Hitting #1 in movies today, “The Perfect Neighbor” displays exactly what officers deal with day to day and even the murders they must solve because of Florida’s Stand Your Ground law. This documentary is filmed entirely from police officers’ bodycams and interviews from the manslaughter death of Ajike Owens.
Owens was shot through her neighbor’s front door, by Susan Lorincz on June 2, 2023. Following the shooting, Lorincz didn’t feel “safe” enough to live in her house anymore, residing in a hotel under protection until June 6, when she was finally charged with manslaughter with a firearm and sentenced to 25 years in prison. Her other charges include culpable negligence, battery, and two counts of assault. Lorincz pleaded that she only shot Owens out of fear and she was simply protecting herself. This is proved wrong later on, as sources say she shot more out of anger, than fear.
Previous to the shooting, Lorincz was a regular, calling 9-1-1 whenever she noticed the friendly neighborhood kids playing football anywhere near her home. She’d scream at them, call them names, even threaten them very often. These kids were between the ages of 6-11 years old and belonged to the parents that lived around the neighborhood. They would go out and play together, oftentimes football–especially during summer break. The parents enjoyed this because they thought it was better than them being on phones or technology all day.
Lorincz didn’t see things in that perspective, though. She claimed the kids to be trespassing on her property, even though the grass area the kids would play on didn’t belong to any of the neighbors. She accused them of breaking her property, sending death threats, and leaving their “trash” everywhere. When in reality, she admits in several interviews that she did, indeed, throw things at the children and call them various slurs.
Many fans of the documentary claim that Lorincz had searched up what Florida’s Stand Your Ground law entailed and think she was trying to use that knowledge to cover up her racism. The state of Florida lives under the Stand Your Ground law, which means people have no duty to retreat before using deadly force in self-defense. Other states that live under this law include Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, etc.
At the end of the documentary, information was included that Stand Your Ground laws have been related to an 8-11% increase in homicide cases. This is 700+ additional deaths a year. Research states that white Americans are much more successful with these self-defense cases when they kill a black person. It is also found that whites are 250% more likely to have their killing of a black person justified than a white killing another white person. This jumps up to 354% in states that have Stand Your Ground laws.
This goes to show that this documentary can serve as a representation of how unfair our civil rights system is in America. Justice for Ajike “AJ” Owens and her four children, especially Israel (9) and Isaac (12), who were first-hand witnesses of the crime.
