Stand your ground update: Florida outlaw biker edition

Florida once again brings us an update on Stand Your Ground laws.  This time it was a bad man killing a badder man.  They were both members of biker gangs.  Paul “the Dog” Smith is a 49 year-old outlaw biker and former member of the Florida branch of the Warlocks.  He had been kicked out of the gang and was a member of the Philly Warlocks, a breakaway sect.  If you follow anything about gangs, ex-members don’t typically have a long lifespan if they don’t stand up to the former members.

 

Paul "The Dog" Smith, outlaw biker in a suit

The Philly Warlocks were having an event at a VFW. It was probably going to be a quiet affair for charity.  You know, barbecuing hot dogs, wet t-shirt contests, the like.  I’m making that up. I have no idea what they do at outlaw biker rallies at the VFW.  What I do know, courtesy of the Orlando Sentinel,  is that the members of the Florida Warlocks, the old gang that he broke off from, didn’t like that they were doing it. And a former badass truckdriver from Louisiana who rode with the Outlaws showed up.

The first one off his bike, to break up the fundraiser was Peter “Hormone” Schlette, who was armed with a gun, meat hook, padlock, knives and brass knuckles “among other weapons.”  That’s a lot of weapons to carry on a bike.  Must have been some full saddle bag. Smith shot at Schlette when Schlette got off his bike and lunged at him.  He shot Schlette in the shoulder and eye.  This didn’t stop Schlette.  It just pissed him off.  So he kept coming and got shot again, until he was dead. Two other Philly Warlocks shot other old like Warlocks. Those guys are facing life in prison, and 27 years (for manslaughter).  In the words of Ron Burgundy, that escalated quickly

Which brings us back to Stand Your Ground, and why do we need it.  Standard self-defense ought to work.  If you’re being attacked, you can defend yourself.  You can defend yourself with the same amount of force that is being used against you. Stand Your Ground allows a defendant to use deadly force against a perceived threat to life.  It’s the perception that is the law.  It allows things to escalate quickly.  Of  course, when you’ve got an outlaw biker coming at you with a meat hook, knives, brass knuckles and guns, things are going to escalate quickly anyway.

Whatever it was intended for, whatever malady the law’s backers in the gun lobby were trying to remedy by making this super-special self-defense, it likely wasn’t meant for outlaw biker brawls.

The jury was instructed on Florida’s Stand Your Ground law and heard from the defendant that he was in fear of his life, from the beatings he took when he got out of the gang.  He heard that the Warlocks were coming with violence.  And when they came, the evidence is that Smith started firing.  That was enough for the jury.  He perceived deadly force might be used, so he responded with deadly force.

This is likely to be one of those laws, where the intentions are met with facts on the ground that the NRA and its backers don’t like. Sort of like when open carry of long guns was the law in California until the Black Panthers in the 60’s showedup at the California state house with long guns, carried openly, and the law changed, at least in California.

Now, you’ve got the yahoos at Open Carry Texas carrying long guns (AR-15 assault rifles) in Chipotle, Target and Walmart and no one can tell who is trying to be “normal” shopping for underwear or ordering a burrito with an assault rifle on their back, and who is a crazy person about to shoot up the place.  

We had self-defense laws. We have self-defense laws.  They’ve been in the common law and on the statute books for years.  We don’t need Stand Your Ground.  Because the law isn’t supposed to be applied differently to folks whether they’re outlaw bikers or ordinary folks.  The law is the law. And when the law doesn’t work the way we like it, it’s time to take a hard look at the law.  That applies to Stand Your Ground and open carry of long guns.  I don’t want an AR-15 with my burrito.

Colombian hitman who killed between 300 and 3000 people released from prison early

Colombia’s release of the most notorious hitman for late drug cartel kingpin Pablo Escobar, while not breaking news (it happened in late August), is worthy of a brief moral discussion. John Jairo Velasquez, also known as “Popeye”, admitted to killing 300 people during the height of Colombia’s drug wars in the 1980’s and 1990’s before the heart of the violence moved north into Mexico.  He also claimed to have had a hand in the killings of up to 3,000 more.  What it means to have a hand in the extra 2,700 killings (whether he ordered them, supervised them, or just lost count somewhere north of 300 – which is entirely possible) is sort of beside the point. He is one of the most notorious mass murderers in the 20^th century.  He was given a 30 year sentence for his crimes.  That works out to about a month and a half per admitted, remembered murder.

John Jario Valesquez, in prison before his release

The BBC reports that he was released from prison after 22 years, eight years early.  He was released under armed guard, because now he fears for his own life.  The cartel that he used to work for doesn’t operate anymore and the likelihood of the families of one of his victims taking vengeance on him is pretty high.

Why the light sentence of 30 years in the first place?  He turned state’s evidence against a government official back in the bad old days of the drug wars. 

According to the BBC:  Popeye was convicted, not of the murder of 300 people, which would surely have had sentences run consecutively, but for his part in the murder of presidential hopeful Luis Carlos Galan in 1989. Galan had taken a hard line against the Cartels.  Velasquez was a witness against former Justice Minster Alberto Santofirmo, a rival candidate and close associate of Escobar, who is serving a 24-year sentence for his part in the murder of Galan.

What we have is the state turning a blind-eye to the murder of 300 people.  Some of whom were in the drug trade.  Some of whom surely were caught up near it, who may have witnessed something unwittingly.  But the state wanted to put away a politician, and the only way was to give a deal to a mass murderer.

Colombia in the 1980’s and early 1990’s could only be called a failed state.  The drug cartels ran rampant and corruption was endemic.  If the prosecutors had pushed hard enough into the 300 murders or the 3000 murders, who knows what they would have found. Perhaps the state, when they prosecuted Velasquez 22 years ago, thought they didn’t have the power to look into the 300 murders. They do now and did when he was in prison.  Or they made a deal back then to not prosecute the other murders because it was worth it to the state to put away a dirty, murderous politician who was connected to the drug cartels and to try to forcibly remove the drug cartels from politics.  Choices were made over what lives were worth prosecuting and a mass-murderer faced a month in prison per murder. 

Now he faces the possibility of vengeance on the streets.  I do not generally condone vengeance, particularly where there is a functioning state that can prosecute crimes.  I also don’t understand how a man who killed at least 300 people gets parole. Colombia is still in the throes of dealing with its drug war, with its war on the FARC guerillas who took over a large part of the drug trade when the Colombian cartels went down.  A lot on this story hasn’t been written.  The fact that this man got parole shows that it hasn’t and that the machinations and deals that are brokered and decide whose lives are worth more than others (the 300 who were killed and not prosecuted versus the one politician who was) continue to play out, decades later and the drugs continue to flow north, albeit from different sources.

Article and picture: BBC.com