Although we haven’t seen the final jury proposals, I don’t think the judge will choose to include the defense’s proposed “20/20” specification because it’s distracting and redundant. In the Noor jury instructions, the wording was “a reasonable police officer, in the same situation, without the benefit of hindsight.” They actually used the wording “peace officer” instead of police officer. The Noor case did not involve an arrest. But I think for that section about reasonable use of force, we could speculate that Judge Cahill would go with pretty similar wording. So the question is whether a lawful arrest can become a felony assault if force is escalated beyond “what a reasonable police officer, in the same situation, without the benefit of hindsight, would believe to be necessary”, and that’s essentially what this jury is deciding. |
That’s too bad. The jury shouldn’t feel threatened. |
| What's up with the defense's first witness? I don't get how he has helped the defense?? |
| Poor guy can't hear a thing. |
| Oh gosh, this next witness isn't doing so great either. I get that this would make someone super nervous but she's kind of mumbling, over answering questions, and keeps smiling/laughing. |
Trying to show similar arrest behavior and slip in the ingestion of drugs. |
She's also contradicting herself and what she wrote in her report. |
But doesn't that help the argument that the drugs didn't cause his death? He didn't die in any of those other instances. |
| The prosecution went slowly with witnesses building their case, this feels rushed. It was stated that defense might wrap up on Thursday, closing arguments on Monday. |
| Also, Defense was limited by the judge in what he could ask these two witnesses. He probably will weave it in when experts are called. |
i think the difference in nervousness is just from these witness not really wanting to be there/in this spotlight, vs the experts seen in prosecution. these first two are only there because of a prior interaction with the victim and don't have a choice but to be there. a lot of the prosecution experts volunteered to be there. all theyre doing is establishing prior behavior. |
| Oh, man. Shawnda Hill DOES NOT WANT TO BE THERE! |
| Why doesn't Eric Nelson have other lawyers in the courtroom with him? |
He does. There has been a female attorney there all the time that was introduced as an “assistant” but I have seen confirmation she is an attorney. Nelson has handled all the talking in court though so I’m sure that’s the defense teams explanation as to why they labelled the roles that way. They would want the optics of not having a huge team behind them, being like any other average defendant. |
| It’s not being mentioned, but the witness in the car Ms. Hill appeared extremely under the influence of something, so much that the Judge noticed and the Defense and Prosecutor bailed on questioning her. I guess it’s irrelevant since it was not confirmed. |