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Following on the heels of multiple states that have recently passed Stand-Your-Ground law, Wyoming Gun Owners just announced that they are teaming up with Senator Anthony Bouchard to make Wyoming the next Stand-Your-Ground state!
Second Amendment Daily reached out to Senator Bouchard to find out why he’s so fired up about the popular legislation.
Second Amendment Daily: What exactly is Stand-Your-Ground law and what does it do?
Senator Bouchard: Stand-Your-Ground law would simply remove the duty to retreat that exists here in Wyoming, before a gun owner could defend himself or someone else from a violent criminal.
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It doesn’t change the current rules on the justifiable use of force when you can shoot someone, it just says that if you’re legally allowed to use force, you don’t have to retreat first. It also provides important criminal and civil liability protections.
If a gun owner is not guilty in criminal court (or is never charged) he would be unable to be brought to civil court where he could be bankrupted even if found innocent. The bill also extends the protections of the Stand-Your-Ground law concept to allow you to defend innocent third parties.
Second Amendment Daily: Why do you think Stand-Your-Ground law is such an important topic for Wyoming?
Senator Bouchard: The idea that law abiding citizens here in Wyoming are required to retreat in the face of a violent predator, is absolutely absurd. The only thing that should be going through a person’s mind in that situation is how to best protect themselves and others.
If you hesitate to pull or use a firearm while facing a lethal threat over fears of what a capricious prosecutor may do to you, you may wind up dead. Wyoming law should clearly protect law abiding citizens, not dangerous criminals.
Second Amendment Daily: What do you say to those who claim that SYG law will allow people to simply ‘shoot first, and ask questions later?’
Senator Bouchard: Talk about ‘Fake News!’ I think this idea that law abiding gun owners are suddenly going to go crazy and have shootouts and duels on Main St. because we pass a Stand-Your-Ground law is simply ludicrous.
Gun owners in Wyoming are the most responsible and sober minded people of all. To suggest that will change because of this bill is absurd, and offensive to every gun owner in the state.
More, if this were true, these random acts of violence would have manifested themselves in the dozens of other states that already have this law on the books, something that hasn’t happened.
Second Amendment Daily: Do you think the fact that both Missouri and Iowa have passed this bill in the previous two years will help you in Wyoming?
Senator Bouchard: Definitely. Gun owners are a community, and that doesn’t stop at the state line.
Stand-Your-Ground law went nowhere for a long time following the George Zimmerman/Trayvon Martin shooting in Florida, even though Stand-Your-Ground law wasn’t used as part of the defense.
But with Missouri passing this law in 2016 and Iowa doing the same thing in 2017, there is renewed momentum behind this legislation. If grassroots gun owners can do this in these states, there’s no reason why the members of Wyoming Gun Owners can’t do the same thing.
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Second Amendment Daily: What help are you seeing from national gun groups in this fight?
Senator Bouchard: Some of the most explosive gains we’ve seen in the last couple of years have taken place once local gun owners banded together to get things done through a state organization.
Rarely are our rights protected from organizations located hundreds of miles away. Before becoming elected to office, I proudly worked for Wyoming Gun Owners, and know that their current leadership is solely focused on passage of this bill.
This fight will be won or lost right here in Wyoming.
In an alert to their members, Wyoming Gun Owners points out that Wyoming is in the minority of states that don’t have Stand-Your-Ground law already on the books.
While Congress has spent over a year on National Reciprocity and then muddied it up with Diane Feinstein’s gun control, more and more states are taking the lead and securing gun rights freedom on their own.
Stay tuned for more updates on the situation in Wyoming.
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