A 35-year-old Black mother, Ajike “AJ” Owens, was shot and killed in Florida by her white neighbor late last week. The shooter, an unidentified woman, yelled at the children to “get off her land” and called them racial slurs. When one of the children accidentally left an iPad behind, Owens went to retrieve it, and after an “aggressive” back and forth, the white neighbor shot through her own door, killing Owens. TheGrio’s Eboni K. Williams breaks down how that law seems to only benefit a specific demographic.
The following is a transcript of the commentary.
Eboni K. Williams: Stand your ground. Now, it’s a law that most of us first started hearing about after the brutal killing of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin. Now, while 29 other states, like Texas, have similar laws known as castle doctrine or “stand your ground” laws, Florida has taken center stage repeatedly when it comes to “stand your ground” laws being invoked after the shooting and the killing of unarmed Black people.
Then, it was Trayvon Martin. Just a few weeks ago, it was 16-year-old Ralph Yarl in Missouri. He was shot at point-blank range, and he miraculously lived to tell about it. And today, it’s Florida mother A.J. Owens. She was shot and killed by her white neighbor in the state of Florida. Now, we know that the data proves that under these “stand your ground” laws, Black people are disproportionately killed and, shocker, white people are the usual perpetrator.
Now, let’s unpack what these castle doctrine laws purport to really do. Who are they designed to protect? And when I ask that question, we have to name those inquiries, both theoretically and practically. So, these castle doctrines, they’re laws that started to pass through state legislatures in the early 2000s, like in Florida, when it was passed in 2005. Now, the legal claim then was that you can shoot and even kill people that essentially come up to your front door.
The theory is that you deserve a supreme right of self-protection, at least in your own home. And therefore, the law essentially permits homeowners and residents to shoot first and ask questions later. Now, on its face, that could actually sound fairly reasonable, right? I mean, who among us doesn’t want to feel an increased sense of safety in our own home? But this is also where this law becomes tremendously problematic.
First, this increased protection inside the home, it almost never protects Black homeowners or residents. And you don’t have to believe me. I just want you to ask Breonna Taylor and her boyfriend, who were lying asleep in their home when Breonna was shot and killed at just 26 years old. She should actually be 30 years old today. Her boyfriend, see, he was using his legally possessed firearm to shoot back at the police, who were shooting at them, again, in their home. And her boyfriend, he actually was initially arrested for it. So, I ask you, where exactly was “stand your ground” then?
And then, more broadly problematic with this law is the fact that the law requires that the homeowner cite a fear of the person that’s on their property, and they do that as a justification for shooting and even killing. But the reality is that when you look at this practically and actually, what it does is it really becomes this legal permission slip for white Americans to shoot and kill Black folks for even coming on their premises. And why is that the case? Well, because white folks will default to a collective, generalized, unsubstantiated fear always of Blackness.
See, that’s the only way to interpret the killing of A.J. Owens. This Black woman dared to walk on this white neighbor’s property and question the very well-being of her children. And for that purported trespass, A.J. Owens paid with her life. It’s only the grace of God that young Ralph Yarl didn’t have to pay with his life for accidentally ringing the doorbell, the wrong doorbell, of a white neighbor when he was simply trying to pick up his younger siblings.
So, now I’m going to say it plain. The reason that “stand your ground” laws exist, for me it’s irrelevant. Listen. Some folks say it was drafted to allow for upset, so-called scared white folks in suburbia to kill their Black neighbors first and ask questions later. That might be true. It may not. I actually don’t care the reason. What I know for sure and what we all know for sure is that “stand your ground” has become a get-out-of-jail-free card for white Americans, and it has simultaneously become a death sentence for Black Americans.
So now we have to tell our state legislatures in all the states, especially Florida and Missouri and Texas and Kentucky, to fix this wrong. Save some Black lives. You know, the ones that y’all said back in 2020 that mattered, those Black lives. Save them. Repeal every state’s “stand your ground” law right now. It’s the least that we owe A.J Owens, Ralph Yarl and Trayvon Martin.
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