For the love of God Texas, why?

[Lorizael]

Was the guy at least found guilty of soliciting?

[Dr Strangelove]

Imagine if Jack the Ripper appeared in today's Texas? He'd probably get a commendation.

[Lorizael]

We all know Jack the Ripper appears in San Francisco, not Texas.

[dannubis]

Friso is Texas on Weed.

[snoopy369]

I have to admit to confusion here. Why did this go to a jury on this issue? The judge should've ruled on the applicability of Castle, and if he/she allowed it, the Prosecution should've dropped the charges. Unless there is a question of fact regarding the applicability of the Castle law (ie, did she actually attemp to rob him, did he actually shoot her, etc.), this should not have gone to a jury trial.

[Ben Kenobi]

Not if the person shot them in the back while they were running away.

If you invited them into your house for the purpose of solicitation, then no, it doesn't apply whatsoever. Castle only applies if there's actual trespass of some sort. You can't just shoot a guest and invoke it.

Lawfully this woman was a guest into his apartment, and even if she stole from him, that doesn't justify shooting her. There was no trespass.

Whomever was the prosecutor here did a terrible job.

[snoopy369]

As someone with a prosecutor for a parent (and a very good one), I would suggest that errant jury results often are unrelated to prosecutorial competence. Beyond that, the jury would not have been asked to rule on the matter of law (does the Castle doctrine apply here); they would have been told whether it did, or at least what specific facts they would need to find in order to apply it. Perhaps the prosecutor did a poor job of arguing that, but as neither of us are lawyers nor have read the case briefs in this case that would be impossible to ascertain.

[Ben Kenobi]

As someone with a prosecutor for a parent (and a very good one), I would suggest that errant jury results often are unrelated to prosecutorial competence. Beyond that, the jury would not have been asked to rule on the matter of law (does the Castle doctrine apply here); they would have been told whether it did, or at least what specific facts they would need to find in order to apply it. Perhaps the prosecutor did a poor job of arguing that, but as neither of us are lawyers nor have read the case briefs in this case that would be impossible to ascertain.b

I'd be interested to see the court briefs myself. Seems like the defense attorney knew exactly what he was doing by focussing on the Castle Doctrine, and sticking to that argument, despite the fact that it doesn't apply with a guest (for rather obvious reasons). So why didn't the prosecutor argue this? I wonder if he did and it's in the briefs.

[snoopy369]

Again, that would not be a matter for the jury... except perhaps the 'guest' bit, which could be considered a fact for the jury to determine (but I would be surprised if it were).

[Ben Kenobi]

http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/local_news/article/Jury-acquits-escort-shooter-4581027.php

This suggests that the prosecutors argued that since it was an illegal act that legal protections didn't apply.

Matt Lovell and Jessica Schulze were the prosecutors.

http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=207881054&authType=name&authToken=i4Yw&locale=en_US&pvs=pp&pohelp=&trk=ndir_viewmore

There's Lovell's profile. Says he's been Asst. Criminal DA in Bexar since 2005. Right out of school with his JD.

And there's Jessica's.

http://texas-employees.findthedata.org/l/242168/Jessica-Schulze

[Ben Kenobi]

Again, that would not be a matter for the jury... except perhaps the 'guest' bit, which could be considered a fact for the jury to determine (but I would be surprised if it were).

Well, that doesn't seem to be the argument used by the prosecution. If the prosecution doesn't bring it up, then it's not going to be ruled on by the Judge.

[rah]

Yeah, Snoop, you never know about the jury. The last jury I served on, I volunteered to be the foreman, since I was stuck there anyway. The suspect was accused of robbery. He was obviously a scam artist. At one point he claimed he was a bible salesman. We had one older woman on the jury that took that one piece of information and ignored everything else. He must have been a good honest boy because he sold bibles. All of us except her voted guilty. It took us 6 hours to to convince her to switch to guilty, and she only did so under protest. She wouldn't even walk with us back to the sentencing portion. During which they were able to introduce his previous record, which was a rap sheet a mile long. Each crime they listed she sunk further and further into her seat as it became obvious that the young man was not what she thought. Well anyway, the point being, was it was conceivable that she could have held her ground and had the jury ending up hung. It would have had nothing to do with competence of the prosecutor. Just a stubborn old woman.

[loinburger]

Yesterday I watched a documentary on crime scene investigation ("Of Dolls and Murder") where a crime scene investigator said that a jury (who had watched too much CSI:[Enter City Here]) acquitted the murderer because the police had failed to check for fingerprints in the wet grass around the victim.

[Ben Kenobi]

http://www.rc123.com/texas_castle_doctrine.html

There's Texas Castle law:

(3) was not otherwise engaged in criminal activity, other than a Class C misdemeanor that is a violation of a law or ordinance regulating traffic at the time the force was used.

Prostitution falls under this.

(c) A person who has a right to be present at the location where the deadly force is used, who has not provoked the person against whom the deadly force is used, and who is not engaged in criminal activity at the time the deadly force is used is not required to retreat before using deadly force as described by this section.

[snoopy369]

Ben, I don't think any of us disagree with you that it probably oughtn't apply (though who knows if it truly does, technically). The issue is that the jury is not responsible for determining matters of law, only facts as pertain to said matters. The judge must have ruled that the doctrine applied, given certain facts that were up to the jury to determine.

If I had to guess, I'd guess that the woman was not technically considered a prostitute (since she did NOT have sex for money, after all), and thus he was not technically in breach of the law (even though he intended to). I'm more concerned by the use of 1(c); it doesn't seem to me that she was committing any of those crimes, nor could he have reasonably believed such; defrauding him is not equal to robbery in the eyes of the law.