<p>By the way, I have seen a man die of a heart attack on a public street. Up close and personal. I watched my father die. Unpleasant experiences, and these weren’t gruesome scenes, per se. But it didn’t cause me to stop functioning. EMT’s, police, fire and safety personnel see accidents and gruesome scenes. They are tragic, for sure, and probably traumatic for some. </p>
<p>Healthcare professionals see surgical and gorey scenes frequently. They get up and go to work.</p>
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<p>True. However, some of those character witnesses haven’t seen him for many years since he retired from the police/Busch Gardens head of security jobs. People can change greatly over time. </p>
<p>Also, we don’t always know everything about someone unless he/she’s so open about him/herself that he/she discloses TMI and is an open book to everyone/most people. I very much doubt he was like that considering such behavior is a serious liability in law enforcement/security work or other professions where discretion and ability to maintain confidentiality of information/sources is critical. </p>
<p>Lastly, the way one acts around friends, good colleagues, and friendly neighbors willing to serve as good character witnesses can be very different from the way one acts around strangers. </p>
<p>duplicate</p>
<p>Several of the character witnesses included neighbors and people he saw in church recently where he volunteers, longtime friends who socialize and travel with him and his daughter.</p>
<p>And it would be easier to follow the conversation if you would respond to a post rather than go back and edit yours in response to subsequent posts. Very confusing. </p>
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True we don’t know everything about a person. Yet somehow you seem to know exactly what he would do or say. An opinion is vastly different from a statement presented as fact. [-X </p>
<p>*t</p>
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<p>Then what I stated in the second and third paragraphs would apply. </p>
<p>After all, do you treat everyone…including random strangers in the same friendly manner you’d treat friendly neighbors and/or folks in your house of worship? Do most people? Maybe a few do, but not most. </p>
<p>Also, sometimes people you thought you knew very well can exhibit some surprises which leave even close friends and colleagues stunned. </p>
<p>There was a 7th grade teacher at my Catholic elementary/junior high who was very amiable and seemed like a very upstanding individual for several years. However, toward the end of my elementary school years, everyone in the school were absolutely stunned when several local newspapers reported he was busted in the act of buying cocaine from an undercover cop. Turned out he had been concealing a long serious cocaine addiction. </p>
<p>Your later paragraphs seemed to have emerged after the subsequent posts.
Sorry- not gonna play these games today. </p>
<p>The shooter’s character witnesses can mostly/only speak about about what they know of him from their closer relationships in what are often more comfortable friendly surroundings for him. </p>
<p>That’s very different from speaking about how he is around unfamiliar strangers far from his familiar surroundings, especially those who offend him…whether rightly or wrongly. </p>
<p>On the other hand, the witnesses at the shooting or his previous incidents are more likely to provide germane testimony as they are able to speak to how he behaved/acted in those settings…including the area where the crime took place. </p>
<p>Thus, one cannot take good character witness testimony completely or even mostly at face value. Especially when it may have little/no bearing on this shooting or previous incidents as the ones providing good character testimony are naturally biased in his favor. </p>
<p>Well, um… thats exactly what a character witness is for.
Feel free to get a last word in though I’ve politely asked you not to respond to my posts. There are other things to do today that need attention. </p>
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<p>Yes. And that’s precisely why they need to be taken with some degree of skepticism and weighed against more germane testimony from witnesses who were there or experienced similar agitated overbearing behavior in previous incidents. </p>
<p>It’s no different than taking Chad Oulson’s character witnesses completely at face value. Good character witnesses have a natural bias in favor of whomever they’re testifying on behalf of. </p>
<p>A reason why you’re disputing my impressions of the shooter from witness testimony in those venues by citing his character witnesses at best, has very little bearing on my stating those impressions. </p>
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<p>When one is participating in a discussion in public or on a online forum thread, there’s an implicit agreement others have a right to respond to your points…including those who disagree or don’t use your preferred way of responding(E.g. No speculating!). </p>
<p>I find your request odd considering it is a tactic often used by folks who cannot tolerate disagreement and are trying to suppress it. Sorry, but that is detrimental towards fostering fostering open discourse on a topic of interest. </p>
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<p>Emphasis is mine.</p>
<p>Again, you are stating your opinion/speculation as fact. We have no idea how he would have reacted that day if the victim had responded as above. None of the people mentioned earlier engaged him in the manner the victim did and none of them are dead, either. </p>
<p>Maybe that was the day he was bound and determined to put a cap in someone. Maybe he just snapped. Maybe he just has a “sense of entitlement” bound up in his identity as a former cop. Maybe he has some kind of organic brain problem brewing. We don’t know any of those things. All we can do is speculate, and we all bring in our own personal biases when we do that.</p>
<p>Maybe if there is a trial we will find out more about the shooter which might give insight into his actions.</p>
<p>I still think he’d be better off to make a plea deal, but perhaps the prosecutors feel their case is so solid they don’t need to give him an inch. Time will tell.</p>
<p>Most people on these threads are able to discuss and report their opinions as just that, their opinions, and there are some who conflate hyperbole and complete conjecture with fact. Serves to detract from, not add to, the discussion. </p>
<p>** crossposted with nrdsb4</p>
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<p>Agree here, but considering the witness testimony and evidence as publicized so far, the defense has little leverage vis a vis the prosecution at this point to negotiate a plea deal at this point. Much less a good one the shooter is likely to accept. At this point, it seems the prosecution has all the good cards while the defense is trying to work with what they have. </p>
<p>There’s also pressure for the prosecution to make an example of him due to public outrage over this shooting…especially considering the circumstances. </p>
<p>And I still don’t think, even if this went to a jury, Oulson’s behavior is going to make much of a difference, at least in terms of determining guilt. Think about the Travyon Martin case. Yes, Zimmerman got off, but it was a near thing, and that was a case in which there were no direct witnesses and a LOT more evidence that Zimmerman might reasonably have feared for his life, at least in the moment; it is not in dispute that there had been some physical altercation between the two, which included some pretty heavy hits to Zimmerman. And as I said, a lot of people, including some legal experts, thought it was the wrong call. Even in Florida, you have to have some good reason to escalate a dispute into gun violence.</p>
<p>Here we have a case in which, as of now, the worst that has been said about Oulson’s behavior still falls wildly short of anything that would warrant legitimate fear for one’s life. The fact that Reeves was a cop would, I would think, hurt him here, because one would expect someone with a law enforcement background to be even more capable than the average person of assessing risk.</p>
<p>I do wonder if there is any early onset dementia going on, here. </p>
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<p>True. However, because the standard for determining someone’s guilty in a criminal case is “Beyond all reasonable doubt”, the defense doesn’t have to necessarily prove the shooter was 100% innocent or justified.</p>
<p>They just need to make arguments portraying Chad Oulson’s behavior is such that there may have been some reasonable justification for him taking out his gun and shooting him. </p>
<p>If the defense is able to put Chad Oulson’s behavior on trial effectively enough and/or they happen to luck out with jurors who could relate to the shooter’s agitation/fear as an elderly man…especially those who feel Chad Oulson should have been as deferential as a doormat because he was younger and was committing an offense, however minor…enough self-doubt could be implanted to enable them to vote not guilty. </p>
<p>Considering there is a large population of elderly retirees and/or SYG supporters in the area who may be able to partially/totally relate or even sympathize with what the shooter may have felt in that situation, the above possibility is one the prosecution will need to watch out for in preparing their case. </p>
<p>The defense needs to prove that Reeves was in fear for his life. That’s a big hill to climb with a cellphone toss.</p>
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<p>True, but if the defense team is good, they’re lucky to get enough jurors who could relate/sympathize with the shooter’s perspective, and/or change the focus of the trial so Chad Oulson’s behavior is on trial…not the shooter who killed him and injured his widow, the defense team may actually succeed however long the odds. </p>
<p>I sincerely hope not, but placing victims on trial by scrutinizing and second-guessing their behavior/actions because they weren’t 100% perfect in their responses, etiquette, etc is one favored tactic by defense attorneys…especially if the evidence against their client is pretty damning. </p>
<p>There’s a misunderstand about self-defense law in Florida. I’ve quoted the law in this thread but I don’t see post numbers now so here it is the relevant section:</p>
<p>“A person who is not engaged in an unlawful activity and who is attacked in any other place where he or she has a right to be has no duty to retreat and has the right to stand his or her ground and meet force with force, including deadly force if he or she reasonably believes it is necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm to himself or herself or another or to prevent the commission of a forcible felony.”</p>
<p>In this case, there is doubt about whether an attack was committed because the shooter initiated and renewed the confrontation. I don’t see the shooter getting past that hurdle. As I mentioned in an earlier post, the Zimmerman/Martin case turned legally on Zimmerman’s assertion that Martin attacked him - which couldn’t be disproven by physical evidence. </p>
<p>Second, the shooter has already admitted in court that he believed he was hit with popcorn and maybe a cellphone. (Everyone acknowledges the victim had both in his hands.) There is no indication the victim was armed. The shooter says popcorn and cellphone, so legally he has essentially admitted that he didn’t “meet force with force” but instead met popcorn and cellphone with gunfire. </p>
<p>The absolute best case the shooter can make is that he was afraid the guy would beat on him but that is only available if he is attacked - and the shooter initiated. And even then firing a weapon when hit with popcorn - and the claim of a cellphone - is not “reasonable” when showing the weapon would be more sensible. </p>
<p>I think the shooter has largely convicted himself. And as I’ve noted in another post, the wife’s comments about him over-reacting are admissible, not privileged.</p>
<p>And bluntly, the facts are terrible for the shooter. First, testimony already on record says the victim said he wanted to respond to a text from the babysitter, meaning the victim wasn’t confronting the shooter but was using non-threatening words. Second and something that can’t be forgotten in the context of jury trials, the victim was a white veteran out with his wife to get some time away from their sick child, not a dope smoking black kid with a discipline record wearing a hoodie in the dark. </p>
<p>As I noted in an earlier post, if I were the defense, I’d be looking for a plea because the cost of defense will bankrupt the family and the chances of getting off are really bad.</p>
<p>jym,</p>
<p>I’m looking at the seconds counter on the video. It jumps from 30 to 35 and you can see the picture jump ahead too. I hadn’t seen that the camera was motion activated, but Im’ not sure that what I am seeing is consistent with a motion activation and stoppage. Its probably some innocent explanation, and I’m not sure what could be there, but what’s missing is the five seconds just before the popcorn gets seized and thrust into the shooters face. </p>
<p>I’m guessing that Reeves had the pistol out and ready earlier and probably because when Oulsen stood up Reeves realized that he had antagonized a much taller man, which might not have been apparent earlier in the darkened theater and because of the tiered seating. </p>
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<p>But if you were the prosecutor wouldn’t you be looking for a trial? It might be a TV trial with near certain victory. How could a prosecutor pass that up?</p>