Now to the story -
Jurors can't reach verdict in killing by border agent
Federal judge declares case a mistrial following three days of deliberations Prosecutors vow to retry it; vast gap between both sides' versions of events
With jurors deadlocked after three days of tense deliberations, a federal judge declared a mistrial Friday afternoon in the high-profile murder case against U.S. Border Patrol agent Nicholas Corbett.
The trial focused on two markedly different stories about what prompted the shooting last year of Francisco Javier DomÃnguez Rivera, stirring passions about immigration and border security while prompting numerous demonstrations outside the Evo A. DeConcini Courthouse.
Just before 3 p.m., jurors sent a note to U.S. District Judge David C. Bury saying they were deadlocked. Bury called them into the courtroom and quizzed the foreman, who assured him there was no hope of reaching a unanimous decision.
Reflecting the emotional charge of the trial, many of the jurors looked weary, even angry, and one woman was crying as she left the courtroom.
Afterward, federal prosecutors vowed to retry the case.
Corbett, 40, was charged with second-degree murder, manslaughter and negligent homicide in the killing of DomÃnguez Rivera on Jan. 12, 2007, after stopping him and three others in the desert between Bisbee and Douglas, near the U.S.-Mexico line.
DomÃnguez Rivera's two brothers and a girlfriend of one of the brothers testified the shooting took place as the 22-year-old man was kneeling to surrender to Corbett. Prosecutors relied on ballistics and medical evidence as well as a video of the incident taken from a great distance to support that testimony.
"In this country, the government stood up for the human rights of someone who was here illegally," said Grant Woods, former state attorney general who was hired by the Cochise County attorney to handle the case. "I don't think it's possible to discount how difficult it is to bring a case like this in this atmosphere."
But Corbett testified DomÃnguez Rivera walked up to him with a rock and tried to "smash" his skull. The two engaged in a hand-to-hand fight, and as DomÃnguez Rivera reached up with the rock, Corbett's gun fired, the jury was told. Defense attorneys also brought in their own experts to offer alternative takes on the medical and ballistics evidence.
"I'm disappointed the jury did not acquit him," said Sean Chapman, the lead defense attorney. "I think he had hoped for a resolution, but he is prepared to go to trial again." Despite the video and witness testimony that matched ballistics and medical reports, the prosecution case was hardly perfect.
Detectives with the Cochise County Sheriff's Department failed to collect a pair of gloves DomÃnguez Rivera was wearing during the shooting.
In a probable-cause statement, which led to murder charges being filed, detectives had noted that DomÃnguez Rivera had "clean hands." But Chapman and fellow defense attorney Jim Calle argued if the gloves had been taken into evidence, they could have been examined for dirt or debris that might have shown DomÃnguez Rivera had held a rock.
Also, in the hours immediately after the shooting, the three witnesses were never separated from one another. Chapman pointed to that error to open the possibility they may have talked about the shooting and created a matching story.
There were also allegations about the Mexican Consulate tampering with the witnesses. Most notably, Chapman read a transcript of a statement Oscar de la Torre Amezcua, Mexican consular general in Douglas, made to the three witnesses while they were in custody after the shooting.
"It's very important for us, like I told you, that the policeman doesn't get out of this clean," de la Torre said, according to transcripts read at the trial.
Still, prosecutors said their case was solid.
"This wasn't about a pair of gloves," said Cochise County Attorney Ed Rheinheimer.
"This was always a case that tilted on physical evidence, forensic evidence, a surveillance video."
And an immigrant's story.
Relying on the testimony of DomÃnguez Rivera's two brothers, Jorge and René, Woods presented an intensely human portrait of an immigrant's life and death.
DomÃnguez Rivera had come to the United States nearly five years ago, working in a cereal plant in New York.
He went home for the holidays last winter to see his parents, and while there persuaded his brothers and one brother's girlfriend to come back with him.
The four traveled from their home outside Puebla, Mexico. But they never made it more than a mile and a half across the border when, aware of the Border Patrol, they decided to turn back.
About 100 yards from the border, they saw Corbett's vehicle. From there, what should have been a routine stop became a shooting that drew national attention.
And both sides acknowledged that the attention, during a time when immigration is a hot issue, may have been the biggest obstacle to the jury reaching a unanimous decision.
"I think it's hard in this case for people to separate the whole debate over immigration from the individual facts of this case," Chapman said.
The next time around, Woods said, prosecutors will bring new character evidence — police reports — showing Corbett has a propensity for violence. Calle said the facts of the case remain the same. And Chapman said earlier he would like to bring in character evidence about DomÃnguez Rivera.
The retrial is tentatively set for April 22.
On StarNet: Should Border Patrol agent Nicholas Corbett be retried?
Take a poll in the online version of this story at azstarnet.com.
● Contact reporter Josh Brodesky at 807-7789 or jbrodesky@azstarnet.com.
Should Border Patrol agent Nicholas Corbett be retried?
Yes 19 %
No 81 %
Total number of votes 596