Earlier Monday Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed HB1, a new bill from the Florida legislature that establishes new criminal definitions under the anti-riot law. The House and Senate worked on the legislation for a year after Governor Ron DeSantis led the initial effort.
[HB1] “defines a “riot” as a public disturbance involving three or more people “acting with the common intent to assist each other in violent and disorderly conduct” that results in injury to another person, damage to property, or danger of injury or damage.
The law grants civil immunity to people who drive into protesters who are blocking a road, prevents people accused of rioting from bailing out of jail until after their first court appearance, and increases penalties for assaulting law-enforcement officers while engaging in a “riot.” It also penalizes local governments that interfere with efforts to stop a riot and allows law-enforcement agencies that face funding reductions to file objections.” (link)
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The anti-riot law titled “Combating Public Disorder,” creates a new crime of “mob intimidation,” enhance penalties for riot-related looting and violence and create an affirmative defense for individuals who injure or kill violent protesters. Polk County Sheriff Grady Judge spoke at the signing.
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Has anyone ever seen Sundance and Ron DeSantis in the same room?
Hooray for Florida, hooray for SANITY.
Desantis is my first choice for the 47th POTUS in three years.
This is so awesome. LOL
If this Bill keeps Lefties from moving to Florida….Yaaaaaayyy!!!!!
“You can run over literal humans” … as opposed to the literal human babies ripped limb from limb daily, the literal humans whose lives and businesses are destroyed by BLM and Antifa mobs, the literal humans who are shot and killed by BLM/Antifa, the literal humans who are being dragged through the court of public opinion for an imaginary crime… those literal humans?
I am glad the whole danger-fraught issue of what are the rights of a driver inadvertently caught in a protest and blocked in by protestors and what are the rights of protestors in the street because the gravity of the injuries inflicted whenever it is a Car vs Pedestrian are usually horrific and, if the patient survives, the medical costs are huge and lengthy. Cars always win the battle.
I hope that a public service announcement that features a judge, an attorney general, a cop, and a defense lawyer discuss the do’s and don’ts of protesting and driving is produced and broadcast so that EVERYONE is safe and minimizes injuries to innocent and lawful citizens, whether they be drivers or protestors.
The scenario that I keep seeing in the news are that Pollyannaish goody-two shoe women protestors or betas are standing right at the front bumper and pleading with the driver to “understand” their protest (even if lawful) but these people are clueless that bad elements in their protest are walking around to the sides and the back of the car with baseball bats and bricks and bashing in windows, tail-lights, and the doors while the driver (and their families inside as passengers) are panicking and are rightfully worried about their health and safety and decide to hit the gas and run over the aforementioned clueless ones….. and then the car stops down the street as the chasing mob tries to rip the driver from the car.
The proposed law hopefully clarifies things. As it would be terrible if a driver was in fact legally authorized to hit the gas while blocked-in by an unlawful and menacing mob, but because of being afraid of what a future jury of idiots might decide, the driver decides to not drive away and then gets murdered or maimed a la Reginald Denny.
I wish this had been addressed years ago.
After the Ferguson trial verdict was done a few years back, students from UC San Diego decide to block the northbound lanes of I-5 next to campus during morning rush-hour, one of the busiest stretches of freeway in Southern California. Unfortunately, they also blocked the emergency/shoulder lane that can be used by paramedics/cops/firetrucks….and the off ramp just past them is the main off ramp to 2 large hospitals and their ER/trauma centers. They caused traffic to back up all the way 15 miles to downtown San Diego. My colleagues who work at the hospital could not get into work to relieve the night-shift nurses and staff (of whom many had to get home to get their kids to child care or school) which jeopardized patient care. It caused the cancellation of many surgeries as both staff and patients could not get in. Ambulance with lights and sirens on were stuck in traffic. ER patients had to be re-routed to other more distant hospitals probably causing increased morbidity and mortality. The VA hospital on UCSD campus probably also had veterans miss long-awaited and delayed appointments. The Chancellor of the College did NOTHING to punish the selfish students.
(Then Karma (or Car-ma) made an appearance on Election Night 2016 when tantruming UCSD students decided to block the near-empty southbound lanes of I-5 after midnight in the dark while wearing their prerequisite dark UCSD logoed hoodies and sweatpants and only using the dim lights from their iphones. A SUV driver just did not see them (as the blockade was right past a dark overpass bridge) and nailed a coed and crushed her legs and pelvis (the driver had swerved at the last minute or else the coed would have been smeared all over). The student then unsuccessfully sued the University for failing to explain to them that blocking a dark freeway at night was dangerous (her suit was tossed out). You can see the whole incident on YouTube)
Why aren’t more Republicans behaving like Ron DeSantis? He’s doing what they all ran on. So did Trump.
Because other Republicans lack the Cojones DeSantis has.
It’s why I changed to Independent.
We need President Trump now but definitely 2024 with Desantis VP
After that 8 years for Desantis as President.
This will sound like fiction, but sometime between 2004 and 2012 I read an op-ed where a person suggested the right of way laws be changed to give preference to pedestrians and cyclists on freeways/interstates. Of course he claimed it was for ‘pedestrian safety.’ Pedestrians and cyclists are not allowed on controlled access roadways, for good reason. At the time I googled the name and located a personal website for that man, and it had some commuter rail stuff on it, etc. The man was self employed and had worked with a Clinton campaign previously, probably Bill. In 2020 I realized what that article was for, but was unable to locate it and thus I cannot get a name.
Superb Presser and Superb Bill. Hooray for Florida!