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Suburban Detroit homeowner convicted of second-degree murder in porch shooting

"Attention crooks: do what you want. If someone tries to stop you, we'll put their asses in prison".

Look for a sharp increase in burglaries and home invasions.

Beware Jehovah's Witnesses! In Red-State America it is completely acceptable to kill someone for knocking on your door. That'll teach those Girl Scouts trying to sell me cookies.
 
:screwy
No we were not. We were discussing a very specific statement regarding his initial statement. As previously shown.
So let me show it again.
Yes as I said, we were discussing a murder.
The murderer testified at his trial that he "raised the gun and shot". Just like I said ," He pulled the trigger".
The jury concluded that he had committed murder, just as I said weeks ago.
His lawyer realized that his flimsy defense that the gun accidentally discharged wasn't going to hold water.
Guns don't just "go off". Fingers pull triggers.
They went for the self defense strategy instead, but no threat to his life could be convincingly shown to the jury.
So I was correct . Wafer has been convicted . He is a murderer.
 
I never she was, however the homeowner thought she was, hence the reason he shot her. Right?

What happened here, is that the ability for citizens to protect their property has been taken away. Any time that happens, crime goes up.

There was no evidence that he was protecting anyone from anything.
 
None of that is evident. There was no evidence she was trying to break in. At least none that was presented at the trial. He openly stated he was worried she might try to break in and he was worried that there might be multiple people out there. Again, this was not a case built around speculation. His account of what happened was accepted. The jury found that based on his account the shooting and lethal force was not warranted.
Yes. The jury found that "worry" is not grounds for a legit killing in self defense.
 
And? What does the conviction have to do with your false spin?
There was no evidence that she was seeking any help.
So what is it you do not understand about that claim being spin?


Odd, it is almost like you are trying to find information to back up your spin.
Sorry, the only thing that exists are opinions that she may have been looking for help, which is not evidence.
Which also flies in the face of the evidence that she turned down offers of help.
Do you even know what the word "evidence" means? Judging from your statements in this thread, I don't think you do.

You seem to confuse "evidence" with "proof", and even then don't see it as proof simply because you don't want to.
 
Do you even know what the word "evidence" means? Judging from your statements in this thread, I don't think you do.

You seem to confuse "evidence" with "proof", and even then don't see it as proof simply because you don't want to.
You seem to be confused and your judger seems to be off.
Did I use the word proof?

Or is it that you do not understand that a proffered opinion is not evidence that she was seeking help?
Or is it that you do not understand that actually testimony of her turning down assistance is evidence?
Which is it?
 
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Yes as I said, we were discussing a murder.
Why do you continue to tell untruths?

We were discussing a very specific statement. And you know that. His initial statement.

He originally stated that the gun accidentally fired. That would make it manslaughter under Mich law.
Guns don't "accidentally" fire themselves.
He had to pull the trigger.

As anybody can see, we were discussing a very specific statement he made.


But since it seems you do not know how to differentiate between what you quote and what you are actually trying to say, I will let this continue.

The jury concluded that he had committed murder, just as I said weeks ago.
Let me show you how absurd your attempt to brag is.
The jury concluded that he had committed manslaughter, just as I said weeks ago.
:doh
 
That's not the message. He over reacted by shooting through the door.

It's the message that will be received. Now, people aren't going to know if they're over-reacting and they're going to hesitate.
 
The facts the trial were pretty clear. Neither side argued or disagreed about what happened. The question the jury faced was not what happened but rather whether his actions were justified. He felt he was in danger, however it was determined his feeling threatened was not justified.

The facts of the trial are not at all clear to me yet. I would've guessed voluntary manslaughter too and am surprised by the second-degree conviction.
 
It's the message that will be received. Now, people aren't going to know if they're over-reacting and they're going to hesitate.

If you don't hesitate before shooting another human being, you shouldn't have a gun.
 
If he had been found innocent....gun owners would have looked better?

George Zimmerman didnt do cc permit holders any favors.

Anti-gunners hate gun owners, anyway. Since owning a gun is a civil right, I'n not interested in how this dude made us look.
 
The prosecutor impeached Wafer’s credibility, saying he had used certain “buzzwords” in front of the jury, and that he had every reason to lie to “save his own skin.”

He then touched on the instruction for “false exculpatory statements,” which provides that if the jury believes the defendant lied about an earlier excuse for a crime they can interpret that as consciousness of guilt evidence. In this case, Muscat argues that Wafer first tried to advance an accident defense, and only later self-defense, and that the first was a false exculpatory statement from which they should infer Wafer’s guilt.

Muscat then spoke to self-defense, noting that at the time you use deadly force in self-defense you have to reasonably believe you are facing death or great bodily harm. Wafer, however, did not have to use deadly force immediately, “He had many other options,” and his use of deadly force was “reckless, it was negligent.” Wafer, he said, engaged with McBride and through his actions “creates the confrontation.” His actions were “unnecessary, unjustified, and unreasonable.”
The earlier "accidental discharge" defense actually worked against him.
The act of pointing the shotgun at a person with the safety off, made him guilty of involuntary manslaughter. But when he said "I raised the gun and shot", convicted him on second degree murder as well.
Wafer never said that he feared for his life. He testified that he was "worried" that someone might break in and that he was "worried " that he may be harmed.
Worry is not a threat. Worry about what someone might do is not grounds for self defense.
Renisha McBride | Theodore Wafer | Closing Arguments
It also came out in testimony that Wafer was angry and looking for a confrontation because his car had been vandalized by kids shooting paintball guns at it.
 
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Not surprised, but saddened for both parties none the less
 
This whole thing is confusing to me. The teen crashed her car, according to the media, several hours earlier, yet all of a sudden she is knocking on a stranger's door, drunk and high, asking for help? She rear-ended a car a few hours before she landed on the man's doorstep, and it was a half-mile away. What the hell was she doing during that time? The woman whose car she ran into said she was going to call for help for her, and McBride said she was going to walk home and didn't need the woman's help.

Several hours, and a half-mile later, she ended up at the home of the man who shot her.

Things just seem off - like something isn't adding up.

I hope the trial details will be published today. The prosecutors said that where she was during those missing hours might never be known. What is known is that at the time of her death, she was still over twice the legal alcohol limit.

Where did she go? Was she passed out in the bushes somewhere, or did she catch a ride to another party, or what? What about the muddy footprint on the a/c unit?

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/24/u...igan-man-who-shot-teenager-on-porch.html?_r=1
 
I've found a site with links to trial details. Haven't clicked on any yet. Here's what the page I landed on says (in part):

Verdict Indicates Jury Unanimously Rejected Self-Defense

The jury’s verdict of guilty necessarily means that they unanimously agreed that state prosecutors had disproved self-defense beyond a reasonable doubt, as was the state’s burden.

The most likely contributors to this conclusion discounting self-defense was Wafer’s early and multiple references to the shooting as an “accident”–which, as an unintentional event, is technically inconsistent with self-defense–and his unlocking and opening his front door, which may have been seen as being unreasonable in the face of a claimed threat.
Renisha McBride | Theodore Wafer | Verdict: Guilty
 
It's the message that will be received. Now, people aren't going to know if they're over-reacting and they're going to hesitate.

Good! Better to hesitate and be correct rather than murder an innocent person.
 
I'm surprised that racism hasn't reared it's ugly head in this.
 
From the same attorney-blogger link, information I hadn't heard about Wafer's front door:

[h=3]Unlocking and Opening the Steel Front Door[/h]

Wafer’s decision to unlock and open the steel front door of his home. McBride never, in FACT, threatened entry–whatever she might have done to the screen door, there remained the steel door to get through. Had that steel door been substantively damaged or had there been any evidence to suggest an actual entry was imminent, I think Wafer would have been fine. Absent that, however, the jury likely expected him to hunker down and wait until entry was imminent before using deadly force–and certainly not to unlock and open that very steel door that was keeping the “intruders” outside.
 
From the same attorney-blogger link, information I hadn't heard about Wafer's front door:

[h=3]Unlocking and Opening the Steel Front Door[/h]

Wafer’s decision to unlock and open the steel front door of his home. McBride never, in FACT, threatened entry–whatever she might have done to the screen door, there remained the steel door to get through. Had that steel door been substantively damaged or had there been any evidence to suggest an actual entry was imminent, I think Wafer would have been fine. Absent that, however, the jury likely expected him to hunker down and wait until entry was imminent before using deadly force–and certainly not to unlock and open that very steel door that was keeping the “intruders” outside.
Which would be wrong for the jury to allow to take precedence over her jumping out at him.


So what else is your point?
As noted in the comments where you got that from.
"A steel door is not a safe.
A steel door with a wood frame will slow down a violent criminal exactly one solid kick’s worth of time. Having a violent criminal on your porch, beating on your door, does not make me feel like “Well, I can call the police and they’ll be here in an hour or so…” ..." ~ georgfelis
 
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A neighbor testified that "...he heard noises outside his home that were sufficiently alarming to induce him to go outside in the early morning hours and check on his cars." Not sure whether he called the police.

About fingerprints and the muddy footprint on the a/c unit[bolding mine]:

Dearborn Heights Police Officer Cyndi Maxwell, a fingerprint expert, testified that she was unable to identify any of the prints collected from Wafer’s screen door.

Michigan State Police Forensics Scientist Jennifer Rizk was also unable to identify these prints from the screen door. Importantly, she did mention evidence of an apparent footprint on an air conditioner unit from outside Wafer’s home. This footprint was neither collected nor preserved, again suggesting substantive defects in the investigative procedures and execution. The footprint would become important to the defense’s narrative of Wafer’s reasonable fear, in that it suggested that someone might have stood on the air conditioner in an effort to gain access to his home. Renisha McBride | Theodore Wafer | Review Into Week 3
 
Yeah, I don't see much evidence that would validate any claims of self-defense. If a drunk person is banging on your door in the middle of the night, call the cops and wait.

As for the tragedy of a teen dying like this: don't go off on your own in the middle of the night when you are hammered. There are hundreds of ways you can get yourself seriously hurt or killed by doing so.
 
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