I have little doubt that this is essentially what occurred.

Opening that door . . . very foolish.

Of course, State has to prove it was criminally foolish beyond a reasonable doubt.

So, he might make it yet.

Remember, conduct is judged to standard of a reasonable and prudent person, in the same or similar circumstances, with the same or similar capabilities, possessing the same or similar specialized knowledge, and possessing the same or similar mental state, at the time.

I wouldn’t be surprised at a hung jury.

–Andrew, @LawSelfDefense

Also, I would be interested to hear a more cohesive time line. We don’t really know how much of the girls episode he slept through. My bet is this all went down in just a few seconds, as would be the usual case.

Frankly, I am betting that he opened the door and a piece of it flew in towards him and spooked him and he stroked the trigger.

As far as Walker, personally, I think he is toast, he didn’t retreat and appears to have had more than ample time to do so.

In this case, I am just not sure and don’t have enough information to give a good opinion.

They did that with the corruption trial of Mayor Kilpatrick.

Unless Wafer managed to provide at least some evidence of the defense elements in a form already admissible into evidence–e.g., during the 911 call–it is indeed hard to see how his burden of production is met without Wafer testifying.

It was much the same in the Michael Dunn case–why he was obliged to take the stand and testify.

–Andrew, @LawSelfDefense

“‘Quite frankly, I don’t know how the defense can put on a case of self-defense without the defendant testifying,’ [Judge] Hathaway said.”

That seems like a peculiar thing for a judge to say.

“I’m curious do you believe Detective Joseph Walker has a valid self defense claim?”

Probably not, given that he shot an unarmed man in a “duty to retreat” state, when it looks like he had plenty of opportunities to retreat.

And FTR, even though Florida *is* a Stand Your Ground state, I don’t think “self defense” is going to fly with Dunn either, given the circumstances of the case.

I’m not that well-informed on the Wafer case, so all I have is my gut instinct as to what I would have done in his place, if I were behind a solid locked door with someone on the other side yelling and pounding away: Get my weapon out, get myself to a safe place in the house, call 911 and let them know what’s going on and keep them on the line, and then if my solid front door is breached tell 911 “I’m in the master bath/closet/basement/whatever, and my front door has just been breached. If s/he gets to me before you all get here, and I’m afraid for my life, I’m sadly going to have to use my weapon.”

Not everything is about race, truly. Stop trying to make it so.

Of course that claim is speculation; we’ve seen no evidence or testimony which would support it. Exactly why McBride decided to attack Wafer’s screen door at that time remains unknown.

I think you mean the Prosecution, but yeah that’s exactly what they’re trying to make of McBride. The comment sections of the Detroit papers’ Web sites are full of that depiction (“knocking gently on the door”) rather than the truth, that she did serious damage to the screen door before Wafer opened the inner door.

IMHO: opening the inner door was tactically stupid – despite the screen door failing, the inner door was still secure. No, take cover and call for help and prepare to repel a home invasion IF they make it through the inner door.

Nobody is going to “suppress” crime information.

But trial exhibits are often excluded on the grounds they are merely graphic representations of what can…and should…come as live testimony.

And go back to Andrew’s oft-stated elements of self-defense. A “crime map” won’t show what someone knew and how that affected their objective and subjective use of deadly force.

Then on the radio today, she was supposedly “…seeking help after an auto accident.” But they don’t mention that she hit a parked car more than *two hours* before the shooting, fled the scene, returned to the scene, and then fled the scene again before police arrived.

No doubt the defense will attempt to suppress all of this before trial so they can portray her as an innocent, knocking gently on the door in hopes of finding a kind soul who would call AAA for them. But when even NPR admits to it…

It’s like saying that a witness can’t have known that this past winter was unusually cold and snowy if he hadn’t seen a chart of the exact date and size of each snowstorm.