I never said Perry didn't have a right to arm himself or that this wasn't a dangerous situation so don't put words in my mouth.
I never put words in your mouth, I was building a case from the ground-up with full context. Quite the opposite, I was actually responding to a statement I read earlier from you that said the rioter had just as much of a right to be armed as Perry. I agree with all that, I was trying to find common agreement on that point.
I'm not trying to say everything you've said is wrong, I'm just trying to provide more context on the situation as a whole so that you can see that no matter what, this guy was falsely convicted. I think the text messages and whole thing about motivation was a total distraction. I agree that these messages were attained illegally and shouldn't have been, but even with their release I don't think it should have had any impact.
I don't care if he was mad at BLM/antifa, I don't care if he was racist against certain races, I don't think that matters at all in this particular instance. I'll get to the "why" soon.
But as an example, if a black person wanted to go into an area with white supremacists wearing tactical armor and a sidearm, and wait to be lynched, then shoot the lynchers, I don't think I would have a problem with that either.
Also I can see a reasonable jury acquitting Perry. I can also see a reasonable jury convicting Perry. At the end of the day this came down to witness credibility over a vey simple question. Did Garrett Foster point his gun at Daniel Perry or did he not?
Irrelevant. There is no law that says somebody has to point a gun at you before you shoot them. In all 50 states, if somebody says, "I'm going to shoot you!" and they reach for their gun, you can shoot them before they point their gun at you. That's not exactly what happened in this case, but it is analogous.
Here is the context you and everyone else trying to argue me down keep ignoring. Perry's cop "expert" would have likely shot Kyle Rittenhouse based on how Kyle was carrying his rifle.
....which is missing the context that I put forward. There is a different standard for shooting a lawful citizen carrying a gun than there is for shooting a criminal who is carrying a gun. I'm not saying you can shoot anybody committing a crime who is carrying a gun, just that there is a different standard for when you could do it. So since Kyle was not committing any crimes or engaging in criminal conduct, nor was he part of a group that was doing so, then no, there would be no justification to shoot Kyle. Whereas this guy was part of a mob of people who were unlawfully blocking a street and unlawfully threatening somebody who was lawfully driving down said street.
But we weren't even talking about if he killed Garrett Foster but why he killed Garrett Foster. It got to a question of "state of mind."
Probably the same state of mind a police officer who puts out a decoy car in a bad neighborhood for criminals to steal. I have no problem with that.
Additionally, I don't think I would have a problem with an armed person who put on a bullet proof vest and walked down a dark alley at night to see if somebody would rob them with a gun, then they could shoot them. If that is such a big problem in their community that they feel the need to risk their lives to do so, I don't think I see any issue with that. If somebody came by the dark alley ten minutes later and was robbed at gunpoint, they would have the right to defend themselves as well.
I think the lawyers were taking advantage of the fake narrative being set around these "protests". Antifa and BLM were burning down businesses and destroying things and hurting people all over the country. It is perfectly reasonable to be upset about that. It's perfectly reasonable to have bad feelings about these rioters, the ones are destroying people's lives. Additionally, while I disavow racism, it is not a crime. Racists still have the right to defend themselves.
Earlier you said something about his text message about what he could "get away with" as far as shooting somebody legally. That's sort of a weasel word way of saying he was looking up the ways he could legally defend himself in his particular jurisdiction.
So basically, he knew there were going to be riots, he knew he might be at these riots. I don't think it matters whether he put himself there on purpose, like Kyle Rittenhouse did, or whether he thought that as an Uber driver he might end up having to go there for occupational purposes.