House panel votes 14-1 to introduce ‘stand your ground’ bill
After 40 minutes of debate, the House State Affairs Committee voted 14-1 this morning to introduce “stand your ground” legislation proposed by Rep. Christy Zito, R-Hammett, though numerous committee members had questions about the bill’s wording and how it would work. “I think it’s appropriate to introduce the bill,” said Rep. Lynn Luker, R-Boise. “I do have some concerns about how it’s drafted. We can explore that later in a hearing.”
The only “no” vote came from Rep. Elaine Smith, D-Pocatello; Rep. Paulette Jordan, D-Plummer, joined all 13 Republicans on the panel to vote in favor of introducing the bill.
Zito’s bill would repeal the current one-paragraph provision in Idaho law that makes it justifiable homicide to kill someone while defending one’s home, property or person “against one who manifestly intends or endeavors, by violence or surprise, to commit a felony” or to break into a home for a violent purpose. Then, it would add two lengthy new sections to Idaho law on “Home Protection – Use of Deadly Force – Presumption of Fear of Death or Great Bodily Harm” and on “Criminal Immunity For Self-Defense.” Among other changes, it would add vehicles and places of business or employment to locations where deadly self-defense would be presumptively sanctioned.
Her bill also adds this clause: “A person who is not knowingly engaged in an unlawful activity and who is attacked in any other place where he has a right to be has no duty to retreat and has the right to stand his ground and meet force with force, including deadly force, if he reasonably believes it is necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm to himself or another, to prevent the commission of a violent felony or when attempting to apprehend a person for any felony committed.”
At the end of that sentence, the bill had this clause, “or to suppress a riot.” The committee voted to strike out those words as it introduced the bill, though Zito said she thought they were appropriate for situations that have arisen in other states, like “the Los Angeles riots.”
Today’s vote clears the way for a possible full hearing on the bill.
