Think twice before using your AR-15 for home defense. 🤔

[Bypass]

 

[GAgunLAWbooklet]

I've never understood how the heck a judge can restrict these types of things. I'd bet anything that Mr. Fish's ODT, or any other 2A social media posts/comments would have been plastered all over the freaking courtroom.

Well, judges are supposed to apply the law not make up new laws. And Georgia has an evidence code in our OCGA title 24.

There are many laws talking about how evidence may be used or excluded from court cases.


HERE's PART OF ONE LAW:
OCGA 24-4-404 (on character evidence)



Evidence of a person's character
or a trait of character

shall not be admissible for the purpose of proving action in conformity therewith
on a particular occasion,
except for:

1. Evidence of a pertinent trait of character offered by an accused or by the prosecution to rebut the same; or if evidence of a trait of character of the alleged victim of the crime is offered by an accused and admitted under paragraph (2) of this subsection, evidence of the same trait of character of the accused offered by the prosecution;
2. Subject to the limitations imposed by Code Section 24-4-412, evidence of a pertinent trait of character of the alleged victim of the crime offered by an accused or by the prosecution to rebut the same; or evidence of a character trait of peacefulness of the alleged victim offered by the prosecution in a homicide case to rebut evidence that the alleged victim was the first aggressor;

 

[GAgunLAWbooklet]

But, another part of our evidence code says that character evidence can only be shown through reputation testimony by people who know that individual and can state that they have a reputation among multiple people who know them of having this characteristic, this trait.

CHARACTER EVIDENCE cannot be shown through testimony about specific incidents that would be called prior bad acts.

I think this is ridiculous because how would somebody get a reputation for having a certain character flaw other than people considering specific incidents where this character flaw came out?

 

[Gunanddoglover]

Moral of the strory, have a hog pit in the backyard

 

[hozjo]

I've never understood how the heck a judge can restrict these types of things. I'd bet anything that Mr. Fish's ODT, or any other 2A social media posts/comments would have been plastered all over the freaking courtroom.

It all comes down to the rules of evidence, which vary depending on the state/ jurisdiction but usually gives the judge quite a wide discretion on what's allowable trying to balance probative/prejudicial value. In particular the usual standard is that if the accused didnt know about the specific acts in the other party's past they couldn't have considered them at the time of the incident so they were irrelevant unless they were similar to the incident in question, or if they are used to show or rebut character.

While these rules are needed to a certain extent. I don't like the amount of discretion given or that the rules are written by and mostly seem to benefit the judicial/ prosecutorial apparatus. In this specific case the "victim's" past encounters with the college security and justice of the peace both involved him getting extremely agitated when confronted about his dogs, and the testimony of his assault, sexual assault, restraining orders, and mental health issues was relevant at the time because the prosecution had witnesses testify to his good character to imply that he would have never started a confrontation.

Trying to appeal a district courts decision on what evidence is allowed is quite difficult because of the discretion and once you enter the appeals process the burden of proof is flipped from the state to you and you need to not only prove the court erred but that it was a reversible and significant enough error to alter the verdict. Even in winning their appeal I believe the appellate court only ruled in Fish's favor on two of the 23 challenges.

I like reading part of the appellate decision and coming across this gem "Moreover, the risk of a jury using the evidence for an improper purpose..." How does one use evidence for an improper purpose, and who is deciding what purpose is proper or improper?

 

[Boogar Presley]

My 590 and a Kabar

 

[palmettomoon]

I don' need nuthin' bit my papaw's thutty thutty. It's a good a self defense weapon as any plastic mattel raffle.

 

[CrzTyler]

I’m camping at the top of the stairs with a 50 bmg

FAFO