBT series When We Rise.

As a journalist fighting for LGBTQI equality, immigrant rights and human rights, it is not enough to just report on what is happening, we need to inform the public about whats happening and present reality as it is and not the way we want it to be, said Jorge Ramos, who came to the attention of non-Latino America when he stood up to presidential candidate Donald Trump and was forcefully removed from a news conference (he was eventually allowed back in). And the reality is that discrimination is still very present in this country, Ramos continued. As individuals we must take an aggressive stand against those violating the rights of others and we need organizations like Astraea to ensure that the rights of everyone are being protected. Neutrality only helps the oppressor.

Introduced by famous trans model Isis King, Gutierrez talked about the violence faced by her trans sisters, reading off the names of ten trans women who have died since January. Rest in Power, she said, adding, even if you dont invest (in the trans community), trust the trans leadership of trans women of color.

Actress Mary McCormack introduced her best friend Bruce Cohen, a fellow Probe disco dancer, saying he is wholly unafraid to challenge oppression. Cohen noted that he co-founded the Uprising of Love coalition with Oscar-winning writer Dustin Lance Black and Grammy-winning singer Melissa Etheridge to stop the oppression of gays before the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia. Cohen, Black and director Gus Van Sant had already experienced the courage of LGBT Russians when they appeared at a screening of Milk as part of the LGBT Side by Side Film festival in St. Petersburg. They failed to stop the persecution instigated by the new anti-homosexual propaganda law. But they brought a film crew to Sochi and captured the moment when a young gay man named Vladimir ran yelling to President Obamas lesbian emissary Billie Jean King that his life was in danger, begging for asylum. They found a way to get him to safety in Americaand the gay Russian is now happily married in Fairfield, Iowa. Were sad we didnt bring (Russian President Vladimir) Putin to his knees, Cohen said. We failed at that. But we saved Vladimirs life. Echoing the nights theme, Cohen concluded: All that you touch, you change. All that you change, changes you.

The Fueling the Frontlines Awards is an amazing opportunity to celebrate our radical community our successes and our fight, said J. Bob Alotta, Executive Director, of the Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice. If we want to maintain and build on the resistance in this current moment then we need to celebrate and support the activists at the forefront of the movement. By utilizing their experience as artists and journalists, our honorees Patrisse, Jorge, Jennicet, Paola and Bruce illustrate, there is a place for everyone to contribute their talents, utilize their platforms and lift their voices to help support the resistance.

From the young activists of color to the older feminists supporting Astraea since its radical philanthropy started funding marginalized groups in 1977, the NeueHouse space felt filled with family. Helping create that sense of fellowship was a mini-concert by the brilliant, dynamic Toshi Regan and the cast of Octavia E. Butlers Parable of the Sower: The Operaa fusion of inspiring art and activism that had everyone eager to dance to the frontlines wearing a rainbow badge of courage and joy in their hearts.

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Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice honors frontline activism - Los Angeles Blade

Ryan Osborne, Star-Telegram , WFAA 12:49 PM. CDT May 27, 2017

Defense counsel Mark O'Mara addresses the jury during closing arguments in George Zimmerman's murder trial July 12, 2013 in Sanford, Florida. (Photo: Joe Burbank-Pool/Getty Images), Custom)

FORT WORTH, Texas -- High-profile Florida attorney Mark OMara is now representing Jacqueline Craig, the black Fort Worth woman whose arrest by a white officer in December sparked accusations of racism and led to widespread criticism of the police department.

OMara, who was in Fort Worth on Friday meeting with the Craig family, is best known for representing George Zimmerman, a neighborhood watch leader who was acquitted in 2013 in the shooting death of black teenager Trayvon Martin.

In Craigs case, she had called police to report an assault on her son. As tensions rose between her and the responding officer, William Martin, she and her teenage daughter were wrestled to the ground and arrested.

OMara said he wanted to partner with her other attorney, Lee Merritt, to work collaboratively with the city of Fort Worth to address Craigs concerns.

Craig, Merritt and their supporters have called repeatedly for the firing of Martin, who arrested Craig in the viral incident and was later suspended for 10 days. They have also sought harsher charges against her neighbor, Itamar Vardi. He was cited for misdemeanor assault of Craigs son.

More recently, Craig and others in the black community have called for the firing of Police Chief Joel Fitzgerald, who last week demoted high-ranking officers Abdul Pridgen and Vance Keyes for leaking Martins bodycam video of Craigs arrest and his personnel file.

Pridgens and Keyes supporters have argued that they were being targeted in the leak investigation because they are black.

OMara said he was intrigued by Craigs case after watching the video of her arrest. The clip, which went viral on Facebook, showed Martin pointing his Taser at Craig and her daughters and wrestling them to the ground.

It also showed Martin asking Craig, Why dont you teach your son not to litter?

When Craig said littering does not give the neighbor the right to touch her son, Martin responded, Why not?

I was pretty frustrated by the video I saw, OMara said. Nobody can look at that video and say thats the way Martin should have acted.

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George Zimmerman attorney now representing Fort Worth's Jacqueline Craig - WFAA

FILE - In this Tuesday, Nov. 19, 2013, file photo, George Zimmerman listens in court, in Sanford, Fla., during his hearing on charges including aggravated assault stemming from a fight with his girlfriend. The Seminole County Sheriff's Office says Zimmerman was arrested in Lake Mary, Friday, Jan. 9, 2015 on an aggravated assault charge, and is being held at the John E. Polk Correctional Facility. (AP Photo/Orlando Sentinel, Joe Burbank, Pool, File)

By Barbara Liston

ORLANDO, Fla. (Reuters) - George Zimmerman, who was acquitted of murder charges in the 2012 shooting death of an unarmed black teenager in Florida, suffered a minor wound after being shot at in his vehicle on Monday, police said.

Zimmerman did not fire a gun in the Monday incident, his latest brush with law enforcement since his 2013 trial, according to police.

No charges were immediately filed in the shooting, which took place on a roadway in Lake Mary, Florida, a suburb of Orlando.

The other man involved was Matthew Apperson, police said. Apperson previously accused Zimmerman of threatening to kill him during a September 2014 roadside dispute, but declined to press charges.

Zimmerman, 31, was a neighborhood watch volunteer when he shot Trayvon Martin, claiming it was in self-defense. The incident prompted civil rights rallies and drew international attention to Florida's controversial "stand your ground" law.

While Zimmerman no longer lives in central Florida, he unexpectedly ran into Apperson on Monday while visiting for Mother's Day, his attorney, Don West, told Reuters.

Zimmerman recognized Apperson, who was flashing his lights, honking and shouting insults, West said.

As Zimmerman attempted to make a U-turn to leave, Apperson pulled up alongside his vehicle and "pulled out a gun and shot it through the passenger window," West said.

Zimmerman was not injured by the bullet but suffered minor wounds from flying glass and debris, West said. He was treated and released from a hospital.

Apperson called authorities to report the incident about the same time that Zimmerman flagged them down around 1 p.m., police said.

The motive for the shooting was not immediately known, police spokeswoman Bianca Gillett said at a news conference.

Earlier this year federal prosecutors decided not to press civil rights charges against Zimmerman in the Martin case.

Since being acquitted of second-degree murder and manslaughter charges in that shooting, Zimmerman has drawn attention for his repeated encounters with law enforcement.

He was arrested in January in connection with a domestic dispute. He was accused of throwing a wine bottle at his girlfriend but prosecutors dropped the charges after she recanted.

He was arrested in November 2013 after allegedly pointing a gun at a different girlfriend during an argument. Those charges were later dropped after the woman withdrew her complaint.

Zimmerman also has drawn the attention of authorities over accusations that he had threatened his then-estranged wife.

(Writing by Letitia Stein; Editing by Bernadette Baum and Bill Trott)

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George Zimmerman shot at, wounded in Florida road dispute

Its hard to know if its more delusion or deception, but the media are again blaming President Trump for violence, this time after a Republican congressional candidate got physical with a reporter. Of course, the medias accusation is much like Planned Parenthood or the MS-13 gang blaming George Zimmerman for our nations diminishing respect for life.

Fake-news outlet the Washington Post is a case in point, currently running an article titled The GOP inherits what Trump has wrought. The paper opines, The angry forces that propelled President Trumps rise are beginning to frame and define the rest of the Republican Party.

When GOP House candidate Greg Gianforte assaulted a reporter who had attempted to ask him a question Wednesday night in Montana, the Post continues, many saw not an isolated outburst by an individual, but the obvious, violent result of Trumps charge that journalists are the enemy of the people. Nonetheless, Gianforte won Thursdays special election to fill a safe Republican seat.

Yes, many saw because many see what they want to see. Of course, its no surprise that the media have glommed onto the Gianforte incident; not only does it serve their ends, but its a man-bites-dog story. The medias selective memory is striking, however.

While conservative violence is relatively rare, the only people as bad as the violent liberals making headlines the past year have been those who didnt make headlines (because they werent covered). And the kicker is that the media have stoked much of this violence.

Its possible the two Post writers, Karen Tumulty and Robert Costa, didnt hear about it (fake-news people associate with other fake-news people), but anti-jihadism crusader Robert Spencer was poisoned by an Icelandic leftist earlier this month. He survived and blames the attack on media propaganda, which has relentlessly portrayed him as a racist while omitting mention of what he actually believes.

Then there was Democrat House candidate Mark Wicklund, who was arrested last year for drunk driving and assaulting a police officer (perhaps he should have followed Trumps lead Trump is a teetotaler). The media, drunk on leftism, also chose not to give this story the ink theyve devoted to the Gianforte incident.

Of course, Gianfortes dust-up with the reporter appears to have been mischaracterized, has been apologized for, and was unplanned. Yet the same cannot be said of the 2016 Democrat scheme to incite violence at Trump rallies. Democrat operative Scott Foval explained the methods on hidden camera in the video below. In an operation allegedly approved by Hillary Clinton, Foval admits that they even paid mentally ill people to instigate trouble and proclaimed, Were starting anarchy here.

Warning: This video contains obscene language.

Speaking of anarchy brings us to Congresswoman Maxine Waters, now a Democrat standard bearer dubbed Auntie Maxine. She called the 1992 Los Angeles riots, which cost 58 lives and took place in her city, a rebellion and somewhat understandable, if not acceptable; she also refused to denounce the savage attack on Reginald Denny, a man rioters beat to within an inch of his life only because of the color of his skin (white). Below is a video of commentator Tucker Carlson exposing Waters history of bigotry.

Then theres Yvette Felarca, a California middle-school teacher and leader of the left-wing groupBy Any Means Necessary. She has taken credit for shutting down (her euphemism for violent action) social commentator Milo Yiannopoulos, referring to how violent protesters who broke windows, threw rocks, hurled incendiary devices at police and set fires prevented him from giving a Feb. 1 UC Berkeley speech. In the Feb. 13 Tucker Carlson Tonight video below, shes shown attacking an apparently peaceful protester in the street, as she labels Yiannopoulos and others fascists.

Note that in whats becoming a pattern, other conservative figures, such as Ann Coulter and social scientist Charles Murray, have also been prevented from speaking on college campuses by violent protesters.

Again courtesy of Carlson, were introduced to attorney Kevin Zeese, co-director of leftist group Popular Resistance. Carlson said during a recent interview, and Zeese did not disagree, that the organization has the goal of making this country ungovernable until President Trump leaves office.

Popular Resistance has associated itself with the violent Occupy Wall Street movement, even once calling itself Occupy Washington, DC. Note also that its name is reminiscent of the Popular Front, the left-wing group that controlled Spain for much of the 1930s and which helped spark the Spanish Civil War.

In the video below, Zeese would not denounce the recent left-wing violence; in typical ends justify the means style, all he would say is that he didnt know if it was effective.

Then, breaking new ground in political depravity, Democrat politicians have actually been leading vulgar chants such as F*** Donald Trump! No less a personage than Democratic National Committee chairman Tom Perez now casually uses profanity in his stump speeches, and Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) followed suit in a recent magazine profile.

This makes the 2006 film Idiocracy sadly prophetic (and it took only a decade), as it portrays a dumbed-down, dystopian American future in which intellectually degraded politicians use profanity reflexively. And how low weve sunk. Note that in a 1776 general order, George Washington inveighed against profanity, calling it a foolish, and wicked practice and a vice so mean and low, without any temptation, that every man of sense, and character, detests and despises it.

One man without sense and character, apparently, is outgoing California Democratic Party Chairman John Burton. In the below video he is shown leading a F*** Donald Trump! chant, at Californias Democratic Party convention in Sacramento, as he and most of the attendees hold up two middle fingers (House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi [D-Calif.] is present, seen on the far right). Ironically, Sacramento means the Sacraments; perhaps cursing is now a new liberal one.

Warning: This video includes obscene language and gestures.

Whats so tragic about this behavior is that just as Bill Clintons sexual improprieties helped define deviancy downwards it coarsens society. Did these leftists, who sometimes sell proposals as being for the children, think at all of the example theyre setting for them?

But violent rhetoric and action have always characterized the Left. In 2012, certain liberals wanted to kill a cute six-year-old boy who expressed anti-Obama sentiments in a video. In 2013, such miscreants expressed support for Christopher Dorner, who murdered innocent people in leftisms name. Town Hall presented 15 more cases of violent leftist rhetoric here, a prime example being, F*** God D****d Joe the God D****d Motherf*****]g plumber! I want Motherf*****]g Joe the plumber dead. Liberal talk show hostCharles Karel Bouleyon the air.

It should now be apparent how comical it is to portray the Gianforte incident as a new American political low inspired by President Trumps behavior. As for the media, they doth protest too much. Theyve instigated much of the violence by suppressing the truth, spreading lies (e.g., Black Lives Matter propaganda) and fomenting unrest. Theyre clearly upset about being called out, but richly deserve the contempt in which Trump and millions of Americans hold them.

They and the rest of the Left also should know that if they want serious conflict, they should stay their evil course. For civil war can be the ultimate result of a breakdown of and the breaking down of civility.

Photo of fire set during Berkeley protests: AP Images

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Political Violence: GOP Blamed for Media Lies That Kill - The New American