Today marked the start of the case in chief of Joseph Walker, the New Jersey police officer charged with first degree murder by the state of Maryland in the road-side shooting of Maryland native Joseph Harvey.
There is no television coverage of the trial itself, and the lawyers have been issued gag orders by the trial judge, so I’m afraid there’s not much of substance to convey.
News reports do disclose that the Walker legal defense is one of self-defense and defense of others, but of course we already knew that.
News coverage so far consists mostly of various New Jersey police organizations expressing “support” for Walker, and members of Harvey’s family observing that Walker could easily have avoided the necessity of deadly force.
Here’s a couple of minutes of TV reporting from a local news channel, WJZ:
–-Andrew, @LawSelfDefense
Andrew F. Branca is an MA lawyer and the author of the seminal book “The Law of Self Defense, 2nd Edition,” available at the Law of Self Defense blog (autographed copies available) and Amazon.com (paperback and Kindle). He holds many state-specific Law of Self Defense Seminars around the country, and produces free online self-defense law educational video- and podcasts at the Law of Self Defense University.
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