"Right to Kill" bill stalled in Senate
From Missouri Digital News: https://mdn.org
MDN Menu

MDN Home

Journalist's Creed

Print

MDN Help

MDN.ORG: Missouri Digital News
MDN Menu

MDN Home

Journalist's Creed

Print

MDN Help

MDN.ORG Mo. Digital News Missouri Digital News MDN.ORG: Mo. Digital News MDN.ORG: Missouri Digital News
Help  

"Right to Kill" bill stalled in Senate

Date: May 10, 2007
By: Matt Tilden
State Capitol Bureau
Links: SB 62

JEFFERSON CITY - With time quickly running out in the Missouri General Assembly, legislators are rushing to come to a compromise regarding a bill that would allow Missourians greater rights to kill intruders entering their home or vehicle.

Dubbed the "Castle Doctrine" by supporters like the National Rifle Association and a "Shoot First" issue by opponents like the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, the issue is one that has been debated by state legislatures across the country since first passed in Florida in 2005.

In Missouri, different bills have passed through each chamber of the General Assembly.

The House version that allows the right to defend oneself  "in a place where he or she has a right to be" makes some Democrats, like Kansas City Senator Jolie Justus, uncomfortable.

Justus, one of only two Democrats to vote against Goodman's initial Senate legislation, said that she thinks it's unwise to allow anyone who feels threatened to use gun violence, especially if they are not in their home.

"It went from the Castle Doctrine to the Stand Your Ground Doctrine, which essentially would mean that wherever a person is, they can defend themselves with gun force, and I think that that creates sort of an O.K. Corral-type atmosphere and it's bad public policy," Justus said.

After a filibuster by Justus on Tuesday, Sen. Jack Goodman, R-Mt. Vernon, the sponsor of the Senate version, withdrew the bill from debate.

Negotiations between legislators from the House and the Senate have begun, and they have until the end of session next Friday to figure out a compromise.

Justus said on Thursday she would not attempt to filibuster again if a compromise is reached.

Goodman said that he believes that the bill will ultimately pass, probably without the "Stand Your Ground" statute in the House bill.

"We've been in negotiations between House and Senate members and the interested parties that were filibustering the legislation, and I'm very confident that we will come to a compromise that leaves us with a very meaningful bill, that allows people new needed protections so that law-abiding can have self-defense rights," Goodman said.

Goodman said earlier this year in that he intentionally left out the more controversial wording because did not want the bill to become "an overblown, shoot 'em up bill with potential for abuse".