A new Georgia gun law will extend the state's stand-your-ground legislation to protect convicted felons who kill using illegal guns, under what one criminal law expert calls a “recipe for unnecessary killing”.



The bill, called HS60, was passed by the state legislature last week and is now awaiting governor Nathan Deal’s signature. It was promoted by state Republicans for offering greater protection to law-abiding citizens. But lawyers, the state association of chiefs of police and anti-gun groups say it is one of the most dangerous provisions in a sweeping bill some campaigners have dubbed “guns everywhere”.

The bill allows people who have a weapons permit to bring loaded handguns into bars and nightclubs – as long as they do not drink alcohol. It also authorises school boards to appoint staff to carry firearms on campus, forces public housing authorities to allow guns in their premises and eliminates criminal charges for those found with guns at airport security.

The bill also expands the class of people who can claim a stand-your-ground defence to include convicted felons, even while it is illegal under Georgia law for a felon to possess a gun.

Joseph Kennedy, a professor of law at the University of North Carolina who specialises in criminal procedure, believes expanding stand-your-ground laws at the same time as concealed carry will lead to more deaths.

"Here's why it's a dangerous thing," Kennedy said. "The more places where a person might reasonably believe someone else is carrying a gun, the more reasonable it is for them to believe another person is drawing a gun, and the more reasonably they can use deadly force."

Kennedy believes stand-your-ground laws are widely misunderstood by the public, with the effect of emboldening them to get into dangerous situations, with potentially fatal results.

"The public understanding of it is different from what the law actually says,” he said. “You still have to have a reasonable fear of death or great bodily harm in order to use a gun. But that's not how the public interprets it. The danger has been the public interprets it as a right to confront somebody, then point a gun. It emboldens them, like the Zimmerman case, where they engage in a confrontation where they otherwise wouldn't.

"It’s a recipe for unnecessary killing.”

George Zimmerman shot and killed Trayvon Martin, an unarmed black teenager, in Florida in February 2012. He was subsequently acquitted of second-degree murder and manslaughter. (Though Martin’s death brought stand-your-ground laws into public focus, Zimmerman's lawyers did not cite them in mounting his defence.)

Frank Rotondo, the executive director of Georgia Association of Chiefs of Police, said he had concerns over the bill, particularly with regard to guns being allowed in public housing and the stand-your-ground expansion. He said the inability of law enforcement officers to ask to see carry permits was a disincentive for people to get permits.

"One of the biggest concerns is it expands stand-your-ground,” he said. “The way it's written, a felon who is not permitted to have a weapon could use a weapon in defence of his or her home and not be charged for having the weapon.

"I'm sure this is going to be a challenge for the courts."

Colin Goddard, senior policy advocate for Mayors Against Illegal Guns, sought to have the bill’s expansion of stand-your-ground removed.

"This is the first time we've seen an attempt in the law to expand stand-your-ground like this," Goddard said. "They passed the bill without any successful justification or discussion about why they would want to grant felons with illegal guns stand-your-ground as a defence. It does seem quite a contradiction of what they said the law was there to do, to protect law abiding Georgia citizens.

"We were concerned about every part of the bill but stand-your-ground was by far the most egregious in terms of public safety as we know it."

Before the bill was passed, Georgia lawmakers backed down on provisions that would have allowed guns in churches and on college campuses, following opposition from state police chiefs, the federal Transportation Security Administration, restaurant associations and episcopal and Catholic churches, as well as gun-control groups and, according to polls, Georgia residents. The final version allows guns in churches only with permission of the clergy.

Pia Carusone, executive director of Americans for Responsible Solutions, the anti-gun lobby founded by Gabrielle Giffords, the former Arizona congresswoman who was shot in 2011, said she was pleased the final bill did not include guns in college campuses and churches, but said it remained worrisome.

"Now, Governor Deal has to decide if he wants to allow guns in TSA lines at the country's busiest airport, force community school boards into bitter, divisive debates about whether they should allow guns in their children's classrooms, and broaden the concealed carry eligibility to people who have previously committed crimes with guns."

The bill also eliminates the prohibition of someone who has been convicted of pointing a firearm at another person from obtaining a carry license.

The expansion of the stand-your-ground provision also indemnifies those carrying guns in unauthorised locations, and those under the influence of drugs or alcohol.

Americans for Responsible Solutions has described the bill as "the most extreme gun bill in America” – a description that irks the gun lobby.

Jerry Henry, director of georgiacarry.org, said every provision in the bill had been introduced in other states. He believes the bill does not go far enough.

"We want church carry" he said. "The law should be uniform. Every piece of private property should be treated as private property. The government needs to keep out of churches and private property.

"We've picked a really, really good gun bill that has a lot of good things."

Henry disputed polls that show 70% of Georgia residents were against the bill's provisions. “These polls are skewed polls,” he said. “We did a poll where we asked a question differently.

“We asked: 'If a person is over 21, with mental health checks and background checks by the FBI, should they have a right to defend themselves in a church?' We got 58% saying yes."