Detroit Front Porch Shooting Case: Day 5 Mid-Day Wrap-Up

We’re back for day 5 of the second degree murder trial of Theodore Wafer in the shooting death of Renisha McBride on his front porch in the early morning hours of November 2, 2013. As has been the case since mid-day of day 1, Judge Hathaway still refuses the trial to be live-streamed.

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Yesterday’s court session closed with some shocking revelations about a previously undisclosed $100 found among McBride’s effects, and audio recording of the on-scene police officers speculating amongst each other that McBride may have been working on a prostitute and trying to collect from a “John” when she was shot and killed. (Our afternoon coverage of Day 4 can be seen here.)

This morning saw testimony from five witnesses, among them:

(A copy of the autopsy report is embedded at the bottom of this post.)

There were several highlights of today’s testimony, one in particular which was captured on video by the Detroit Free Press. When asked about the footprint on the air conditioner, which the defense suggests might have been an indication of someone trying to break into the house, Detective Sergeant Gurka suggested drily that perhaps that’s the person whom Wafer should have shot (key dialogue at 0:35):

Another general theme of the morning was defense counsel Cheryl Carpenter beating on Gurka about various alleged deficiencies in how the crime scene was secured, evidence collected and processed, protected, and particularly how what could be some key pieces of evidence were not collected until large numbers of persons had walked over the scene in the course of a vigil for McBride at Wafer’s home.

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With that, let’s get to today’s chronology of tweets and live blog posts:

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Detective Sgt. Stephen Gurka, Dearborn Heights PD, on Cross-Examination

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Monica McBride, Mother of Renisha McBride, Tells of Receipt of $100 Bill


 

Dr. Kilak Kesha, Assistant Wayne County Medical Examiner, Performed Autopsy

 

 

 

 

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As promised, here’s Dr. Kesha’s autopsy report of Renisha McBride:

 

We’ll be back this evening with out end-of-day wrap-up of day 5 of the trial.

–-Andrew, @LawSelfDefense

[NOTE: Images of trial postings from the live blog of the Detroit Free Press have been removed at their request.]

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.

Tags: Renisha McBride

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