FrontSight wrote: Thu Oct 28, 2021 10:45 am
This will be an interesting case to watch. The actual shooting event has a lot of elements about it that support self defense. However, everything that lead up to that moment is in question. I'm very interested in where this case is going to go. Its also a case where there are no good guys.
Remember, for a successful self defense case, you really need to meet 5 tests
1 - You're the innocent party (as in, not the aggressor)
2 - The threat has to be imminent
3 - The force you employ must be proportional to the threat
4 - Duty to retreat (depending on which state you're in)
5 - Your conduct has to be reasonable
I'm very interested in seeing how the defense and prosecution address these 5 issues, because there's all kinds of gray area with this case.
For the latter two shootings...
1) He was running away.
2) He was chased by at least three people, one trying to take his head off with a roundhouse kick, one armed with a hand gun, and one with a skateboard/club (the latter two were shot, the hand gun guy lost his bicep and is really lucky that's all he lost, the skateboard guy died).
3) The crowd chasing him was trying to at minimum beat him to a pulp if not kill him, and take his weapon.
4) He was retreating, he was running away.
5) Hmmm, none of this on either side can be considered "reasonable".
For the first shooting...
Witnesses have said a crowd cornered him and tried to take his weapon after he doused a flaming dumpster that the rioters had set alight, mostly led by the first guy killed, though there's no video of that encounter that I've seen (there is lots of video of the second and third shootings however).
It will be interesting...