No.
Posted on 09/24/2019 8:31:35 AM PDT by Presbyterian Reporter
DALLAS - The second day of testimony in the murder trial for former Dallas police officer Amber Guyger started out with audio and video evidence from the night she shot her upstairs neighbor.
Guyger is charged with murder for the death of 26-year-old Botham Jean in September of Jean last year.
She claims the shooting was accidental. She told police she went into Jean’s apartment thinking it was her own and shot him because she thought he was an intruder.
The state’s first witness Tuesday morning was the 911 call taker who received Guyger’s call. Guyger listened and occasionally wiped away tears as her 911 call was played in court.
“Oh my God, I thought it was my apartment. F***!,” she says on the call.
“I thought it was my apartment,” she repeats over and over.
Jurors also saw graphic body camera video from Officer Michael Lee. He was one of the first officers to arrive on the scene the night of the shooting.
The video shows Lee running up four flights of stairs and through hallways to find Guyger in Jean’s apartment.
“I thought it was my apartment,” Gugyer frantically repeats once the officer arrives.
In the video, Lee gives Jean CPR, trying heroic efforts to keep him alive until paramedics arrive.
“Come on, Chief!” he yells repeated.
As the trial began Monday, the state showed the jury explicit text messages and talked about Snapchats Guyger sent to her police partner Martin Rivera that night in September 2018.
She also spent 16 minutes on the phone with him on her way home. She then parked on the wrong floor at the Southside Flats and went into Jean’s apartment instead of her own.
Prosecutors also said Guyger missed several other cues that she was on the wrong floor including a bright red door mat outside Jean’s door and the smell of marijuana in his apartment.
After the shooting, Guyger called 911 and continued sending Rivera messages. One stated, “I need you.” Guyger and Rivera deleted their messages after the shooting, prosecutors said.
Guyger’s said argued what happened that night was just an unfortunate set of circumstances that led to Jean’s untimely death.
“She's thinking. ‘Oh, my God. There's an intruder in my apartment’ and she's face-to-face with him. She's within ten yards of him and he starts approaching her. And she reacts like any police officer would, who has a gun with confronting a burglary suspect,” said Robert Rogers, Gugyer’s defense attorney.
She was originally charged with manslaughter and the DA upped it to murder. I wonder if overcharging her was intentional and a way to get her off. Can't have the police convicted of shooting people now can we?
If it was a “hit”, why did she call and report it to the police?
Conspiracy theories are reassuring. They make us think there’s a reason for things, rather than just random fate. So we want to believe that this was some kind of elaborate plan that could only happen to the victim, rather than bad luck that could happen to any of us.
Calling it in is trying to make it look like an accident. That is her defense. If she just set out to kill him, I doubt she could have engineered a scenario where she gets away, and the killer is never found. Her calling it in is more probable. No one mixes up their neighbor’s smells, colors inside, furniture, etc. I would never mix up my apartment with someone else’s ...that’s a bridge too far.
Not so sure “intent” has anything to do with the act.... May not be premeditated murder, but intentionally shooting someone w/o lawful justification is commonly called murder. Ask any number of armed citizens who failed at the lethal force equation and are in the joint...
Negligent is when a shot is fired without actually intending to fire- as in the case of a struggle for a weapon and grip strength overcomes fine motor control and a trigger is depressed in the effort to retain the weapon, or if a shot at a target is fired and there unbeknownst is a person downrange who is hit.
Guyger drew, pointed/aimed and fired with intent to shoot someone, even if unwittingly ( if you find that really an extenuating and mitigating circumstance).
We shall see.
I wonder what would have happened if I had assaulted that woman, thinking perhaps that she had done something to my wife and stolen her car?
Not from the get out of jail stand point. Lot's of prosecutors overcharge the police. Lesser charges would have led to convictions. This has been a strategy for a while.
No.
Security cameras galore, shot fired=sound, neighbors physical/forensic evidence, cartridge case on the floor, a hair and DNA ( I think most cop guns have a fired case in the file cabinet somewhere and maybe even a bullet for comparison-I would hope so anyway).
Wile it wasn’t a hit or even premediated (unless there is more evidence to be revealed...), it certainly was intentional, she drew, aimed, fired with intention to shoot someone, even if truly mistaken as to where she was.
Will a “reasonable man” exercise show that anyone could do the same/believe the same under those circumstances? Not if I were on the jury.
Even if she claims she was “in fear for her life”, being in the wrong place a the wrong time does not make it better.
She obviously has no qualified immunity to fall back on, that is the tell.
Which does not PROVE that she intended to MURDER Mr. Jean. You do know how our juries and court systems work, right?
She is using the Whoops, I’m in the Wrong Castle Defense.
Let’s just say ‘most’ then.
If anything, as a trained police officer she’d be less likely to make this kind of error and MORE likely to know exactly what she was doing.
The calls and texts between her and her boyfriend show she was NOT tired and exhausted after a 13 hour day. She was on desk duty that day anyway.
She was not tired, but horny. She and her boyfriend had been sexting for hours.
Also interesting is her 911 call where she kept cussing and cussing. And saying over and over that she was gonna get fired.
~Sheesh~
She pulled the trigger with intent to kill. Would a reasonable person have done so?
I think not.
I wonder if the jury can opt to convict on lesser charges?
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She was first charged with Manslaughter. Later - BLM activists and public opinion had the DA bump it up to Murder.
But I did just read today that the jury could convict her on either charge. Murder - or the lesser charge of Manslaughter.
Should be interesting.
I am a licensed professional myself, and in my licensing exams that point is hammered into us. I have professional responsibilities that are in force even when I’m not working — and even when I’m traveling on vacation in a place where I am not licensed to practice.
Not sure if you understand what MURDER charges entail in Texas, but for both First Degree Murder and Murder (which is technically second degree murder, but we do not call it that), “lack of intent” is a oft successfully used defense!
If she did not go into that apartment with the intent to kill Mr. Jean, then that would be a reasonable doubt about her committing MURDER. Manslaughter - absolutely! But MURDER, is going to be very difficult to prove beyond a reasonable doubt, unless there was some OTHER angle...she and Mr. Jean had a past, etc...
“That’s one hell of a price to pay for being stylish.”
Talk about “BUNK!” She was not approaching that door as a COP!
If you are walking into a drug house, then your mindset and your thought processes are DIFFERENT than when you are walking into your own house (or what you think is your own house).
If you are approaching your own house as if it is a threat to your own life, then I question your mental capacity as a “licensed professional!”
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