Lawyers for Alleged Charlie Kirk Assassin Don’t Want Video Introduced as Evidence
“Several videos of Kirk’s murder circulated widely online minutes after the shooting.”
I bet they don’t want any videos introduced. They’re pretty damning.
FOX News reports:
Tyler Robinson doesn’t want video of Charlie Kirk’s murder introduced as evidence
Lawyers for Tyler Robinson, the 22-year-old accused assassin of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk, have asked a Utah judge to block video of the murder from being introduced as evidence at a hearing scheduled for Feb. 3.
Kirk, a 31-year-old father of two, suffered a fatal gunshot wound to the neck at Utah Valley University in September, when he was participating in a public speaking event sponsored by the campus chapter of Turning Point.
In a memorandum filed Tuesday, Robinson’s attorneys claimed the video is irrelevant to their motion to have the county prosecutor’s office disqualified from handling the case and would violate his right to a fair trial.
Robinson’s lawyers have accused the Utah County Attorney’s Office of having a conflict of interest because the adult child of a deputy prosecutor was present during the assassination. Prosecutors have denied a conflict and said they do not need or plan to rely on the adult child as a witness.
Several videos of Kirk’s murder circulated widely online minutes after the shooting. It was not immediately clear from court filings if the video prosecutors planned to introduce as evidence has been publicly seen before.
The defense described it as a color video taken “only a few feet away from Mr. Kirk.” It includes audio “including unidentified voices, immediately before, during and after the shooting.”
“This is a solid argument,” said Donna Rotunno, a Chicago-based criminal defense attorney and Fox News contributor.
She said prosecutors don’t need to actually play the clip to illustrate that they don’t need to rely on the adult child’s testimony or to argue that they don’t have a conflict.
“The video should not be played if it isn’t needed to prove any material issues in the hearing,” she said. “I do not see how it is needed to determine if the prosecution should be disqualified.”
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Comments
Facially, the argument makes sense. If the only issue to be decided on that day is whether or not a prosecutor has a conflict of interest, it has nothing to do with the actual mechanics of the murder… UNLESS it shows the presence of the family member in question.
I’m not sure I understand why the mere presence of a deputy prosecutor’s child at the scene constitutes a conflict of interest. Especially if the prosecution does not intend to use that child as a witness. And even if the prosecutor’s child took the video and needs to testify about when and where the video was taken, how does that constitute a conflict?
I don’t claim to be a lawyer, so could someone please enlighten me?
I don’t either. I expect the defense is just throwing stuff against the wall in hopes some of it sticks. So a judge is required to rule whether or not it sticks, before everybody can get down to business. It’s just business as usual.
This is just another act in the circus.
Act 1: Raise a silly issue (that a prosecutor should be disqualified for being related to someone who was present but not involved)
Act 2: Raise a silly issue about the evidence to be presented in the original silly issue (We don’t need the video to show whether or not the relative was really there or something)
Act 3: (Upcoming) Complain the the prosecutor isn’t playing fair and also the judge is making biased decisions and should be removed.
The goal of all this has nothing to do with the trial. This is just the lawyers trying to drum up business in future high profile cases by showing that they can turn anything into a circus.
It’s about delaying at this point.
I’m waiting for some lawyer to move that all evidence should be thrown out for being prejudicial…