Florida's stand your ground defense used to shoot SUV full of loud teens

[DarthSkywalker]

Yep, same group of fools.

 

[Lantern Venom]

Apparently, this guy showed no emotion in court. Didn't faze him at all.

Even if you kill someone in self defense, at least have the decency to feel affected in some way about it.

This guy killed a kid and doesn't seem to care at all. Lock him up and throw away the key, it's only a matter of time before he does it again.

According to CNN, he was in shock, and asked his lawyer, "How is this happening?" while the verdict was being read. It sounds as if Dunn still thinks he was justified in what he did.

 

[Nell2ThaIzzay]

I agree with everything you typed right here.

My point wasn't that blacks are treated equally in these cases as whites, that's not true at all. My point was about the fact that there are rarely any breaking country wide news reports of black on white crimes like this. I find it kind of weird.

The Zimmerman case made headlines because a white guy (well, half white) shot down a black kid in cold blood and an arrest wasn't even made for months. THAT'S what the controversy was.

 

[Figs]

Yeah, so your argument has no basis. Of course.

Whatever. People too lazy to look up on their own just write it off.

 

[DarthSkywalker]

Whatever. People too lazy to look up on their own just write it off.

You mean how someone makes a baseless claim, shows no evidence and then tries to place the blame on others?

 

[Figs]

You mean how someone makes a baseless claim, shows no evidence and then tries to place the blame on others?

Where I've lived for most of my life before I recently moved, I would read and hear a lot of crimes on the local news channels and papers. Oakland, Richmond, and Stockton are pretty bad areas in CA. None of these ever went big across the nation though.

 

[KalMart]

Usually I'd say something along the lines well folks, the jury has spoken, period, and it's time to move on. BUT, for this one...

The jury has spoken. Period. Yes, a jury has spoken, albeit a notably schizophrenic jury on the whole, they have spoken and this all over the map set of verdicts make no sense at all. Notably, if the defense utilizes the same things I heard near the end/ending of this trial, and I am just a legal layman, they could get EVERYTHING thrown out and start over.

After hearing the State's case TRIED IN THE MEDIA ALL ALONG THE WAY FOR OVER A YEAR, and then not till near the end of the trial finally seeing/hearing the interview of the defendant's side of things the day after the shooting, I agree that there was/is no way this was 1st degree murder. The jury knew there was no 1st degree murder as well.

Additionally, an honest jury could not bring in a 2nd degree murder charge for the deceased either, which this jury did not; however, if there was no 2nd degree murder committed against the deceased, then only a schizophrenic jury would convict the defendant of 2nd degree murder with regards to the other occupants of the SUV. I think some wheeling and dealing went on in the jury room, which is not bringing justice for the defendant.

Unfortunately for we Floridians, angela corey is using her office to bilk us for millions of dollars, YET AGAIN, by over reaching for the highest conviction level on the books, WHICH BASED ON THE FACTS, SHE KNEW ALL ALONG, OR SHOULD HAVE KNOWN ALL ALONG, 1ST DEGREE MURDER WOULD BE IMPOSSIBLE TO ATTAIN IN THIS CASE WITH RATIONALLY THINKING JURORS.

The shooter's frame of mind is key as far as the charge. The shooter thought his life was in danger, so he started shooting, no one knowing all the facts blames him for this fact, but the shooter did NOT call or contact the Police after "fleeing" to safety/a safe area. IMHO, this is excusable and needs punished, but for the State's attorney to over charge the shooter with 1st degree murder in an attempt to punish the shooter is ludicrous, and the jury's unequal verdicts bear this out.

I do not know if Florida has a depraved indifference charge or not, but punish the guy with something that is based on the facts of the case on mot the emotions.

Just my $0.02, ymmv


-PW

Sounds familiar, doesn't it?

 

[charl_huntress]

#1) We will NEVER really know due to the shooter not calling the Police until the next day.


2) We will NEVER really know due to the Police not searching the parking lot until three days later, but this was because they only had the teens' side of the story due to the shooter not calling the Police until the next day.


I honestly think he already knows.

That's the sticking point. He had time to consider the options and discarded calling the police as an option. I just can't get over that.

As for me personally, I've never had a problem with him shooting, as I almost had to shoot, of all places, in a Popeye's Chicken drive through lane. I know how fast one sometimes has to act in order to save one's own life. It's a position and predicament that law abiding people should NEVER be put in, but I digress.

Don't digress... How in the hell did you almost shoot someone in the drive-thru of a Popeye's Chicken?

According to his testimony during the Police interview, his frame of mind caused him to be in fear for his life. Period. In Florida, thank God, this is enough to use deadly force with or without having to Stand Your Ground, which this was not a SYG case. He didn't call the Police. How do you almost do a mag-dump on a threat and then not call the Police? He's guilty, but not of murder.

That again is the point that sticks with me. 10 rounds is a lot of bullets and he was taking up defensive stances to try and hit them after they were trying to get away. I'm willing to give some credence to the man's fear, but if he was truly in fear then he should have called the police afterward....immediately afterward.

I respect your views, charl_huntress, so I am not trying to argue or debate here, I'm just garnering other peoples' opinions on this one.


-PW

No worries... I appreciate a differing point of view.

 

[katie_girl09]

It's a mistrial, guys. He wasn't found not guilty. I understand that it makes no sense whatsoever declaring a mistrial when you just admitted that the man was guilty of attempted murder. But I still think it's a bit too early to say that Davis ultimately won't get justice.

 

[SentinelMind]

The only justification I've heard for mistrial is the belief that Dunn may have been justified shooting the person he killed if he believed he had a weapon but that he is not justified in shooting at others in the same van.



Excerpt from jury/judge exchange
-- "Or, if we determine deadly force is justified against one person, is it justified against the others?" Judge: "No. Self-defense and justifiable use of deadly force applies separately to each count.


Since there was no gun, none of this should matter. It scares me if only one guy was in the loud van, some jurors could justify letting a Dunn go home free on just claiming self-defense.

 

[KalMart]

The only justification I've heard for mistrial is the belief that Dunn may have been justified shooting the person he killed if he believed he had a weapon but that he is not justified in shooting at others in the same van.



Excerpt from jury/judge exchange
-- "Or, if we determine deadly force is justified against one person, is it justified against the others?" Judge: "No. Self-defense and justifiable use of deadly force applies separately to each count.


Since there was no gun, none of this should matter. It scares me if only one guy was in the loud van, some jurors could justify letting a Dunn go home free on just claiming self-defense.

If he had reason to perceive a threat to his life, and the jurors agree that they would too in that situation, then it's not murder and yeah, cdl even bee seen as justifiable use of deadly force.

Actually, it sounds as if they (i.e., the mass media in general) are learning and "adjusting" their stratagems as they go.

That's nice, but it'd be nice if Corey learned as well.

 

[KalMart]

Sorry, but I meant my comment as a condemnation of the media. The mass media believes they've identified their mistakes made from the M & Z event, which to them the primary mistake they made was reporting Z's side of the story along with their race baiting the entire event. It made the reporting too fair and balanced. This is why they later decided to out right lie and report falsehoods, which is something they are going to have to pay Z for eventually, and with BIG TIME DOLLARS, when they finally settle his law suitS out of court. (There is NO way they will let any of them go to trial. The awards would be far to great for Z.)

As far as the mass media was concerned, Z walked due to their allowing his side of the story to get out prior to trial. I think they had a different strategy with this shooting.


Concerning the M & Z event, I personally went down to Hemming Plaza in order to challenge the New Black Panther leadership when they had their rally here in Jacksonville. IMHO, they all continued to use the mass media's rhetoric as well as the mass media's falsely reported "facts" to incorrectly accuse Z of being a racist and refused to discuss anything else rationally. Likewise, I used the evidence from Police tapes and Police reports to paint a different picture, so to speak. We came to an impasse based on interpretation and or conclusions drawn from the actual evidence, which I had the benefit of having WAY MORE evidence than they did due to their relying solely on the mass media's reporting of the event. .

The media decided early on to make this about race, about SYG laws, and decided NOT to report on facts that may have helped Dunn's story.

They are learning how to brainwash people through information control, and don't have any doubts, information control is people control by way of brainwashing.


EVEN SO, DUNN IS GUILTY, BUT NOT OF MURDER, DUE TO HIS NOT CALLING THE POLICE AFTER REACHING "SAFETY."



eta: Please, do not even get me started on angela corey's incompetence that she tries to disguise as tenacity.


Just my $0.02, ymmv


-PW

Did her re-election thing already pass or is that still on the table?

And yeah, I said from the beginning that it was a racial drama and quite frankly really not fair to the friends and family of Martin....because if the law worked the way it should, he'd walk free if they continued with their prosecution. Are there racial inequalities in arrests and convictions? Absolutely. But you won't fix that by over-charging in an attempt to 'balance out' the unfairness, so to speak.

As far as mass-media....what would you expect? It's entertainment, after all.

 

[Hal_Jordan]

If he had reason to perceive a threat to his life, and the jurors agree that they would too in that situation, then it's not murder and yeah, cdl even bee seen as justifiable use of deadly force.

No thanks. Paranoid nutjobs with guns are enough of a problem without gratifying and excusing their paranoia.

 

[KalMart]

No thanks. Paranoid nutjobs with guns are enough of a problem without gratifying and excusing their paranoia.

That's not what they or the law is doing. That's what media and emotion does.

 

[DarthSkywalker]

The problem with the law is that it centers completely on whether the person perceives a threat. So there doesn't actually have to be a threat. The person just needs to feel/think there is one.

 

[KalMart]

The problem with the law is that it centers completely on whether the person perceives a threat. So there doesn't actually have to be a threat. The person just needs to feel/think there is one.

But that also has to be judged as to whether that perception is rational and excusable under the circumstances. You don't automatically escape any punishment or culpability if you perceive it as self-defense. You cold still be guilty of gross negligence or aggravation/instigation, etc. It's not an arbitrary and empowering thing. It's something that has to be proven as and judged as well, not a hall pass.

 

[DarthSkywalker]

But that also has to be judged as to whether that perception is rational and excusable under the circumstances. You don't automatically escape any punishment or culpability if you perceive it as self-defense. You cold still be guilty of gross negligence or aggravation/instigation, etc. It's not an arbitrary and empowering thing. It's something that has to be proven as and judged as well, not a hall pass.

Except that doesn't work in theory. In both this and the Zimmerman case, the prosecution is suddenly asked to prove that it wasn't self-defense. Murders happen, and it is no longer enough to prove that. You have to prove that the person killed didn't deserve to die. Suddenly the victim is on trial. Stand Your Ground is different then normal self-defense in that regard.

 

[Xeno]

Gunman 'in disbelief' over loud-music verdict

That's hilarious. The bastard was convinced he would walk and got the shock of his life when he found out that he wouldn't. Now he'll have to listen to that "thug music" the rest of his natural life. Maybe he'll get lucky and be put in solitary where he's locked down 23 hours a day. A few decades of that will drive him crazier than 120 dB rap music ever could.

The day that murdering piece of **** testified I happened to be in an office building that had CNN playing in the lobby. The idiot anchors covering the trial were all convinced that Dunn would walk because he managed to cry on the witness stand, which they thought would automatically make the jury buy his story. Thankfully the jurors were at least a little more intelligent than Ashley Banfield and her pals. A murder conviction would have been preferable but knowing that scum will spend the rest of his life caged like an animal will do for now.

 

[DarthSkywalker]

He was basically convicted because he kept shooting. He kept shooting at the van, putting lives at risk that he himself acknowledged had done nothing wrong.

 

[KalMart]

Except that doesn't work in theory. In both this and the Zimmerman case, the prosecution is suddenly asked to prove that it wasn't self-defense. Murders happen, and it is no longer enough to prove that. You have to prove that the person killed didn't deserve to die. Suddenly the victim is on trial. Stand Your Ground is different then normal self-defense in that regard.

But it was self-defense in an aggravated and negligent case of manslaughter...NOT murder. That's why it's considered and why it's important both ways. Murder is a very specific legal term with parameters that have to be met and proved beyond the raw fact that someone is dead. These same laws so just as much to convict someone rightfully as well as to keep someone from being falsely or over-zealously convicted. It worked correctly in that case. it just didn't give the emotional result tat some were looking for. And it's something that the prosecution should have been smarter about.

And no, you are not interpreting correctly. Proving that it wasn't intended murder does not prove that the person deserved to die...that it was right and morally acceptable that they died. It proves that it was not what legally qualifies the killing as murder. If someone is guilty of manslaughter, they are still imprisoned heavily, judged to be ultimately responsible for a wrongful and undeserving death. That's what they should have gone after. But if you try to convict for legally-defined murder, they walk if you do not prove that...you generally don't 'bargain down' if you don't get the verdict you like. The prosecution should have known that from the evidence instead of playing off of the emotion, racial tension and trying to rally public/media by over-charging. Now the perception is "A murderer has gone free, and it's deemed acceptable and deserving that the kid was killed." Both completely and factually wrong.

 

[DJ_KiDDvIcIOUs]

"Loud Music" Killing Juror Wanted to Convict Michael Dunn of Murder

A home care nurse administrator who was known as "Juror No. 4" in the Florida murder trial of Michael Dunn—the white man not convicted last week of murdering Jordan Davis over the black teen's "loud music"—says she, and most of her peers, wanted to convict Dunn of the killing.

That juror, who identified herself only as Valerie, explained what went on in the jury's deliberations to Byron Pitts on last night's episode of Nightline.

When asked, "Do you think Michael Dunn got away with murder?" she responds, "At this point, I do, myself personally. Yes."

The jury was made up of eight whites, two blacks, a Hispanic, and an Asian. Valerie says the initial jury vote was 10 to 2 for a first degree murder conviction. Especially convincing to the majority was the fact that after pumping shots into the teens' parked SUV, Dunn got back into his vehicle, returned to his hotel, and ordered pizza.

But the stumbling point, she says, came with a question on page 25 of the jury instructions:

The question: do you believe that Michael Dunn was justified or unjustified in the murder of Jordan Davis?"

"It said if he believed that he had an eminent threat to himself or his fiancee, so that was a thing that those two folks believed – he was frightened and there was no other option for him in regards to Mr. Davis," Valerie said...

According to Valerie, the jurors who believed Dunn was guilty were split between first-degree, second-degree and manslaughter – but because they were unable to unanimously overcome the issue of self-defense, the jury was deadlocked.
There was yelling, screaming and profanity in the deliberation room. Valerie admitted that she did some of the screaming.

At the end of several days of deliberation, the jury vote was 9 to 3 to convict Dunn of murder. It was hopelessly hung on the count, even though it voted to convict Dunn on a host of lesser charges, including three counts of attempted murder for shooting at Davis' friends.

The interview ends with this chilling piece of dialogue, Valerie's advice in hindsight to a man who thought he had no choice but to unload his gun into a carload of black teens playing loud music he didn't like:

Nightline: Do you think Michael Dunn had options?

Juror No. 4: Oh, yes sir.

Nightline: What were his options?

Juror No. 4: Roll your window up. Ignore the taunting. Put your car in reverse. Back up to the front of the store. Move one parking spot over. That's my feeling.
Update: Language in this story has been corrected to clarify that the jury hung on Dunn's murder charge; he was not acquitted, and could stand trial for murder again.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/juror-loud-music-trial-wanted-murder-conviction/story?id=22571068

I really hope the next jury takes this guy down. The language of the law in FL needs to change. So if I have a schizophrenic episode and believe people are trying to harm me then I can just kill them and claim I stood my ground right? Ya, ok, let's see how well that would hold up in court

 

[Hobgoblin]

The thing I don't understand is, why did Dunn take the parking spot next to the car playing loud music that he didn't like? Wouldn't it make more sense to park somewhere else if he hated the music so much?

Also, one of the teens in the car said it seemed like Dunn and his girlfriend were in a bad mood when they arrived. It's funny that Dunn said that he and his gf were in a great mood. I dont know about you, but if I were talking to the police about a shooting that I took part in, I'd just be giving the bare facts, not talking about my mood.

 

[charl_huntress]

I really do think Dunn may have wanted a bit of a confrontation. Not saying he wanted to shoot them, but I think he may have the sort of personality that would seek out that sort of confrontation to begin with. Maybe the fact he had been drinking played into this.

I live in CA and loud music from cars is something you are going to encounter. I could see him requesting the music be turned down if he had a child or children with him, and the lyrics were raunchy, or maybe if he had someone elderly with him. Yet...it was just him...so it wasn't as though he was protecting/defending anyone else. He just wanted the noise turned down or off and he felt the need to verbalize that request to a bunch of teenagers. I'm more perplexed by him choosing to do that then anything else that happened afterward tbh.

 

[Ant-manic]

Gunman 'in disbelief' over loud-music verdict

That's hilarious. The bastard was convinced he would walk and got the shock of his life when he found out that he wouldn't. Now he'll have to listen to that "thug music" the rest of his natural life. Maybe he'll get lucky and be put in solitary where he's locked down 23 hours a day. A few decades of that will drive him crazier than 120 dB rap music ever could.

The day that murdering piece of **** testified I happened to be in an office building that had CNN playing in the lobby. The idiot anchors covering the trial were all convinced that Dunn would walk because he managed to cry on the witness stand, which they thought would automatically make the jury buy his story. Thankfully the jurors were at least a little more intelligent than Ashley Banfield and her pals. A murder conviction would have been preferable but knowing that scum will spend the rest of his life caged like an animal will do for now.

i saw the same thing you did. i was dumbstruck at Banfield's interpretation of things. she believed the guy's sob story.

 

[Ant-manic]

I really do think Dunn may have wanted a bit of a confrontation. Not saying he wanted to shoot them, but I think he may have the sort of personality that would seek out that sort of confrontation to begin with. Maybe the fact he had been drinking played into this.

I live in CA and loud music from cars is something you are going to encounter. I could see him requesting the music be turned down if he had a child or children with him, and the lyrics were raunchy, or maybe if he had someone elderly with him. Yet...it was just him...so it wasn't as though he was protecting/defending anyone else. He just wanted the noise turned down or off and he felt the need to verbalize that request to a bunch of teenagers. I'm more perplexed by him choosing to do that then anything else that happened afterward tbh.

i'm perplexed at him getting out of his car and shooting at a fleeing vehicle.