ORLANDO, (Reuters) – U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder told the convention of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People that ‘Stand Your Ground’ self-defense laws that have been adopted in 30 states should be reconsidered.
Holder was addressing the annual meeting of the NAACP in Orlando, 25 miles from the small city of Sanford, Florida, where jurors on Saturday found former neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman not guilty of second-degree murder and manslaughter in the shooting death of Trayvon Martin. “Separate and apart from the case that has drawn the nation’s attention, it’s time to question laws that senselessly expand the concept of self-defense and sow dangerous conflict in our neighborhoods,” Holder said.
The verdict by a nearly all-white jury of six women in the Zimmerman trial reverberated around the country and rocked the NAACP’s convention of 3,000 national, state and local officers and members.
Holder, who is black, also related personal stories about being racially profiled as a young adult and stopped by police when he was committing no crime.
“Trayvon’s death last spring caused me to sit down and have a conversation with my own 15-year-old son, like my dad did with me,” Holder said. “This was a father-son tradition I hoped would not need to be handed down.”
Under the “Stand Your Ground” law, which was approved in 2005 and has been copied in some form by about 30 other states, people fearing for their lives can use deadly force without having to retreat from a confrontation, even when it is possible.
