“Every floor is practically identical, and you’re on autopilot.”
Are all the apartments furnished identically?
Are the numbers on the doors identical?
I’m just talking about the interior corridors and the apartment doors. There is usually no natural light, and it might not be very brightly lit if the landlord is cheap.
More importantly, people coming home are usually thinking about something else. They don’t look where they’re going, because they have gotten off the elevator, turned right, and put their key in the fourth door down a thousand times before.
She never stepped into the wrong apartment. She was trying her key in what she though was her lock when a black man opened the door from inside.
So she shot him.
Wouldn’t you? (do I need a sarcasm tag?)
She didn’t walk in. The tried her key in the lock. The poor guy inside opened to see who was there. So she thinks she’s at her door when it suddenly opens and he is there.
Confrontation happened at the door.
My guess is that when she heard “her” door unlocking from the inside, she drew her gun and then it went down. She never saw inside the apartment.