Art:
Zoogster, if you go back to the opening post, isn't he talking about clearcut cases?
Not necessarily.
As kleanbore mentions there is a lot of variation in witness statements, even uninvolved witnesses often first look after some commotion has drawn their attention, and so what they see at that point can bias them against the defender failing to see the start of events.
While the buddies with the initial attacker are often going to lie to benefit their version of events.
So you have multiple versions of what happened, by both the attacker's group and uninvolved witnesses, along with a different version from the defender.
One big thing I would point out beyond what kleanbore mentions is that many posts in this thread refer to a felony being committed by the initial attacker. Such as those referring to "felonious assault".
But the attacker has likely committed no felony initially.
First of all "assault" is the threat of force, and so a felony version typically involves a threat with a weapon. (Like pulling a gun when unjustified on another person but not using it would be a felony assault.) The case in question involves someone coming up and punching someone, there is no threat of force even used, and a threat to punch would be a misdemeanor assault.
Battery is the use of force which is the correct term that would apply here, and it requires certain things to enter into the felony realm to become 'aggravated battery' under Florida law:
In most cases a simple punch, especially against another healthy young male is a misdemeanor, unless serious injury results.
An unarmed attack may discretionarily be charged as a felony in some cases, or a misdemeanor, and typically only reaches the felony stage by the time someone is being seriously beaten or kicked/stomped/kneed on the ground, or suffered other serious or permanent injuries.
So it is not someone committing a 'forcible felony' by any assured measure of the law when they come up and punch someone else.
That removes the 'forcible felony' justification for use of deadly force and only leaves 'reasonably believes that such force is necessary to prevent imminent death or great bodily harm'.
So a jury gets to decide if such action was "reasonable". If the belief at that point of great bodily harm or death was reasonable, or if only the use of normal force was reasonable at that point and not deadly force.
The fact that they are traveling together also makes the argument of a clear disparity of force more difficult than if the person was alone when attacked.
One of the things that often makes it difficult to use a gun against an unarmed threat is that the point a simple misdemeanor battery turns into a forcible felony is when it meets the definition of aggravated battery in Florida.
Now a quick search for the definition of "aggravated battery" as defined in Florida law:
http://www.justiceflorida.com/2008/...s-the-crime-of-aggravated-battery-in-florida/
A person can commit the crime of aggravated battery in one of three ways in Florida. If a person, while committing the crime of battery:
1. Intentionally or knowingly causes great bodily harm, permanent disability, or permanent disfigurement of another person; or
2. Uses a deadly weapon; or
3. If a person who was the victim of a battery was pregnant at the time of the offense and the offender knew or should have known that the victim was pregnant, then the offender may be guilty of the crime of aggravated battery.
Well he is not pregnant, and even if he was the attacker likely wouldn't have known, no deadly weapon as defined by the law was used by the attacker, no permanent disfigurement or disability has clearly been caused yet, and "great bodily harm" is rather ambiguous but not likely at the start of the attack.
What this means is that especially lone individuals being attacked are not certainly facing a 'forcible felony' from an unarmed attacker until they are likely in a condition where drawing or using a firearm would be difficult or impossible. While someone coming to the defense of another would need to witness something defining an aggravated battery, like the other person being kicked or stomped on the ground before knowing they are witnessing a "forcible felony".
So 'forcible felony' is out, and you are left with the much more discretionary:
776.012 Use of force in defense of person.
A person is justified in the use of force, except deadly force, against another when and to the extent that the person reasonably believes that such conduct is necessary to defend himself or herself or another against such other's imminent use of unlawful force. However, the person is justified in the use of deadly force only if he or she reasonably believes that such force is necessary to prevent imminent death or great bodily harm to himself or herself or another, or to prevent the imminent commission of a forcible felony.
A jury will decide how reasonable it was.
So he may be justified, but it certainly is not a clear cut case for outsiders who were not present and are faced with different and sometimes conflicting variations of the story to determine.
Such a case would likely be presented to the media in a way that described two sides in some sort of fight, where one side shot the other and has been charged.
Thus never making it to the "armed citizen" type columns, because it would be at the trial many months later when it was no longer fresh and news worthy where it might be determined to be self defense. That is why home defense and defense during business robberies dominate such pro-gun columns, they sound good from the start, while many other stories have the defender initially sounding like just another bad guy.
The op's type of case often have "drunken brawl" (were the victims enjoying a night on the town when attacked?), "road rage" (was an argument over a vehicle or pedestrian right of way or a fender bender proceeding the attack), or other bad sounding tags added to them in the media based on the context, causing a normal person not to even recognize them as a self defense case.
Women and the elderly are more likely to get a better initial benefit of the doubt and news friendly story, but the OP sounds like a scenario of two young men.
