Joined by the girlfriend of a black man who was shot dead by a white man over a disabled parking spot at a Clearwater convenience store, black pastors, civil rights leaders and politicians marched to Governor Rick Scott’s office Wednesday to demand a repeal of the state’s controversial “stand your ground law.”
Tensions over the shooting of Markeis McGlockton escalated after Pinellas County Sheriff Bob Gualtieri decided not to arrest shooter Michael Drejka, who claimed he shot in self-defense. Civil Rights attorney Ben Crump calls Stand Your Ground “a racist, Jim Crow-era law.”
“Now, everywhere is somebody’s ground,” said Crump. “It almost suggests that for black people and people of color, our ground is only where white people deem it appropriate to be.”
Crump represents Brittany Jacobs, the girlfriend of McGlockton. She and her kids were inside the vehicle when Drejka confronted her about their car being illegally parked in a disabled spot without a permit.
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