Los Angeles Assemblymember Rick Zbur says he wants to narrow the standards for justifiable homicide. Critics say he wants to make self-defense illegal.
Assembly Bill 1333 has provoked a great deal of debate since its introduction in late February.
In response to several states’ “stand-your-ground laws,” which permit people in certain cases to use deadly force in self-defense, Zbur’s bill seeks to codify certain circumstances when homicide “is not justifiable.” Those circumstances would include when the person was:
- Outside their home and knew that using deadly force could have been avoided by safely retreating;
- Engaging in mutual combat or knowingly provoking a person (though this provision has some exceptions).
Zbur, a Democrat, told me his proposal doesn’t run afoul with California’s “castle doctrine,” which allows people to use deadly force to defend themselves in their own home. Rather, it seeks to address gun violence, and the rising instances of armed vigilantism in the U.S.
- Zbur: “What this bill is focused on is someone who goes out in public, picks a fight — and when the victim responds — they shoot them and claim self-defense.”
There is evidence — including from a 2020 study by the research and policy think tank RAND Corporation and a 2022 analysis by the University of Oxford — that link stand-your-ground laws with increases in firearm homicides …