TAMPA, Fla. — Prosecutors have decided that no charges will be filed in the September 2022 shooting that left a University of Tampa student dead.
19-year-old Carson Senfield was shot and killed after a night out on his birthday.
"It seems like no one cares,” attorney AJ Alvarez said, who is representing Senfield’s family, who live in Buffalo, New York. “This young life with so much promise was just ripped away from them."
Alvarez says Senfield approached a car the family thinks he believed to be his Uber. As he potentially tried to get in, Alvarez says he was shot and killed by someone in the car.
Investigators say the shooter won't be facing charges because of Florida’s "Stand Your Ground" law.
"There needs to be public outrage,” Alvarez said. “‘Stand Your Ground’ has gotten to the point now where it's breeding individuals looking to shoot someone."
We asked USF's Center for Justice Research and Policy Co-Director Dr. Edelyn Verona if states with stricter gun laws tend to have less gun violence.
"Per capita, hands down the research is pretty clear, they have less gun violence,” she explained. “the other thing to consider is, gun laws are done by state. So, no matter how strong the gun regulations are in one state, if they’re adjacent to states with weaker gun regulations then it’s very easy for guns to transfer in between that.”
Florida is one of the dozens of states with a Stand Your Ground law, or something comparable, and permitless carry becomes legal in the Sunshine State on July 1.
Verona says research in states with similar laws in place is still in the early stages and mixed on the way stats are trending.
"When states have these ‘permitless carries,’ they tend to have higher gun violence rates, but the question is, ‘Was it actually the law that created the rise, or something already in that state that created the rise?’" Verona said.
As Senfield's parents are still fighting for more information about why their son's shooter won't be charged, their attorney says it's a stain on the area and our state.
"I really just can't express to you how embarrassed I am to be a member of this community and to have to sit there and look those parents in the eye and say, ‘I‘m sorry, they didn't file charges,'" Alvarez said.
Prosecutors tell us the shooter's identity is protected by "Marsy's Law," and they are being treated as the victim in this case.