Conjecture-
Somehow, Z’s appearance and presence in the neighborhood and his ‘following’ of M was a threat to M’s masculinity. By circling around Z’s car, M was daring Z to step out of the car and most likely inviting Z to get into a verbal or physical altercation. M was asserting his dominance over Z. By not stepping out of the car when M challenged Z in this way, Z was to M confirming his submission to M. At this time, though Z did not know it for certain, M had committed himself to getting rid of Z or physically beating him if Z stayed around and M ever saw him again.
Z, not feeling restrained by M’s show of aggression and dominance, waited until M was gone, then got out of the car to try to find out where he was to answer the police question. Z may have considered himself reasonably safe from M because either M had continued to his destination, or because none of the burglaries involved violence, might have been a non-violent burglar casing his next victim’s home.
Later, M found Z walking around M’s neighborhood (’territory’), apparently having ignored M’s challenge. From M’s perspective Z was ‘guilty’ of ignoring M’s warning to Z and deserving of a beatdown as punishment.
Both M and Z were asserting their dominance. M chose to assert his dominance with unlawful deadly physical force and was lawfully met with deadly force by Z.
Men are programmed to be dominant by thousands of years of evolution. Women are programmed to be submissive by the same evolutionary forces. Ordinarily women might have a difficult time relating to the mindsets of two men meeting at night in the rain and challenging each other for dominance. However, several of the women in this particular jury are married, so they are IMHO more likely to be sympathetic towards Z if the evidence suggests that the scenario as described above is what actually transpired between Z and M on the evening of M’s death. The exception- the unmarried female high level manager- is likely to be fairly intelligent by reason of her occupation, and so may be more likely than average to be able to put herself in Z’s position and reason based on hypothetical scenarios such as the above conjecture. Therefore the jury might favor Z, even though it is all female.
an interesting post. I, (female) am taking it under consideration, and thinking on it overnight.
Women are programmed to be submissive by the same evolutionary forces.
You're not married, are you?