Florida Stand your Ground law revision passes committee

[6andcounting]

(10-21-2015, 04:21 PM)fredtoast Wrote: Varies from state to state.

Self defense is what is called an "affirmative defense".  An affirmative defense does not attack the truth of the facts the state has submitted.  An "affirmative defense" raises new claims by the defense that excuse or justify the defendants behavior (insanity, emergency situation, self-defense, etc).  So the defendant is usually required to prove these new claims by at least a "preponderance of the evidence" before the State is required to disprove them.  So I don't really know how this new law works in Florida.  There has to be some proof of self defense presented before the state can be required to disprove self-defense.  I could see if they were talking about shootings taking place in a persons home, but in Florida the stand-your-ground law applies everywhere.  Can't imagine how the defense could argue that the state failed to disprove self defense when no evidence of self defense was presented.

Makes sense. It's a little more rigid than just spouting off anything and claiming to the jury that it should be accepted as doubt. When it comes to the finer details of the argument it's about persuading the jury, but other than that there is some responsibility on the defense to construct a proper argument with evidence.