Convenient store stand-your-ground shooter charged

[TheGreenHornet]

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

And the answer to that question is "no".

You base that on your perception of the video....thus like the jury...you are not following the law. The law of self defense in florida is based on the perception of the defendant ...as in whether or not he was in reasonable fear of his life...I have laid out all the reasons regarding why he was or could have been in fear of his life or great bodily injury.

For anyone to logically claim he was not in fear of his life you would need to point out why he could not possibly have been in fear of his life or of great bodily injury.

Your hatred of black people has you saying stupid shit. If that nonsense you are spouting was true, then all anyone would have to say is that they felt threatened. That isn't how the law works. I can take no more of your ignorance. Dismissed.

bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaa another one bites the dust. As has been said when liberals perceive they have lost an argument they always, always resort to playing the race card.....you a waycist, you a waycist LOL

Again...you make it quite clear you have no understanding of the law of self defense in Florida though I explained it to you in a manner that even a 6yr old should be able to understand it.

The key woids being....IN REASONABLE FEAR OF THEIR LIFE or OF GRIEVIOUS BODILY HARM

I laid out all the reasons why it would have been reasonable for Drejka to be in fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

The guy is not stupid....he has a degree in math and physics...... he would have had no reason to pull the trigger if he had not been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

You and all the others on here he want to dispute the fact that he was in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm are the ones that are being un-reasonable and illogical not even to mention with no good understanding of the law. Pathetic but I needed a good laugh....thanx. LOL

5 Reasons That Shouting "Racism" Doesn't Work Anymore

"As has been said when liberals perceive they have lost an argument they always, always resort to playing the race card"

PredFan is not a Liberal. You lose yet another argument.

"The key woids being....IN REASONABLE FEAR OF THEIR LIFE or OF GRIEVIOUS BODILY HARM"

Again.... it's not reasonable to think you face imminent death or great bodily harm from someone walking away from you.

bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa what a idiot. He was not walking away doofus.

He backed up a lil bit stopped and turned slightly sideways.

And....and...and...still within striking distance of his victim and as I have pointed out numerous times already...it has also been shown that very intelligent people have different opinions on this....again in the trial the expert witness on what constitutes retreat, self defense, body language as in the placement of his feet and his posture demonstrates that in fact he was not retreating.

Not even to mention that the mental condition drejka was in makes it perfectly reasonable he did not even notice the movement of his attacker.

He was focused on getting his gun out, raising it to a position to fire(difficult for him because of his injured arm) clicking the safety off, aiming and pulling the trigger all of which took time and time was something he had very little of.

It is obvious none of the posters on here have ever been in such a traumatic situation or otherwise they would have some understanding of the disorientation and stress Drejka was under not even to mention he was dazed and in some degree of shock...all of which makes it very reasonable he did notice the movements of his attacker.

BTW did i say Pred fan is a liberal?...I do not pay that much attention to screen names.

Anyhow that was no argument. At best just an erroneous observation.

Is he the one I said was a p.c. republican? I do recall that....sounded like a liberal....he denied it and then i pointed out if he was not a liberal he must be a p.c. republican.





I

 

[Faun]

And the answer to that question is "no".

You base that on your perception of the video....thus like the jury...you are not following the law. The law of self defense in florida is based on the perception of the defendant ...as in whether or not he was in reasonable fear of his life...I have laid out all the reasons regarding why he was or could have been in fear of his life or great bodily injury.

For anyone to logically claim he was not in fear of his life you would need to point out why he could not possibly have been in fear of his life or of great bodily injury.

Your hatred of black people has you saying stupid shit. If that nonsense you are spouting was true, then all anyone would have to say is that they felt threatened. That isn't how the law works. I can take no more of your ignorance. Dismissed.

bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaa another one bites the dust. As has been said when liberals perceive they have lost an argument they always, always resort to playing the race card.....you a waycist, you a waycist LOL

Again...you make it quite clear you have no understanding of the law of self defense in Florida though I explained it to you in a manner that even a 6yr old should be able to understand it.

The key woids being....IN REASONABLE FEAR OF THEIR LIFE or OF GRIEVIOUS BODILY HARM

I laid out all the reasons why it would have been reasonable for Drejka to be in fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

The guy is not stupid....he has a degree in math and physics...... he would have had no reason to pull the trigger if he had not been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

You and all the others on here he want to dispute the fact that he was in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm are the ones that are being un-reasonable and illogical not even to mention with no good understanding of the law. Pathetic but I needed a good laugh....thanx. LOL

5 Reasons That Shouting "Racism" Doesn't Work Anymore

"As has been said when liberals perceive they have lost an argument they always, always resort to playing the race card"

PredFan is not a Liberal. You lose yet another argument.

"The key woids being....IN REASONABLE FEAR OF THEIR LIFE or OF GRIEVIOUS BODILY HARM"

Again.... it's not reasonable to think you face imminent death or great bodily harm from someone walking away from you.

bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa what a idiot. He was not walking away doofus.

He backed up a lil bit stopped and turned slightly sideways.

And....and...and...still within striking distance of his victim and as I have pointed out numerous times already...it has also been shown that very intelligent people have different opinions on this....again in the trial the expert witness on what constitutes retreat, self defense, body language as in the placement of his feet and his posture demonstrates that in fact he was not retreating.

Not even to mention that the mental condition drejka was in makes it perfectly reasonable he did not even notice the movement of his attacker.

He was focused on getting his gun out, raising it to a position to fire(difficult for him because of his injured arm) clicking the safety off, aiming and pulling the trigger all of which took time and time was something he had very little of.

It is obvious none of the posters on here have ever been in such a traumatic situation or otherwise they would have some understanding of the disorientation and stress Drejka was under not even to mention he was dazed and in some degree of shock...all of which makes it very reasonable he did notice the movements of his attacker.

BTW did i say Pred fan is a liberal?...I do not pay that much attention to screen names.

Anyhow that was no argument. At best just an erroneous observation.

Is he the one I said was a p.c. republican? I do recall that....sounded like a liberal....he denied it and then i pointed out if he was not a liberal he must be a p.c. republican.





I

"bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa what a idiot. He was not walking away doofus."

He's seen on the video backing away from Drejka from the moment he saw Drejka reaching into his pocket. That's the very definition of "walking away."

You can disagree all you want, a jury of his peers decided otherwise. Your only option now is to pound sand.

 

[TheGreenHornet]

Nonsense....you should have heard the expert witness in regards to what actually constitututes retreat. He was still in close proximity to his victim when he was shot...as in within sriking distance. He could have easily rushed his victim again if he had not been shot. Too many have no clue as to what actually constitutes retreat...to retreat means to be in a place where you are no longer a reasonable threat.

The black dude did not actually retreat until he was shot.

In addition you like many others do not have a adequate understanding of the law on self defense.



Anyhow here is something else I think that is extremely unfair to defendants in Florida....the 6 man jury. I was not even aware until relatively recently that this is going on...I think it is highly outrageous to anyone concerned about justice.

It is much easier.....much, much easier for the state to convict someone with a 6 man jury. This needs to be stopped.

In 1970, the U.S. Supreme Court approved the use of a 6-person jury in a Florida criminal case, ruling that neither the language nor the history of the U.S Constitution mandates a 12-person jury. Instead, the Supreme Court, referring to the 12-person jury as a “historical accident,” held that the purpose of a jury is to provide a cross-section of the community, and juries of less than 12 persons in serious felony cases do not violate that purpose or the constitution. Nevertheless, only two states in the U.S. (Florida and Connecticut) allow for 6-person juries for serious felony accusations.

I didn't hear any of the court proceedings so you may have better information than I do.

However, I did see the video. To me it looked like the thug had tried to retreat. I suspect that is what the jury saw and the reason Drejka was found guilty.

By the way, I served on a six man murder trial back in the 1980s. I was the jury foreman. It was Second Degree murder.

I think in Florida for murder the Defendant always has the right to request a 12 man jury. However, it could just be for 1st degree.

I am a strong supporter of the right to carry. I also teach responsible firearm use as a Firearms Instructor and Range Officer. I am a strong supporter of SYG. However, I don't think I would ever use a firearm for somebody pushing me down. I would need to perceive a greater threat to my life.

When I teach a concealed carry class I advise the students to be very careful about drawing a firearm. It will be a life changing experience. Drejka found that out the hard way.

To me Drejka was an asshole that didn't have the common sense to mind his own business. He met another asshole and now one asshole is dead and another asshole will be spending most, if not all, of the rest of his life in a state prison.

Assholes give responsible gun owners a bad name.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

Nonsense....you should have heard the expert witness in regards to what actually constitututes retreat. He was still in close proximity to his victim when he was shot...as in within sriking distance. He could have easily rushed his victim again if he had not been shot. Too many have no clue as to what actually constitutes retreat...to retreat means to be in a place where you are no longer a reasonable threat.

The black dude did not actually retreat until he was shot.

In addition you like many others do not have a adequate understanding of the law on self defense.



Anyhow here is something else I think that is extremely unfair to defendants in Florida....the 6 man jury. I was not even aware until relatively recently that this is going on...I think it is highly outrageous to anyone concerned about justice.

It is much easier.....much, much easier for the state to convict someone with a 6 man jury. This needs to be stopped.

In 1970, the U.S. Supreme Court approved the use of a 6-person jury in a Florida criminal case, ruling that neither the language nor the history of the U.S Constitution mandates a 12-person jury. Instead, the Supreme Court, referring to the 12-person jury as a “historical accident,” held that the purpose of a jury is to provide a cross-section of the community, and juries of less than 12 persons in serious felony cases do not violate that purpose or the constitution. Nevertheless, only two states in the U.S. (Florida and Connecticut) allow for 6-person juries for serious felony accusations.

I didn't hear any of the court proceedings so you may have better information than I do.

However, I did see the video. To me it looked like the thug had tried to retreat. I suspect that is what the jury saw and the reason Drejka was found guilty.

By the way, I served on a six man murder trial back in the 1980s. I was the jury foreman. It was Second Degree murder.

I think in Florida for murder the Defendant always has the right to request a 12 man jury. However, it could just be for 1st degree.

I am a strong supporter of the right to carry. I also teach responsible firearm use as a Firearms Instructor and Range Officer. I am a strong supporter of SYG. However, I don't think I would ever use a firearm for somebody pushing me down. I would need to perceive a greater threat to my life.

When I teach a concealed carry class I advise the students to be very careful about drawing a firearm. It will be a life changing experience. Drejka found that out the hard way.

To me Drejka was an asshole that didn't have the common sense to mind his own business. He met another asshole and now one asshole is dead and another asshole will be spending most, if not all, of the rest of his life in a state prison.

Assholes give responsible gun owners a bad name.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

Nonsense....you should have heard the expert witness in regards to what actually constitututes retreat. He was still in close proximity to his victim when he was shot...as in within sriking distance. He could have easily rushed his victim again if he had not been shot. Too many have no clue as to what actually constitutes retreat...to retreat means to be in a place where you are no longer a reasonable threat.

The black dude did not actually retreat until he was shot.

In addition you like many others do not have a adequate understanding of the law on self defense.



Anyhow here is something else I think that is extremely unfair to defendants in Florida....the 6 man jury. I was not even aware until relatively recently that this is going on...I think it is highly outrageous to anyone concerned about justice.

It is much easier.....much, much easier for the state to convict someone with a 6 man jury. This needs to be stopped.

In 1970, the U.S. Supreme Court approved the use of a 6-person jury in a Florida criminal case, ruling that neither the language nor the history of the U.S Constitution mandates a 12-person jury. Instead, the Supreme Court, referring to the 12-person jury as a “historical accident,” held that the purpose of a jury is to provide a cross-section of the community, and juries of less than 12 persons in serious felony cases do not violate that purpose or the constitution. Nevertheless, only two states in the U.S. (Florida and Connecticut) allow for 6-person juries for serious felony accusations.

I didn't hear any of the court proceedings so you may have better information than I do.

However, I did see the video. To me it looked like the thug had tried to retreat. I suspect that is what the jury saw and the reason Drejka was found guilty.

By the way, I served on a six man murder trial back in the 1980s. I was the jury foreman. It was Second Degree murder.

I think in Florida for murder the Defendant always has the right to request a 12 man jury. However, it could just be for 1st degree.

I am a strong supporter of the right to carry. I also teach responsible firearm use as a Firearms Instructor and Range Officer. I am a strong supporter of SYG. However, I don't think I would ever use a firearm for somebody pushing me down. I would need to perceive a greater threat to my life.

When I teach a concealed carry class I advise the students to be very careful about drawing a firearm. It will be a life changing experience. Drejka found that out the hard way.

To me Drejka was an asshole that didn't have the common sense to mind his own business. He met another asshole and now one asshole is dead and another asshole will be spending most, if not all, of the rest of his life in a state prison.

Assholes give responsible gun owners a bad name.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

Yes, I pointed that out....he was found guilty because of how the jury members perceived the video.

That is not following the law.

I do not think you are comprehending what I have been saying nor do I think you understand the law on self-defense in the state of Florida. Why that is I have no friggin idea...have you ever actually read the Florida Statutes on Self-Defense?

Again and I am getting tired as hell of having to back over a plowed field.

But one more time and I think this is the last time I am going to explain this.........The florida law on self defense says anyone is justified to use lethal force if they have a REASONABLE fear their life is in danger or that they may suffer grievious bodily harm....do you get that?

It says nothing about the defendants judgement....it deals strictly with the defendants state of mind, his perception..........aka..............did the defendant have a REASONABLE fear that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

Of course the jury had the responsibilty of finding him guilty or not guilty...there is no doubt about that. Yet....that does not mean just because they voted to find him guilty....that does not make him guilty.

As you point out....juries are wrong too many times as the cases you mention demonstrates. No doubt there are many innocent people in jail. No doubt innocent people have been executed.

Now I think we agree on that at least.

But then you get off track by bringing up different kinds of assault.....yes Drejka was assaulted but that in and of itself is irrelevant.....again....the critical point to understand is whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life or of great bodily harm as the Florida Law says he must be in order to be justified to use lethal force.

Now, I do not know if you read the part where I laid out all the reasons why Drejka should have been considered to be in REASONABLE fear of his life...did you read any of them? If you read all the reasons I posted ...do you disagree with any of them? I think what we have here is a failure to communicate...who said dat?

Then to further compound your errors you bring up your evaluation of his mental health. Not knowing the man I do not know his mental state....but if he had any record of mental illness I think his lawyers would have brought that up.

I do know he had a degree in math and physics...so he definitely was not mentally retarded....though even people at the genius level can be mentally unstable....but since the possibility of that was not brought up in the trial I think we have to preclude considering that.

Then you go even further adrift when you bring up your belief that Drejka made some very bad choices or decisions...which I would not deny but that has nothing absolutely noting to do with whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life or of grievious bodily injury.

I would not and most pepole I am sure would not bother to tell anyone that they were illegally parked in a handicap spot. I would agree that was not a smart thing to do...as in there are crazies out there lots of them...some of them would you shoot you for cutting them off on the freeway...we hear about stuff like that all the time.

Drejka went into that store all the time and the owner told him after a previous episode on the parking lot that he should not be doing that...it was not worth it. aka....informing folks that they should not be parfking in a handicapped spot unless they were actually handicapped.....what was Drejka's answer....he agreed but said he could not help it...that it was a pet peeve of his because he had a family member that was handicapped.

Now that sounds like he had some sort of obsession that he called his pet peeve. Now I would not deny that is not a mental problem at some level but it is again....irrelevant to whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life.



Then you bring up the judgement thing again and say that his judgement in essence did not make him innocent or guilty.

Again......you may think of it as judgement.....but I think the more correct term is perception....whether or not he had a reasonable belief....again whether or not he had a REASONABLE belief as in perceived that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

That is what the law says.....he must have a Reasonable belief....not that he must have good judgement ....but he must have a REASONABLE belief that his life is in danger or that he may suffer grievious bodily harm.

Now obviously the key woid being REASONABLE.....who decides whether or not he had a reasonable belief?....not him, not you, not me....no one except the jury has that obligation or that duty......and what I am saying is that they--the jury-- failed in their duty to ascertain whether or not he had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer
grievious bodily harm.

The next question being why did they fail? I have spelled it out before....now this of course is my opinion as I was not privy to their deliberations.....I watched the trial as you know.....and in the prosecutors summation.....he kept telling the jury...watch the video, watch the video....now why was he so emphatic that they watch the video...he well knew they would watch the video....he did not have to tell them to watch the video....I am convinced the reason he kept telling them that was to get them to focus so intently on the video that they would forget their primary duty under the law....to ascertain whether or not Drejka had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily injury.

Also it was brought out in the trial that intelligent people after watching the video disagree on whether or not the black guy was retreating....now this concept of retreating has coinfused most of the posters on here. They are absolutely convinced that just because upon seeing the weapon come out that the black guy stopped advancing on Drejka(yes even after he had violently slammed drejka to the ground...he kept advancing obviously intent on doing further damage to Drejka. We have all seen the videos that circulate on the internet of black thugs kicking people to death...and most likely drejka had seen those videos also.

but to get back to the black dude....after he saw the weapon come out....he stopped advancing and took a couple of steps backward and turned to the side....was he trying to retreat?

I do not think so and the defense's expert witness did not think so citing such things as the position of his feet, his stance etc. the guy was very knowledgable about self defense, body language etc. He made a couple of halting backward steps out of reaction to seeing the weapon like one jerks their hand back when they touch a hot stove. He turned slightly to the side to present a smaller target according to the expert and that is just common sense.

Now another thing most posters do not get is that he was still within striking distance...still very close to where his victim was...so close he could have quickly been on top of drejka if he so chose. Thus he was still a threat.

Now as I have also pointed out....drejka being in not the best state of mind....slightly dazed, disoriented, and at least in a mild state of shock was thus not in a state of mind where he would notice or pay any attention to some small movement backwards by the black guy...drejka had one major motivation....one goal....to remove the threat to his life...the black guy.

Thus with difficulty he raised his weapon...had to use his left hand to support the weapon because of his injured right arm and sighted on the center mass of his target...now all of this happened very, very quickly...it was not in slow motion like the video the jury saw. drejka had to make an extremely fast life or death decision...to shoot or not to shoot...at the most he probably had about 2 seconds to make this decision.

Now back to the black guy...the toxicoogy reports clearly showed he had a huge amount of 2 drugs in his body...that is beyond dispute. The states expert witness on the possible effects of these drugs showed that they are capable of making a person very aggressive. So in this state of being under the influence...one cannot predict with any certainty or accuracy what the black guy would have done had he not been shot...he might have run off or he might have decided to rush his victim and he could have done that very,very quickly as the distance between him and his victim has been cited as being approx. 10 to l2 ft. One could cover that distance in a split second.

Also...the black guy had a history of commiting assault...so you take a guy that obviously has a pre-disposition of violence and fill him up with 2 drugs(he had a very high level of the drugs in his system) and you want to predict what he will or will or will not do? Get real.

Thus obviously if drejka had chose not to shoot he would have been gambling with his life. Not something I or any reasonable person would want to do.


Sure it is easy for all these posters (monday morning quarterbacks)to say what they would have done....of course...with hindsight and a slow motion video to enlighten them.

drejka did not have hindsight to guide him nor a slow motion video...he was living and reacting to a threat in real time....and time was of the essence. He had to act quickly if he wanted to do his best to make sure he survived.

Would you gamble with your life? I do not think any reasonable person should or would.

Thus I am convinced drejka had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

Nonsense....you should have heard the expert witness in regards to what actually constitututes retreat. He was still in close proximity to his victim when he was shot...as in within sriking distance. He could have easily rushed his victim again if he had not been shot. Too many have no clue as to what actually constitutes retreat...to retreat means to be in a place where you are no longer a reasonable threat.

The black dude did not actually retreat until he was shot.

In addition you like many others do not have a adequate understanding of the law on self defense.



Anyhow here is something else I think that is extremely unfair to defendants in Florida....the 6 man jury. I was not even aware until relatively recently that this is going on...I think it is highly outrageous to anyone concerned about justice.

It is much easier.....much, much easier for the state to convict someone with a 6 man jury. This needs to be stopped.

In 1970, the U.S. Supreme Court approved the use of a 6-person jury in a Florida criminal case, ruling that neither the language nor the history of the U.S Constitution mandates a 12-person jury. Instead, the Supreme Court, referring to the 12-person jury as a “historical accident,” held that the purpose of a jury is to provide a cross-section of the community, and juries of less than 12 persons in serious felony cases do not violate that purpose or the constitution. Nevertheless, only two states in the U.S. (Florida and Connecticut) allow for 6-person juries for serious felony accusations.

I didn't hear any of the court proceedings so you may have better information than I do.

However, I did see the video. To me it looked like the thug had tried to retreat. I suspect that is what the jury saw and the reason Drejka was found guilty.

By the way, I served on a six man murder trial back in the 1980s. I was the jury foreman. It was Second Degree murder.

I think in Florida for murder the Defendant always has the right to request a 12 man jury. However, it could just be for 1st degree.

I am a strong supporter of the right to carry. I also teach responsible firearm use as a Firearms Instructor and Range Officer. I am a strong supporter of SYG. However, I don't think I would ever use a firearm for somebody pushing me down. I would need to perceive a greater threat to my life.

When I teach a concealed carry class I advise the students to be very careful about drawing a firearm. It will be a life changing experience. Drejka found that out the hard way.

To me Drejka was an asshole that didn't have the common sense to mind his own business. He met another asshole and now one asshole is dead and another asshole will be spending most, if not all, of the rest of his life in a state prison.

Assholes give responsible gun owners a bad name.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

"It says nothing about the defendants judgement....it deals strictly with the defendants state of mind, his perception..........aka..............did the defendant have a REASONABLE fear that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm."

This is the dumbest shit I've read on this thread.

A defendant in such a case has to have a reasonable fear of imminent death or great bodily harm. It's in the hands and hearts of the jury to decide if that fear was reasonable. It's not the jury's job to mindlessly accept a defendant's claim that his fear was reasonable. If that were the case, one could shoot and kill a jaywalker and explain to a jury they should be acquitted because they had a reasonable fear of death or great bodily harm from the person crossing a street illegally.

The jury in this case weighed the evidence and determined Drejka's claim of such fear of imminent death or great bodily harm .... was ... not reasonable.

I have pointed out more than once that it is the jury's obligation and duty by law to determine whether or not the defendant was in reasonable fear of his life and or grievious bodily harm....try and keep up.

Unfortunately, the jury did not consider all the evidence that would indicate Drejka could have been and most likely was in fear of his life and so forth.

What the jury did was to go by their perception that the black guy was retreating. Thus they erroneously concluded Drejka should not have fired....what they should have been doing in order to follow the law would have been to weigh all the reasons that indicated drejka was in fear of his life....instead they focused on their perception when they should have been focusing on Drejkas perception or belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

I have posted all the reasons why he should have been considered in fear of his life. I am not going back over all that. It has been posted and can be seen. The jury did not consider all of these reasons that would support drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life and most likely was.

I will mention one major thing they definitely overlooked...drejas's mental impairment as a result of all the trauma he had experienced. That alone is enough to over-rule the b.s. of the black guy retreating as in drejka due to his mental condition did not notice that the black guy had taken a few steps backward which was irrelevant anyhow....as he was still in striking distance and thus still a threat.....Drejka he had more important things on his mind like what he must do to eliminate the threat to his life.

The jury foreman has come out now and said that the jury's perception that the black guy was retreating was why they voted to convict.

That proves my point...they focused on their perception and not the perception of the defendant when the law on self defense plainly states it is the belief or the perception of the defendant that determines whether or not he can justifiably use lethal force.

The jury was in error and the statement by the jury foreman proves that.

All of this will come out in the appeal process. If the jury had an adequate understanding of the law on self defense they would have not made such a mistake.

 

[Faun]

I didn't hear any of the court proceedings so you may have better information than I do.

However, I did see the video. To me it looked like the thug had tried to retreat. I suspect that is what the jury saw and the reason Drejka was found guilty.

By the way, I served on a six man murder trial back in the 1980s. I was the jury foreman. It was Second Degree murder.

I think in Florida for murder the Defendant always has the right to request a 12 man jury. However, it could just be for 1st degree.

I am a strong supporter of the right to carry. I also teach responsible firearm use as a Firearms Instructor and Range Officer. I am a strong supporter of SYG. However, I don't think I would ever use a firearm for somebody pushing me down. I would need to perceive a greater threat to my life.

When I teach a concealed carry class I advise the students to be very careful about drawing a firearm. It will be a life changing experience. Drejka found that out the hard way.

To me Drejka was an asshole that didn't have the common sense to mind his own business. He met another asshole and now one asshole is dead and another asshole will be spending most, if not all, of the rest of his life in a state prison.

Assholes give responsible gun owners a bad name.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

I didn't hear any of the court proceedings so you may have better information than I do.

However, I did see the video. To me it looked like the thug had tried to retreat. I suspect that is what the jury saw and the reason Drejka was found guilty.

By the way, I served on a six man murder trial back in the 1980s. I was the jury foreman. It was Second Degree murder.

I think in Florida for murder the Defendant always has the right to request a 12 man jury. However, it could just be for 1st degree.

I am a strong supporter of the right to carry. I also teach responsible firearm use as a Firearms Instructor and Range Officer. I am a strong supporter of SYG. However, I don't think I would ever use a firearm for somebody pushing me down. I would need to perceive a greater threat to my life.

When I teach a concealed carry class I advise the students to be very careful about drawing a firearm. It will be a life changing experience. Drejka found that out the hard way.

To me Drejka was an asshole that didn't have the common sense to mind his own business. He met another asshole and now one asshole is dead and another asshole will be spending most, if not all, of the rest of his life in a state prison.

Assholes give responsible gun owners a bad name.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

I didn't hear any of the court proceedings so you may have better information than I do.

However, I did see the video. To me it looked like the thug had tried to retreat. I suspect that is what the jury saw and the reason Drejka was found guilty.

By the way, I served on a six man murder trial back in the 1980s. I was the jury foreman. It was Second Degree murder.

I think in Florida for murder the Defendant always has the right to request a 12 man jury. However, it could just be for 1st degree.

I am a strong supporter of the right to carry. I also teach responsible firearm use as a Firearms Instructor and Range Officer. I am a strong supporter of SYG. However, I don't think I would ever use a firearm for somebody pushing me down. I would need to perceive a greater threat to my life.

When I teach a concealed carry class I advise the students to be very careful about drawing a firearm. It will be a life changing experience. Drejka found that out the hard way.

To me Drejka was an asshole that didn't have the common sense to mind his own business. He met another asshole and now one asshole is dead and another asshole will be spending most, if not all, of the rest of his life in a state prison.

Assholes give responsible gun owners a bad name.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

Yes, I pointed that out....he was found guilty because of how the jury members perceived the video.

That is not following the law.

I do not think you are comprehending what I have been saying nor do I think you understand the law on self-defense in the state of Florida. Why that is I have no friggin idea...have you ever actually read the Florida Statutes on Self-Defense?

Again and I am getting tired as hell of having to back over a plowed field.

But one more time and I think this is the last time I am going to explain this.........The florida law on self defense says anyone is justified to use lethal force if they have a REASONABLE fear their life is in danger or that they may suffer grievious bodily harm....do you get that?

It says nothing about the defendants judgement....it deals strictly with the defendants state of mind, his perception..........aka..............did the defendant have a REASONABLE fear that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

Of course the jury had the responsibilty of finding him guilty or not guilty...there is no doubt about that. Yet....that does not mean just because they voted to find him guilty....that does not make him guilty.

As you point out....juries are wrong too many times as the cases you mention demonstrates. No doubt there are many innocent people in jail. No doubt innocent people have been executed.

Now I think we agree on that at least.

But then you get off track by bringing up different kinds of assault.....yes Drejka was assaulted but that in and of itself is irrelevant.....again....the critical point to understand is whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life or of great bodily harm as the Florida Law says he must be in order to be justified to use lethal force.

Now, I do not know if you read the part where I laid out all the reasons why Drejka should have been considered to be in REASONABLE fear of his life...did you read any of them? If you read all the reasons I posted ...do you disagree with any of them? I think what we have here is a failure to communicate...who said dat?

Then to further compound your errors you bring up your evaluation of his mental health. Not knowing the man I do not know his mental state....but if he had any record of mental illness I think his lawyers would have brought that up.

I do know he had a degree in math and physics...so he definitely was not mentally retarded....though even people at the genius level can be mentally unstable....but since the possibility of that was not brought up in the trial I think we have to preclude considering that.

Then you go even further adrift when you bring up your belief that Drejka made some very bad choices or decisions...which I would not deny but that has nothing absolutely noting to do with whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life or of grievious bodily injury.

I would not and most pepole I am sure would not bother to tell anyone that they were illegally parked in a handicap spot. I would agree that was not a smart thing to do...as in there are crazies out there lots of them...some of them would you shoot you for cutting them off on the freeway...we hear about stuff like that all the time.

Drejka went into that store all the time and the owner told him after a previous episode on the parking lot that he should not be doing that...it was not worth it. aka....informing folks that they should not be parfking in a handicapped spot unless they were actually handicapped.....what was Drejka's answer....he agreed but said he could not help it...that it was a pet peeve of his because he had a family member that was handicapped.

Now that sounds like he had some sort of obsession that he called his pet peeve. Now I would not deny that is not a mental problem at some level but it is again....irrelevant to whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life.



Then you bring up the judgement thing again and say that his judgement in essence did not make him innocent or guilty.

Again......you may think of it as judgement.....but I think the more correct term is perception....whether or not he had a reasonable belief....again whether or not he had a REASONABLE belief as in perceived that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

That is what the law says.....he must have a Reasonable belief....not that he must have good judgement ....but he must have a REASONABLE belief that his life is in danger or that he may suffer grievious bodily harm.

Now obviously the key woid being REASONABLE.....who decides whether or not he had a reasonable belief?....not him, not you, not me....no one except the jury has that obligation or that duty......and what I am saying is that they--the jury-- failed in their duty to ascertain whether or not he had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer
grievious bodily harm.

The next question being why did they fail? I have spelled it out before....now this of course is my opinion as I was not privy to their deliberations.....I watched the trial as you know.....and in the prosecutors summation.....he kept telling the jury...watch the video, watch the video....now why was he so emphatic that they watch the video...he well knew they would watch the video....he did not have to tell them to watch the video....I am convinced the reason he kept telling them that was to get them to focus so intently on the video that they would forget their primary duty under the law....to ascertain whether or not Drejka had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily injury.

Also it was brought out in the trial that intelligent people after watching the video disagree on whether or not the black guy was retreating....now this concept of retreating has coinfused most of the posters on here. They are absolutely convinced that just because upon seeing the weapon come out that the black guy stopped advancing on Drejka(yes even after he had violently slammed drejka to the ground...he kept advancing obviously intent on doing further damage to Drejka. We have all seen the videos that circulate on the internet of black thugs kicking people to death...and most likely drejka had seen those videos also.

but to get back to the black dude....after he saw the weapon come out....he stopped advancing and took a couple of steps backward and turned to the side....was he trying to retreat?

I do not think so and the defense's expert witness did not think so citing such things as the position of his feet, his stance etc. the guy was very knowledgable about self defense, body language etc. He made a couple of halting backward steps out of reaction to seeing the weapon like one jerks their hand back when they touch a hot stove. He turned slightly to the side to present a smaller target according to the expert and that is just common sense.

Now another thing most posters do not get is that he was still within striking distance...still very close to where his victim was...so close he could have quickly been on top of drejka if he so chose. Thus he was still a threat.

Now as I have also pointed out....drejka being in not the best state of mind....slightly dazed, disoriented, and at least in a mild state of shock was thus not in a state of mind where he would notice or pay any attention to some small movement backwards by the black guy...drejka had one major motivation....one goal....to remove the threat to his life...the black guy.

Thus with difficulty he raised his weapon...had to use his left hand to support the weapon because of his injured right arm and sighted on the center mass of his target...now all of this happened very, very quickly...it was not in slow motion like the video the jury saw. drejka had to make an extremely fast life or death decision...to shoot or not to shoot...at the most he probably had about 2 seconds to make this decision.

Now back to the black guy...the toxicoogy reports clearly showed he had a huge amount of 2 drugs in his body...that is beyond dispute. The states expert witness on the possible effects of these drugs showed that they are capable of making a person very aggressive. So in this state of being under the influence...one cannot predict with any certainty or accuracy what the black guy would have done had he not been shot...he might have run off or he might have decided to rush his victim and he could have done that very,very quickly as the distance between him and his victim has been cited as being approx. 10 to l2 ft. One could cover that distance in a split second.

Also...the black guy had a history of commiting assault...so you take a guy that obviously has a pre-disposition of violence and fill him up with 2 drugs(he had a very high level of the drugs in his system) and you want to predict what he will or will or will not do? Get real.

Thus obviously if drejka had chose not to shoot he would have been gambling with his life. Not something I or any reasonable person would want to do.


Sure it is easy for all these posters (monday morning quarterbacks)to say what they would have done....of course...with hindsight and a slow motion video to enlighten them.

drejka did not have hindsight to guide him nor a slow motion video...he was living and reacting to a threat in real time....and time was of the essence. He had to act quickly if he wanted to do his best to make sure he survived.

Would you gamble with your life? I do not think any reasonable person should or would.

Thus I am convinced drejka had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

I didn't hear any of the court proceedings so you may have better information than I do.

However, I did see the video. To me it looked like the thug had tried to retreat. I suspect that is what the jury saw and the reason Drejka was found guilty.

By the way, I served on a six man murder trial back in the 1980s. I was the jury foreman. It was Second Degree murder.

I think in Florida for murder the Defendant always has the right to request a 12 man jury. However, it could just be for 1st degree.

I am a strong supporter of the right to carry. I also teach responsible firearm use as a Firearms Instructor and Range Officer. I am a strong supporter of SYG. However, I don't think I would ever use a firearm for somebody pushing me down. I would need to perceive a greater threat to my life.

When I teach a concealed carry class I advise the students to be very careful about drawing a firearm. It will be a life changing experience. Drejka found that out the hard way.

To me Drejka was an asshole that didn't have the common sense to mind his own business. He met another asshole and now one asshole is dead and another asshole will be spending most, if not all, of the rest of his life in a state prison.

Assholes give responsible gun owners a bad name.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

"It says nothing about the defendants judgement....it deals strictly with the defendants state of mind, his perception..........aka..............did the defendant have a REASONABLE fear that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm."

This is the dumbest shit I've read on this thread.

A defendant in such a case has to have a reasonable fear of imminent death or great bodily harm. It's in the hands and hearts of the jury to decide if that fear was reasonable. It's not the jury's job to mindlessly accept a defendant's claim that his fear was reasonable. If that were the case, one could shoot and kill a jaywalker and explain to a jury they should be acquitted because they had a reasonable fear of death or great bodily harm from the person crossing a street illegally.

The jury in this case weighed the evidence and determined Drejka's claim of such fear of imminent death or great bodily harm .... was ... not reasonable.

I have pointed out more than once that it is the jury's obligation and duty by law to determine whether or not the defendant was in reasonable fear of his life and or grievious bodily harm....try and keep up.

Unfortunately, the jury did not consider all the evidence that would indicate Drejka could have been and most likely was in fear of his life and so forth.

What the jury did was to go by their perception that the black guy was retreating. Thus they erroneously concluded Drejka should not have fired....what they should have been doing in order to follow the law would have been to weigh all the reasons that indicated drejka was in fear of his life....instead they focused on their perception when they should have been focusing on Drejkas perception or belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

I have posted all the reasons why he should have been considered in fear of his life. I am not going back over all that. It has been posted and can be seen. The jury did not consider all of these reasons that would support drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life and most likely was.

I will mention one major thing they definitely overlooked...drejas's mental impairment as a result of all the trauma he had experienced. That alone is enough to over-rule the b.s. of the black guy retreating as in drejka due to his mental condition he did not even notice that because he had more important things on his mind like what he must do to eliminate the threat to his life.

The jury foreman has come out and said now that the jury's perception that the black guy was retreating was why they voted to convict. That proves my point...they focused on their perception and not the perception of the defendant when the law on self defense plainly states it is the belief or the perception of the defendant that determines whether or not he can justifiably use lethal force.

Oh? What evidence did the jury not consider?

 

[TheGreenHornet]

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

Yes, I pointed that out....he was found guilty because of how the jury members perceived the video.

That is not following the law.

I do not think you are comprehending what I have been saying nor do I think you understand the law on self-defense in the state of Florida. Why that is I have no friggin idea...have you ever actually read the Florida Statutes on Self-Defense?

Again and I am getting tired as hell of having to back over a plowed field.

But one more time and I think this is the last time I am going to explain this.........The florida law on self defense says anyone is justified to use lethal force if they have a REASONABLE fear their life is in danger or that they may suffer grievious bodily harm....do you get that?

It says nothing about the defendants judgement....it deals strictly with the defendants state of mind, his perception..........aka..............did the defendant have a REASONABLE fear that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

Of course the jury had the responsibilty of finding him guilty or not guilty...there is no doubt about that. Yet....that does not mean just because they voted to find him guilty....that does not make him guilty.

As you point out....juries are wrong too many times as the cases you mention demonstrates. No doubt there are many innocent people in jail. No doubt innocent people have been executed.

Now I think we agree on that at least.

But then you get off track by bringing up different kinds of assault.....yes Drejka was assaulted but that in and of itself is irrelevant.....again....the critical point to understand is whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life or of great bodily harm as the Florida Law says he must be in order to be justified to use lethal force.

Now, I do not know if you read the part where I laid out all the reasons why Drejka should have been considered to be in REASONABLE fear of his life...did you read any of them? If you read all the reasons I posted ...do you disagree with any of them? I think what we have here is a failure to communicate...who said dat?

Then to further compound your errors you bring up your evaluation of his mental health. Not knowing the man I do not know his mental state....but if he had any record of mental illness I think his lawyers would have brought that up.

I do know he had a degree in math and physics...so he definitely was not mentally retarded....though even people at the genius level can be mentally unstable....but since the possibility of that was not brought up in the trial I think we have to preclude considering that.

Then you go even further adrift when you bring up your belief that Drejka made some very bad choices or decisions...which I would not deny but that has nothing absolutely noting to do with whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life or of grievious bodily injury.

I would not and most pepole I am sure would not bother to tell anyone that they were illegally parked in a handicap spot. I would agree that was not a smart thing to do...as in there are crazies out there lots of them...some of them would you shoot you for cutting them off on the freeway...we hear about stuff like that all the time.

Drejka went into that store all the time and the owner told him after a previous episode on the parking lot that he should not be doing that...it was not worth it. aka....informing folks that they should not be parfking in a handicapped spot unless they were actually handicapped.....what was Drejka's answer....he agreed but said he could not help it...that it was a pet peeve of his because he had a family member that was handicapped.

Now that sounds like he had some sort of obsession that he called his pet peeve. Now I would not deny that is not a mental problem at some level but it is again....irrelevant to whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life.



Then you bring up the judgement thing again and say that his judgement in essence did not make him innocent or guilty.

Again......you may think of it as judgement.....but I think the more correct term is perception....whether or not he had a reasonable belief....again whether or not he had a REASONABLE belief as in perceived that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

That is what the law says.....he must have a Reasonable belief....not that he must have good judgement ....but he must have a REASONABLE belief that his life is in danger or that he may suffer grievious bodily harm.

Now obviously the key woid being REASONABLE.....who decides whether or not he had a reasonable belief?....not him, not you, not me....no one except the jury has that obligation or that duty......and what I am saying is that they--the jury-- failed in their duty to ascertain whether or not he had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer
grievious bodily harm.

The next question being why did they fail? I have spelled it out before....now this of course is my opinion as I was not privy to their deliberations.....I watched the trial as you know.....and in the prosecutors summation.....he kept telling the jury...watch the video, watch the video....now why was he so emphatic that they watch the video...he well knew they would watch the video....he did not have to tell them to watch the video....I am convinced the reason he kept telling them that was to get them to focus so intently on the video that they would forget their primary duty under the law....to ascertain whether or not Drejka had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily injury.

Also it was brought out in the trial that intelligent people after watching the video disagree on whether or not the black guy was retreating....now this concept of retreating has coinfused most of the posters on here. They are absolutely convinced that just because upon seeing the weapon come out that the black guy stopped advancing on Drejka(yes even after he had violently slammed drejka to the ground...he kept advancing obviously intent on doing further damage to Drejka. We have all seen the videos that circulate on the internet of black thugs kicking people to death...and most likely drejka had seen those videos also.

but to get back to the black dude....after he saw the weapon come out....he stopped advancing and took a couple of steps backward and turned to the side....was he trying to retreat?

I do not think so and the defense's expert witness did not think so citing such things as the position of his feet, his stance etc. the guy was very knowledgable about self defense, body language etc. He made a couple of halting backward steps out of reaction to seeing the weapon like one jerks their hand back when they touch a hot stove. He turned slightly to the side to present a smaller target according to the expert and that is just common sense.

Now another thing most posters do not get is that he was still within striking distance...still very close to where his victim was...so close he could have quickly been on top of drejka if he so chose. Thus he was still a threat.

Now as I have also pointed out....drejka being in not the best state of mind....slightly dazed, disoriented, and at least in a mild state of shock was thus not in a state of mind where he would notice or pay any attention to some small movement backwards by the black guy...drejka had one major motivation....one goal....to remove the threat to his life...the black guy.

Thus with difficulty he raised his weapon...had to use his left hand to support the weapon because of his injured right arm and sighted on the center mass of his target...now all of this happened very, very quickly...it was not in slow motion like the video the jury saw. drejka had to make an extremely fast life or death decision...to shoot or not to shoot...at the most he probably had about 2 seconds to make this decision.

Now back to the black guy...the toxicoogy reports clearly showed he had a huge amount of 2 drugs in his body...that is beyond dispute. The states expert witness on the possible effects of these drugs showed that they are capable of making a person very aggressive. So in this state of being under the influence...one cannot predict with any certainty or accuracy what the black guy would have done had he not been shot...he might have run off or he might have decided to rush his victim and he could have done that very,very quickly as the distance between him and his victim has been cited as being approx. 10 to l2 ft. One could cover that distance in a split second.

Also...the black guy had a history of commiting assault...so you take a guy that obviously has a pre-disposition of violence and fill him up with 2 drugs(he had a very high level of the drugs in his system) and you want to predict what he will or will or will not do? Get real.

Thus obviously if drejka had chose not to shoot he would have been gambling with his life. Not something I or any reasonable person would want to do.


Sure it is easy for all these posters (monday morning quarterbacks)to say what they would have done....of course...with hindsight and a slow motion video to enlighten them.

drejka did not have hindsight to guide him nor a slow motion video...he was living and reacting to a threat in real time....and time was of the essence. He had to act quickly if he wanted to do his best to make sure he survived.

Would you gamble with your life? I do not think any reasonable person should or would.

Thus I am convinced drejka had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

"It says nothing about the defendants judgement....it deals strictly with the defendants state of mind, his perception..........aka..............did the defendant have a REASONABLE fear that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm."

This is the dumbest shit I've read on this thread.

A defendant in such a case has to have a reasonable fear of imminent death or great bodily harm. It's in the hands and hearts of the jury to decide if that fear was reasonable. It's not the jury's job to mindlessly accept a defendant's claim that his fear was reasonable. If that were the case, one could shoot and kill a jaywalker and explain to a jury they should be acquitted because they had a reasonable fear of death or great bodily harm from the person crossing a street illegally.

The jury in this case weighed the evidence and determined Drejka's claim of such fear of imminent death or great bodily harm .... was ... not reasonable.

I have pointed out more than once that it is the jury's obligation and duty by law to determine whether or not the defendant was in reasonable fear of his life and or grievious bodily harm....try and keep up.

Unfortunately, the jury did not consider all the evidence that would indicate Drejka could have been and most likely was in fear of his life and so forth.

What the jury did was to go by their perception that the black guy was retreating. Thus they erroneously concluded Drejka should not have fired....what they should have been doing in order to follow the law would have been to weigh all the reasons that indicated drejka was in fear of his life....instead they focused on their perception when they should have been focusing on Drejkas perception or belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

I have posted all the reasons why he should have been considered in fear of his life. I am not going back over all that. It has been posted and can be seen. The jury did not consider all of these reasons that would support drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life and most likely was.

I will mention one major thing they definitely overlooked...drejas's mental impairment as a result of all the trauma he had experienced. That alone is enough to over-rule the b.s. of the black guy retreating as in drejka due to his mental condition he did not even notice that because he had more important things on his mind like what he must do to eliminate the threat to his life.

The jury foreman has come out and said now that the jury's perception that the black guy was retreating was why they voted to convict. That proves my point...they focused on their perception and not the perception of the defendant when the law on self defense plainly states it is the belief or the perception of the defendant that determines whether or not he can justifiably use lethal force.

Oh? What evidence did the jury not consider?

If you had read my posts you would know. I am not going back over all that. It is posted and availabe ...so if you are interested go back and read my posts.

 

[22lcidw]

You base that on your perception of the video....thus like the jury...you are not following the law. The law of self defense in florida is based on the perception of the defendant ...as in whether or not he was in reasonable fear of his life...I have laid out all the reasons regarding why he was or could have been in fear of his life or great bodily injury.

For anyone to logically claim he was not in fear of his life you would need to point out why he could not possibly have been in fear of his life or of great bodily injury.

Your hatred of black people has you saying stupid shit. If that nonsense you are spouting was true, then all anyone would have to say is that they felt threatened. That isn't how the law works. I can take no more of your ignorance. Dismissed.

bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaa another one bites the dust. As has been said when liberals perceive they have lost an argument they always, always resort to playing the race card.....you a waycist, you a waycist LOL

Again...you make it quite clear you have no understanding of the law of self defense in Florida though I explained it to you in a manner that even a 6yr old should be able to understand it.

The key woids being....IN REASONABLE FEAR OF THEIR LIFE or OF GRIEVIOUS BODILY HARM

I laid out all the reasons why it would have been reasonable for Drejka to be in fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

The guy is not stupid....he has a degree in math and physics...... he would have had no reason to pull the trigger if he had not been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

You and all the others on here he want to dispute the fact that he was in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm are the ones that are being un-reasonable and illogical not even to mention with no good understanding of the law. Pathetic but I needed a good laugh....thanx. LOL

5 Reasons That Shouting "Racism" Doesn't Work Anymore

"As has been said when liberals perceive they have lost an argument they always, always resort to playing the race card"

PredFan is not a Liberal. You lose yet another argument.

"The key woids being....IN REASONABLE FEAR OF THEIR LIFE or OF GRIEVIOUS BODILY HARM"

Again.... it's not reasonable to think you face imminent death or great bodily harm from someone walking away from you.

bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa what a idiot. He was not walking away doofus.

He backed up a lil bit stopped and turned slightly sideways.

And....and...and...still within striking distance of his victim and as I have pointed out numerous times already...it has also been shown that very intelligent people have different opinions on this....again in the trial the expert witness on what constitutes retreat, self defense, body language as in the placement of his feet and his posture demonstrates that in fact he was not retreating.

Not even to mention that the mental condition drejka was in makes it perfectly reasonable he did not even notice the movement of his attacker.

He was focused on getting his gun out, raising it to a position to fire(difficult for him because of his injured arm) clicking the safety off, aiming and pulling the trigger all of which took time and time was something he had very little of.

It is obvious none of the posters on here have ever been in such a traumatic situation or otherwise they would have some understanding of the disorientation and stress Drejka was under not even to mention he was dazed and in some degree of shock...all of which makes it very reasonable he did notice the movements of his attacker.

BTW did i say Pred fan is a liberal?...I do not pay that much attention to screen names.

Anyhow that was no argument. At best just an erroneous observation.

Is he the one I said was a p.c. republican? I do recall that....sounded like a liberal....he denied it and then i pointed out if he was not a liberal he must be a p.c. republican.





I

"bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa what a idiot. He was not walking away doofus."

He's seen on the video backing away from Drejka from the moment he saw Drejka reaching into his pocket. That's the very definition of "walking away."

You can disagree all you want, a jury of his peers decided otherwise. Your only option now is to pound sand.

Whatever the jury has decided, that will change as the violence escalates. Self preservation by hair trigger decisions is our future. You wanted this. You asked for it...you got it.....Toyota!

 

[Faun]

Your hatred of black people has you saying stupid shit. If that nonsense you are spouting was true, then all anyone would have to say is that they felt threatened. That isn't how the law works. I can take no more of your ignorance. Dismissed.

bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaa another one bites the dust. As has been said when liberals perceive they have lost an argument they always, always resort to playing the race card.....you a waycist, you a waycist LOL

Again...you make it quite clear you have no understanding of the law of self defense in Florida though I explained it to you in a manner that even a 6yr old should be able to understand it.

The key woids being....IN REASONABLE FEAR OF THEIR LIFE or OF GRIEVIOUS BODILY HARM

I laid out all the reasons why it would have been reasonable for Drejka to be in fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

The guy is not stupid....he has a degree in math and physics...... he would have had no reason to pull the trigger if he had not been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

You and all the others on here he want to dispute the fact that he was in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm are the ones that are being un-reasonable and illogical not even to mention with no good understanding of the law. Pathetic but I needed a good laugh....thanx. LOL

5 Reasons That Shouting "Racism" Doesn't Work Anymore

"As has been said when liberals perceive they have lost an argument they always, always resort to playing the race card"

PredFan is not a Liberal. You lose yet another argument.

"The key woids being....IN REASONABLE FEAR OF THEIR LIFE or OF GRIEVIOUS BODILY HARM"

Again.... it's not reasonable to think you face imminent death or great bodily harm from someone walking away from you.

bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa what a idiot. He was not walking away doofus.

He backed up a lil bit stopped and turned slightly sideways.

And....and...and...still within striking distance of his victim and as I have pointed out numerous times already...it has also been shown that very intelligent people have different opinions on this....again in the trial the expert witness on what constitutes retreat, self defense, body language as in the placement of his feet and his posture demonstrates that in fact he was not retreating.

Not even to mention that the mental condition drejka was in makes it perfectly reasonable he did not even notice the movement of his attacker.

He was focused on getting his gun out, raising it to a position to fire(difficult for him because of his injured arm) clicking the safety off, aiming and pulling the trigger all of which took time and time was something he had very little of.

It is obvious none of the posters on here have ever been in such a traumatic situation or otherwise they would have some understanding of the disorientation and stress Drejka was under not even to mention he was dazed and in some degree of shock...all of which makes it very reasonable he did notice the movements of his attacker.

BTW did i say Pred fan is a liberal?...I do not pay that much attention to screen names.

Anyhow that was no argument. At best just an erroneous observation.

Is he the one I said was a p.c. republican? I do recall that....sounded like a liberal....he denied it and then i pointed out if he was not a liberal he must be a p.c. republican.





I

"bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa what a idiot. He was not walking away doofus."

He's seen on the video backing away from Drejka from the moment he saw Drejka reaching into his pocket. That's the very definition of "walking away."

You can disagree all you want, a jury of his peers decided otherwise. Your only option now is to pound sand.

Whatever the jury has decided, that will change as the violence escalates. Self preservation by hair trigger decisions is our future. You wanted this. You asked for it...you got it.....Toyota!

You almost sound happy about that.

 

[TheGreenHornet]

Your hatred of black people has you saying stupid shit. If that nonsense you are spouting was true, then all anyone would have to say is that they felt threatened. That isn't how the law works. I can take no more of your ignorance. Dismissed.

bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaa another one bites the dust. As has been said when liberals perceive they have lost an argument they always, always resort to playing the race card.....you a waycist, you a waycist LOL

Again...you make it quite clear you have no understanding of the law of self defense in Florida though I explained it to you in a manner that even a 6yr old should be able to understand it.

The key woids being....IN REASONABLE FEAR OF THEIR LIFE or OF GRIEVIOUS BODILY HARM

I laid out all the reasons why it would have been reasonable for Drejka to be in fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

The guy is not stupid....he has a degree in math and physics...... he would have had no reason to pull the trigger if he had not been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

You and all the others on here he want to dispute the fact that he was in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm are the ones that are being un-reasonable and illogical not even to mention with no good understanding of the law. Pathetic but I needed a good laugh....thanx. LOL

5 Reasons That Shouting "Racism" Doesn't Work Anymore

"As has been said when liberals perceive they have lost an argument they always, always resort to playing the race card"

PredFan is not a Liberal. You lose yet another argument.

"The key woids being....IN REASONABLE FEAR OF THEIR LIFE or OF GRIEVIOUS BODILY HARM"

Again.... it's not reasonable to think you face imminent death or great bodily harm from someone walking away from you.

bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa what a idiot. He was not walking away doofus.

He backed up a lil bit stopped and turned slightly sideways.

And....and...and...still within striking distance of his victim and as I have pointed out numerous times already...it has also been shown that very intelligent people have different opinions on this....again in the trial the expert witness on what constitutes retreat, self defense, body language as in the placement of his feet and his posture demonstrates that in fact he was not retreating.

Not even to mention that the mental condition drejka was in makes it perfectly reasonable he did not even notice the movement of his attacker.

He was focused on getting his gun out, raising it to a position to fire(difficult for him because of his injured arm) clicking the safety off, aiming and pulling the trigger all of which took time and time was something he had very little of.

It is obvious none of the posters on here have ever been in such a traumatic situation or otherwise they would have some understanding of the disorientation and stress Drejka was under not even to mention he was dazed and in some degree of shock...all of which makes it very reasonable he did notice the movements of his attacker.

BTW did i say Pred fan is a liberal?...I do not pay that much attention to screen names.

Anyhow that was no argument. At best just an erroneous observation.

Is he the one I said was a p.c. republican? I do recall that....sounded like a liberal....he denied it and then i pointed out if he was not a liberal he must be a p.c. republican.





I

"bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa what a idiot. He was not walking away doofus."

He's seen on the video backing away from Drejka from the moment he saw Drejka reaching into his pocket. That's the very definition of "walking away."

You can disagree all you want, a jury of his peers decided otherwise. Your only option now is to pound sand.

Whatever the jury has decided, that will change as the violence escalates. Self preservation by hair trigger decisions is our future. You wanted this. You asked for it...you got it.....Toyota!

hehheh anyone care to translate that...I do not speak japanese. bwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

 

[Marion Morrison]

Admiral's running his mouth about things he doesn't know.

See Pinellas County sheriff's active service calls

Did you intend to prove yourself wrong? Not a single service call is in Clearwater.

Introduce yourself to the other members of the self-inflicted racist dumbass club!

I would, but I am not a member!

Right now..give it time..

Here's one.

CAD Event Details

LOLOLOL

You dumbfucking moron, that's the Putnam County Sheriff's Office, not the Pinellas County Sheriff's Office; and that address is in Satsuma, in Putnam County.

105 Clearwater Road, Satsuma, FL

Yeah, Putnam is a long ways from Pinellas, oops.
That doesn't change what I've experienced over the years, ******.

One day we played the little brothers football right behind the surfside.

There was the kickoff, and I blew past all defenders and stuck the holy crap out of the poor kid that caught the ball. They made 0 yards on return. Aannnnd I was worried about his health for around 10 minutes.

We won, too. I do remember huddling and gasping for breath, though.

The lil bros were around 21, we were pushing 26-ish around then.

 

[Faun]

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

Yes, I pointed that out....he was found guilty because of how the jury members perceived the video.

That is not following the law.

I do not think you are comprehending what I have been saying nor do I think you understand the law on self-defense in the state of Florida. Why that is I have no friggin idea...have you ever actually read the Florida Statutes on Self-Defense?

Again and I am getting tired as hell of having to back over a plowed field.

But one more time and I think this is the last time I am going to explain this.........The florida law on self defense says anyone is justified to use lethal force if they have a REASONABLE fear their life is in danger or that they may suffer grievious bodily harm....do you get that?

It says nothing about the defendants judgement....it deals strictly with the defendants state of mind, his perception..........aka..............did the defendant have a REASONABLE fear that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

Of course the jury had the responsibilty of finding him guilty or not guilty...there is no doubt about that. Yet....that does not mean just because they voted to find him guilty....that does not make him guilty.

As you point out....juries are wrong too many times as the cases you mention demonstrates. No doubt there are many innocent people in jail. No doubt innocent people have been executed.

Now I think we agree on that at least.

But then you get off track by bringing up different kinds of assault.....yes Drejka was assaulted but that in and of itself is irrelevant.....again....the critical point to understand is whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life or of great bodily harm as the Florida Law says he must be in order to be justified to use lethal force.

Now, I do not know if you read the part where I laid out all the reasons why Drejka should have been considered to be in REASONABLE fear of his life...did you read any of them? If you read all the reasons I posted ...do you disagree with any of them? I think what we have here is a failure to communicate...who said dat?

Then to further compound your errors you bring up your evaluation of his mental health. Not knowing the man I do not know his mental state....but if he had any record of mental illness I think his lawyers would have brought that up.

I do know he had a degree in math and physics...so he definitely was not mentally retarded....though even people at the genius level can be mentally unstable....but since the possibility of that was not brought up in the trial I think we have to preclude considering that.

Then you go even further adrift when you bring up your belief that Drejka made some very bad choices or decisions...which I would not deny but that has nothing absolutely noting to do with whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life or of grievious bodily injury.

I would not and most pepole I am sure would not bother to tell anyone that they were illegally parked in a handicap spot. I would agree that was not a smart thing to do...as in there are crazies out there lots of them...some of them would you shoot you for cutting them off on the freeway...we hear about stuff like that all the time.

Drejka went into that store all the time and the owner told him after a previous episode on the parking lot that he should not be doing that...it was not worth it. aka....informing folks that they should not be parfking in a handicapped spot unless they were actually handicapped.....what was Drejka's answer....he agreed but said he could not help it...that it was a pet peeve of his because he had a family member that was handicapped.

Now that sounds like he had some sort of obsession that he called his pet peeve. Now I would not deny that is not a mental problem at some level but it is again....irrelevant to whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life.



Then you bring up the judgement thing again and say that his judgement in essence did not make him innocent or guilty.

Again......you may think of it as judgement.....but I think the more correct term is perception....whether or not he had a reasonable belief....again whether or not he had a REASONABLE belief as in perceived that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

That is what the law says.....he must have a Reasonable belief....not that he must have good judgement ....but he must have a REASONABLE belief that his life is in danger or that he may suffer grievious bodily harm.

Now obviously the key woid being REASONABLE.....who decides whether or not he had a reasonable belief?....not him, not you, not me....no one except the jury has that obligation or that duty......and what I am saying is that they--the jury-- failed in their duty to ascertain whether or not he had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer
grievious bodily harm.

The next question being why did they fail? I have spelled it out before....now this of course is my opinion as I was not privy to their deliberations.....I watched the trial as you know.....and in the prosecutors summation.....he kept telling the jury...watch the video, watch the video....now why was he so emphatic that they watch the video...he well knew they would watch the video....he did not have to tell them to watch the video....I am convinced the reason he kept telling them that was to get them to focus so intently on the video that they would forget their primary duty under the law....to ascertain whether or not Drejka had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily injury.

Also it was brought out in the trial that intelligent people after watching the video disagree on whether or not the black guy was retreating....now this concept of retreating has coinfused most of the posters on here. They are absolutely convinced that just because upon seeing the weapon come out that the black guy stopped advancing on Drejka(yes even after he had violently slammed drejka to the ground...he kept advancing obviously intent on doing further damage to Drejka. We have all seen the videos that circulate on the internet of black thugs kicking people to death...and most likely drejka had seen those videos also.

but to get back to the black dude....after he saw the weapon come out....he stopped advancing and took a couple of steps backward and turned to the side....was he trying to retreat?

I do not think so and the defense's expert witness did not think so citing such things as the position of his feet, his stance etc. the guy was very knowledgable about self defense, body language etc. He made a couple of halting backward steps out of reaction to seeing the weapon like one jerks their hand back when they touch a hot stove. He turned slightly to the side to present a smaller target according to the expert and that is just common sense.

Now another thing most posters do not get is that he was still within striking distance...still very close to where his victim was...so close he could have quickly been on top of drejka if he so chose. Thus he was still a threat.

Now as I have also pointed out....drejka being in not the best state of mind....slightly dazed, disoriented, and at least in a mild state of shock was thus not in a state of mind where he would notice or pay any attention to some small movement backwards by the black guy...drejka had one major motivation....one goal....to remove the threat to his life...the black guy.

Thus with difficulty he raised his weapon...had to use his left hand to support the weapon because of his injured right arm and sighted on the center mass of his target...now all of this happened very, very quickly...it was not in slow motion like the video the jury saw. drejka had to make an extremely fast life or death decision...to shoot or not to shoot...at the most he probably had about 2 seconds to make this decision.

Now back to the black guy...the toxicoogy reports clearly showed he had a huge amount of 2 drugs in his body...that is beyond dispute. The states expert witness on the possible effects of these drugs showed that they are capable of making a person very aggressive. So in this state of being under the influence...one cannot predict with any certainty or accuracy what the black guy would have done had he not been shot...he might have run off or he might have decided to rush his victim and he could have done that very,very quickly as the distance between him and his victim has been cited as being approx. 10 to l2 ft. One could cover that distance in a split second.

Also...the black guy had a history of commiting assault...so you take a guy that obviously has a pre-disposition of violence and fill him up with 2 drugs(he had a very high level of the drugs in his system) and you want to predict what he will or will or will not do? Get real.

Thus obviously if drejka had chose not to shoot he would have been gambling with his life. Not something I or any reasonable person would want to do.


Sure it is easy for all these posters (monday morning quarterbacks)to say what they would have done....of course...with hindsight and a slow motion video to enlighten them.

drejka did not have hindsight to guide him nor a slow motion video...he was living and reacting to a threat in real time....and time was of the essence. He had to act quickly if he wanted to do his best to make sure he survived.

Would you gamble with your life? I do not think any reasonable person should or would.

Thus I am convinced drejka had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

"It says nothing about the defendants judgement....it deals strictly with the defendants state of mind, his perception..........aka..............did the defendant have a REASONABLE fear that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm."

This is the dumbest shit I've read on this thread.

A defendant in such a case has to have a reasonable fear of imminent death or great bodily harm. It's in the hands and hearts of the jury to decide if that fear was reasonable. It's not the jury's job to mindlessly accept a defendant's claim that his fear was reasonable. If that were the case, one could shoot and kill a jaywalker and explain to a jury they should be acquitted because they had a reasonable fear of death or great bodily harm from the person crossing a street illegally.

The jury in this case weighed the evidence and determined Drejka's claim of such fear of imminent death or great bodily harm .... was ... not reasonable.

I have pointed out more than once that it is the jury's obligation and duty by law to determine whether or not the defendant was in reasonable fear of his life and or grievious bodily harm....try and keep up.

Unfortunately, the jury did not consider all the evidence that would indicate Drejka could have been and most likely was in fear of his life and so forth.

What the jury did was to go by their perception that the black guy was retreating. Thus they erroneously concluded Drejka should not have fired....what they should have been doing in order to follow the law would have been to weigh all the reasons that indicated drejka was in fear of his life....instead they focused on their perception when they should have been focusing on Drejkas perception or belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

I have posted all the reasons why he should have been considered in fear of his life. I am not going back over all that. It has been posted and can be seen. The jury did not consider all of these reasons that would support drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life and most likely was.

I will mention one major thing they definitely overlooked...drejas's mental impairment as a result of all the trauma he had experienced. That alone is enough to over-rule the b.s. of the black guy retreating as in drejka due to his mental condition he did not even notice that because he had more important things on his mind like what he must do to eliminate the threat to his life.

The jury foreman has come out and said now that the jury's perception that the black guy was retreating was why they voted to convict. That proves my point...they focused on their perception and not the perception of the defendant when the law on self defense plainly states it is the belief or the perception of the defendant that determines whether or not he can justifiably use lethal force.

Oh? What evidence did the jury not consider?

If you had read my posts you would know. I am not going back over all that. It is posted and availabe ...so if you are interested go back and read my posts.

Nothing you've posted demonstrates the jury got this one wrong.not even some of the bullshit you posted to prop up your failed position. Your claim that Drejka didn't see McGlockton retreat is proven bullshit according to the video. Your claim that Drejka struggled with his firearm is proven bullshit according to the video. Your claim that McGlockton wasn't retreating is proven bullshit according to the video. Your claim that McGlockton was within striking distance isn't bullshit, but it becomes bullshit with a gun pointed at him. Your claim that only Jacobs was belligerent is not supported by the evidence.

Meanwhile, you've failed to show Drejka's life was in imminent danger. You failed to show Drejka made any effort to escape the situation. And you failed to explain what you meant when you said Jacobs "axed him"...

 

[Marion Morrison]

Yes, I pointed that out....he was found guilty because of how the jury members perceived the video.

That is not following the law.

I do not think you are comprehending what I have been saying nor do I think you understand the law on self-defense in the state of Florida. Why that is I have no friggin idea...have you ever actually read the Florida Statutes on Self-Defense?

Again and I am getting tired as hell of having to back over a plowed field.

But one more time and I think this is the last time I am going to explain this.........The florida law on self defense says anyone is justified to use lethal force if they have a REASONABLE fear their life is in danger or that they may suffer grievious bodily harm....do you get that?

It says nothing about the defendants judgement....it deals strictly with the defendants state of mind, his perception..........aka..............did the defendant have a REASONABLE fear that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

Of course the jury had the responsibilty of finding him guilty or not guilty...there is no doubt about that. Yet....that does not mean just because they voted to find him guilty....that does not make him guilty.

As you point out....juries are wrong too many times as the cases you mention demonstrates. No doubt there are many innocent people in jail. No doubt innocent people have been executed.

Now I think we agree on that at least.

But then you get off track by bringing up different kinds of assault.....yes Drejka was assaulted but that in and of itself is irrelevant.....again....the critical point to understand is whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life or of great bodily harm as the Florida Law says he must be in order to be justified to use lethal force.

Now, I do not know if you read the part where I laid out all the reasons why Drejka should have been considered to be in REASONABLE fear of his life...did you read any of them? If you read all the reasons I posted ...do you disagree with any of them? I think what we have here is a failure to communicate...who said dat?

Then to further compound your errors you bring up your evaluation of his mental health. Not knowing the man I do not know his mental state....but if he had any record of mental illness I think his lawyers would have brought that up.

I do know he had a degree in math and physics...so he definitely was not mentally retarded....though even people at the genius level can be mentally unstable....but since the possibility of that was not brought up in the trial I think we have to preclude considering that.

Then you go even further adrift when you bring up your belief that Drejka made some very bad choices or decisions...which I would not deny but that has nothing absolutely noting to do with whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life or of grievious bodily injury.

I would not and most pepole I am sure would not bother to tell anyone that they were illegally parked in a handicap spot. I would agree that was not a smart thing to do...as in there are crazies out there lots of them...some of them would you shoot you for cutting them off on the freeway...we hear about stuff like that all the time.

Drejka went into that store all the time and the owner told him after a previous episode on the parking lot that he should not be doing that...it was not worth it. aka....informing folks that they should not be parfking in a handicapped spot unless they were actually handicapped.....what was Drejka's answer....he agreed but said he could not help it...that it was a pet peeve of his because he had a family member that was handicapped.

Now that sounds like he had some sort of obsession that he called his pet peeve. Now I would not deny that is not a mental problem at some level but it is again....irrelevant to whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life.



Then you bring up the judgement thing again and say that his judgement in essence did not make him innocent or guilty.

Again......you may think of it as judgement.....but I think the more correct term is perception....whether or not he had a reasonable belief....again whether or not he had a REASONABLE belief as in perceived that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

That is what the law says.....he must have a Reasonable belief....not that he must have good judgement ....but he must have a REASONABLE belief that his life is in danger or that he may suffer grievious bodily harm.

Now obviously the key woid being REASONABLE.....who decides whether or not he had a reasonable belief?....not him, not you, not me....no one except the jury has that obligation or that duty......and what I am saying is that they--the jury-- failed in their duty to ascertain whether or not he had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer
grievious bodily harm.

The next question being why did they fail? I have spelled it out before....now this of course is my opinion as I was not privy to their deliberations.....I watched the trial as you know.....and in the prosecutors summation.....he kept telling the jury...watch the video, watch the video....now why was he so emphatic that they watch the video...he well knew they would watch the video....he did not have to tell them to watch the video....I am convinced the reason he kept telling them that was to get them to focus so intently on the video that they would forget their primary duty under the law....to ascertain whether or not Drejka had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily injury.

Also it was brought out in the trial that intelligent people after watching the video disagree on whether or not the black guy was retreating....now this concept of retreating has coinfused most of the posters on here. They are absolutely convinced that just because upon seeing the weapon come out that the black guy stopped advancing on Drejka(yes even after he had violently slammed drejka to the ground...he kept advancing obviously intent on doing further damage to Drejka. We have all seen the videos that circulate on the internet of black thugs kicking people to death...and most likely drejka had seen those videos also.

but to get back to the black dude....after he saw the weapon come out....he stopped advancing and took a couple of steps backward and turned to the side....was he trying to retreat?

I do not think so and the defense's expert witness did not think so citing such things as the position of his feet, his stance etc. the guy was very knowledgable about self defense, body language etc. He made a couple of halting backward steps out of reaction to seeing the weapon like one jerks their hand back when they touch a hot stove. He turned slightly to the side to present a smaller target according to the expert and that is just common sense.

Now another thing most posters do not get is that he was still within striking distance...still very close to where his victim was...so close he could have quickly been on top of drejka if he so chose. Thus he was still a threat.

Now as I have also pointed out....drejka being in not the best state of mind....slightly dazed, disoriented, and at least in a mild state of shock was thus not in a state of mind where he would notice or pay any attention to some small movement backwards by the black guy...drejka had one major motivation....one goal....to remove the threat to his life...the black guy.

Thus with difficulty he raised his weapon...had to use his left hand to support the weapon because of his injured right arm and sighted on the center mass of his target...now all of this happened very, very quickly...it was not in slow motion like the video the jury saw. drejka had to make an extremely fast life or death decision...to shoot or not to shoot...at the most he probably had about 2 seconds to make this decision.

Now back to the black guy...the toxicoogy reports clearly showed he had a huge amount of 2 drugs in his body...that is beyond dispute. The states expert witness on the possible effects of these drugs showed that they are capable of making a person very aggressive. So in this state of being under the influence...one cannot predict with any certainty or accuracy what the black guy would have done had he not been shot...he might have run off or he might have decided to rush his victim and he could have done that very,very quickly as the distance between him and his victim has been cited as being approx. 10 to l2 ft. One could cover that distance in a split second.

Also...the black guy had a history of commiting assault...so you take a guy that obviously has a pre-disposition of violence and fill him up with 2 drugs(he had a very high level of the drugs in his system) and you want to predict what he will or will or will not do? Get real.

Thus obviously if drejka had chose not to shoot he would have been gambling with his life. Not something I or any reasonable person would want to do.


Sure it is easy for all these posters (monday morning quarterbacks)to say what they would have done....of course...with hindsight and a slow motion video to enlighten them.

drejka did not have hindsight to guide him nor a slow motion video...he was living and reacting to a threat in real time....and time was of the essence. He had to act quickly if he wanted to do his best to make sure he survived.

Would you gamble with your life? I do not think any reasonable person should or would.

Thus I am convinced drejka had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

"It says nothing about the defendants judgement....it deals strictly with the defendants state of mind, his perception..........aka..............did the defendant have a REASONABLE fear that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm."

This is the dumbest shit I've read on this thread.

A defendant in such a case has to have a reasonable fear of imminent death or great bodily harm. It's in the hands and hearts of the jury to decide if that fear was reasonable. It's not the jury's job to mindlessly accept a defendant's claim that his fear was reasonable. If that were the case, one could shoot and kill a jaywalker and explain to a jury they should be acquitted because they had a reasonable fear of death or great bodily harm from the person crossing a street illegally.

The jury in this case weighed the evidence and determined Drejka's claim of such fear of imminent death or great bodily harm .... was ... not reasonable.

I have pointed out more than once that it is the jury's obligation and duty by law to determine whether or not the defendant was in reasonable fear of his life and or grievious bodily harm....try and keep up.

Unfortunately, the jury did not consider all the evidence that would indicate Drejka could have been and most likely was in fear of his life and so forth.

What the jury did was to go by their perception that the black guy was retreating. Thus they erroneously concluded Drejka should not have fired....what they should have been doing in order to follow the law would have been to weigh all the reasons that indicated drejka was in fear of his life....instead they focused on their perception when they should have been focusing on Drejkas perception or belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

I have posted all the reasons why he should have been considered in fear of his life. I am not going back over all that. It has been posted and can be seen. The jury did not consider all of these reasons that would support drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life and most likely was.

I will mention one major thing they definitely overlooked...drejas's mental impairment as a result of all the trauma he had experienced. That alone is enough to over-rule the b.s. of the black guy retreating as in drejka due to his mental condition he did not even notice that because he had more important things on his mind like what he must do to eliminate the threat to his life.

The jury foreman has come out and said now that the jury's perception that the black guy was retreating was why they voted to convict. That proves my point...they focused on their perception and not the perception of the defendant when the law on self defense plainly states it is the belief or the perception of the defendant that determines whether or not he can justifiably use lethal force.

Oh? What evidence did the jury not consider?

If you had read my posts you would know. I am not going back over all that. It is posted and availabe ...so if you are interested go back and read my posts.

Nothing you've posted demonstrates the jury got this one wrong.not even some of the bullshit you posted to prop up your failed position. Your claim that Drejka didn't see McGlockton retreat is proven bullshit according to the video. Your claim that Drejka struggled with his firearm is proven bullshit according to the video. Your claim that McGlockton wasn't retreating is proven bullshit according to the video. Your claim that McGlockton was within striking distance isn't bullshit, but it becomes bullshit with a gun pointed at him. Your claim that only Jacobs was belligerent is not supported by the evidence.

Meanwhile, you've failed to show Drejka's life was in imminent danger. You failed to show Drejka made any effort to escape the situation. And you failed to explain what you meant when you said Jacobs "axed him"...

Drejka was in the wrong, next!

 

[Faun]

Oh, for ****'s sake, grow a pair. When someone announces they're a racist by posting, "another dead magic Negro.. Who cares," they should expect to be called a racist. And calling that racist a racist didn't shut down the argument -- that poster didn't have an argument to begin with. He's just a racist troll who couldn't resist expressing his racism. Meanwhile, the argument goes on around him anyway.

Oh, and by the way, the argument is actually going our way... the shooter was convicted.

Well, of course everyone knows the shooter was convicted but the controversy is whether or not the jury got it right.

And the ball game is not over until the appeal is dealt with.

This is a much more important case than most realize because if the jury verdict is allowed to stand it will fundamentally change the law on self defense as has been pointed out previously.

Well you're not exactly winning an argument while our side of the argument prevailed in court.

And no, it doesn't change self-defense laws. Self defense laws were never intended to allow people to murder someone in retreat.

You lack of a good analytical ability interferes with your perception of the reality of this case. Aka...what and how it all went down. Obviously you have never been under attack as well.

First of all--the law on self defense has always centered on the perception of the victim aka whether or not the victim has a reasonable belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

The key element in this case is of course whether or not the drugged up black thug was actually retreating.

The next thing to consider is what constitutes retreating?

Now as we have seen the video was slowed down to the slow motion mode for the jurors and in slow motion mode the following can be seen: first of all of course the black thug high on drugs as proved in court by toxicology reports rushes out of the store after a white guy comes in and says there is a problem on the parking lot.

Now what is the first thing seen by the thug on exiting the store---a white dude arguing with his g/f. The black guy does not ask any questions, does not try to find out what the argument is about as would any reasonable person...he just rushes up and violently assaults the white guy.

And then.....this is critical........and then...he continues to advance towards the white guy he has knocked to the ground. Why did he continue to advance? Obviously he meant to do more harm to his victim i.e. kick him in the head or whatever....we have all seen the videos of scenarios like this...some black thug or a gang of black thugs beating some hapless victim to death...these videos are all over the internet...and it is reasonable to conclude the Drejka had seen such vidieos.

It is highly likely that after getting knocked to the ground that his first thought was that his assailant would do to him like what he had seen happen to other victims in his situation...on the ground and highly vulnurable to further attacks by his assailant.

The video then shows Drejka manage with some difficulty to get his weapon out as his right arm had been injured in the assault. Upon sight of the weapon the black guy stops his advance and in slow motion you can see he takes a couple of halting backward steps whilst still facing his victim and then turning slightly in order to present a smaller target.

Now the question arises was he actually 'retreating' and that is the basis on which the prosecution was able to sway the jury to vote for a conviction....that the perp was retreating from the scene of his crime...but was he?

The defense brought in a expert witness a black guy with much experience and knowledge of what constitutes self defense,body language and retreat.

He made a very good case that the black guy was not retreating and that he remained within striking distance of his victim....which means that if he so wanted he could have easily rushed the defendant and continued his assault.

Now we must not forget he was high on drugs and in such a impaired condition it is difficult to predict with any accuracy what he might have done if he had not got shot.

Meanwhile, of course his victim was dazed, disoriented, injured and undoubtedly in a mild state of shock at least. He did realize that if he wanted to protect his life that he had to make a very fast decision.

He only had a couple of seconds to make this life or death decision and in such a state of disorientation and stress he chose to shoot and anyone who has been in such a similar life threatening scenario knows that one misses a lot of details in such a scenario and that their main objective being-- to get the weapon out and prepare to fire it --which means getting the weapon into a firing mode, clicking the safety off, aligning and sighting the weapon on his assailant and then pulling the trigger.

Whilst being focused on doing all that it is not to be reasonably expected that the victim would note the movement of his assailants feet. He is aiming his weapon at the center mass of his victim...lining up the sights on the gun and then pulling the trigger. All this takes some time and a lot of concentration on his target.

Now most people will run if someone pulls a gun on them, why wait around to get shot? Makes no sense. But as we know the thug with a history of assault was high on a couple of drugs....thus his judgement was impaired.

The very drugs that very likely had put him into such an aggressive mode also prevented him from understanding that he needed to flee in order to avoid getting shot. Like you see his buddy running to hide behind some cars as soon as he sees the weapon pulled out.

Anyhow for whatever reason he does not retreat until he is shot then he takes off running....that is actually retreating but he waited too long to do that. It cost him his life.

You're making up more nonsense to justify your misunderstanding of events.

Ecstacy is what was found McGlockton's system. Ecstacy is not a drug that makes one aggressive.

You should have watched the trial ....the defense with the help of an expert on the subject of ectasy went into great detail on how in many cases it does cause extreme agressiveness...and he was loaded with the drug exceeding high dose in his system and that combined with his known predisposition for violence(he had a history of assault) was not a good combination

The prosecution claimed that ectasy was a love drug that it makes people all lovey dovey etc.

If so why did the black dude slam drejka to the ground? he demonstrated no desire to even try and find out what was going on...just rushed out and comitted assault.

Now it does make some people very sociable, understanding aka empathetic...but it affects different people in different ways as most drugs do.

Of course the defense put up witnesses to take their side.

 

[Marion Morrison]

I didn't hear any of the court proceedings so you may have better information than I do.

However, I did see the video. To me it looked like the thug had tried to retreat. I suspect that is what the jury saw and the reason Drejka was found guilty.

By the way, I served on a six man murder trial back in the 1980s. I was the jury foreman. It was Second Degree murder.

I think in Florida for murder the Defendant always has the right to request a 12 man jury. However, it could just be for 1st degree.

I am a strong supporter of the right to carry. I also teach responsible firearm use as a Firearms Instructor and Range Officer. I am a strong supporter of SYG. However, I don't think I would ever use a firearm for somebody pushing me down. I would need to perceive a greater threat to my life.

When I teach a concealed carry class I advise the students to be very careful about drawing a firearm. It will be a life changing experience. Drejka found that out the hard way.

To me Drejka was an asshole that didn't have the common sense to mind his own business. He met another asshole and now one asshole is dead and another asshole will be spending most, if not all, of the rest of his life in a state prison.

Assholes give responsible gun owners a bad name.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

I didn't hear any of the court proceedings so you may have better information than I do.

However, I did see the video. To me it looked like the thug had tried to retreat. I suspect that is what the jury saw and the reason Drejka was found guilty.

By the way, I served on a six man murder trial back in the 1980s. I was the jury foreman. It was Second Degree murder.

I think in Florida for murder the Defendant always has the right to request a 12 man jury. However, it could just be for 1st degree.

I am a strong supporter of the right to carry. I also teach responsible firearm use as a Firearms Instructor and Range Officer. I am a strong supporter of SYG. However, I don't think I would ever use a firearm for somebody pushing me down. I would need to perceive a greater threat to my life.

When I teach a concealed carry class I advise the students to be very careful about drawing a firearm. It will be a life changing experience. Drejka found that out the hard way.

To me Drejka was an asshole that didn't have the common sense to mind his own business. He met another asshole and now one asshole is dead and another asshole will be spending most, if not all, of the rest of his life in a state prison.

Assholes give responsible gun owners a bad name.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

I didn't hear any of the court proceedings so you may have better information than I do.

However, I did see the video. To me it looked like the thug had tried to retreat. I suspect that is what the jury saw and the reason Drejka was found guilty.

By the way, I served on a six man murder trial back in the 1980s. I was the jury foreman. It was Second Degree murder.

I think in Florida for murder the Defendant always has the right to request a 12 man jury. However, it could just be for 1st degree.

I am a strong supporter of the right to carry. I also teach responsible firearm use as a Firearms Instructor and Range Officer. I am a strong supporter of SYG. However, I don't think I would ever use a firearm for somebody pushing me down. I would need to perceive a greater threat to my life.

When I teach a concealed carry class I advise the students to be very careful about drawing a firearm. It will be a life changing experience. Drejka found that out the hard way.

To me Drejka was an asshole that didn't have the common sense to mind his own business. He met another asshole and now one asshole is dead and another asshole will be spending most, if not all, of the rest of his life in a state prison.

Assholes give responsible gun owners a bad name.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

Yes, I pointed that out....he was found guilty because of how the jury members perceived the video.

That is not following the law.

I do not think you are comprehending what I have been saying nor do I think you understand the law on self-defense in the state of Florida. Why that is I have no friggin idea...have you ever actually read the Florida Statutes on Self-Defense?

Again and I am getting tired as hell of having to back over a plowed field.

But one more time and I think this is the last time I am going to explain this.........The florida law on self defense says anyone is justified to use lethal force if they have a REASONABLE fear their life is in danger or that they may suffer grievious bodily harm....do you get that?

It says nothing about the defendants judgement....it deals strictly with the defendants state of mind, his perception..........aka..............did the defendant have a REASONABLE fear that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

Of course the jury had the responsibilty of finding him guilty or not guilty...there is no doubt about that. Yet....that does not mean just because they voted to find him guilty....that does not make him guilty.

As you point out....juries are wrong too many times as the cases you mention demonstrates. No doubt there are many innocent people in jail. No doubt innocent people have been executed.

Now I think we agree on that at least.

But then you get off track by bringing up different kinds of assault.....yes Drejka was assaulted but that in and of itself is irrelevant.....again....the critical point to understand is whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life or of great bodily harm as the Florida Law says he must be in order to be justified to use lethal force.

Now, I do not know if you read the part where I laid out all the reasons why Drejka should have been considered to be in REASONABLE fear of his life...did you read any of them? If you read all the reasons I posted ...do you disagree with any of them? I think what we have here is a failure to communicate...who said dat?

Then to further compound your errors you bring up your evaluation of his mental health. Not knowing the man I do not know his mental state....but if he had any record of mental illness I think his lawyers would have brought that up.

I do know he had a degree in math and physics...so he definitely was not mentally retarded....though even people at the genius level can be mentally unstable....but since the possibility of that was not brought up in the trial I think we have to preclude considering that.

Then you go even further adrift when you bring up your belief that Drejka made some very bad choices or decisions...which I would not deny but that has nothing absolutely noting to do with whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life or of grievious bodily injury.

I would not and most pepole I am sure would not bother to tell anyone that they were illegally parked in a handicap spot. I would agree that was not a smart thing to do...as in there are crazies out there lots of them...some of them would you shoot you for cutting them off on the freeway...we hear about stuff like that all the time.

Drejka went into that store all the time and the owner told him after a previous episode on the parking lot that he should not be doing that...it was not worth it. aka....informing folks that they should not be parfking in a handicapped spot unless they were actually handicapped.....what was Drejka's answer....he agreed but said he could not help it...that it was a pet peeve of his because he had a family member that was handicapped.

Now that sounds like he had some sort of obsession that he called his pet peeve. Now I would not deny that is not a mental problem at some level but it is again....irrelevant to whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life.



Then you bring up the judgement thing again and say that his judgement in essence did not make him innocent or guilty.

Again......you may think of it as judgement.....but I think the more correct term is perception....whether or not he had a reasonable belief....again whether or not he had a REASONABLE belief as in perceived that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

That is what the law says.....he must have a Reasonable belief....not that he must have good judgement ....but he must have a REASONABLE belief that his life is in danger or that he may suffer grievious bodily harm.

Now obviously the key woid being REASONABLE.....who decides whether or not he had a reasonable belief?....not him, not you, not me....no one except the jury has that obligation or that duty......and what I am saying is that they--the jury-- failed in their duty to ascertain whether or not he had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer
grievious bodily harm.

The next question being why did they fail? I have spelled it out before....now this of course is my opinion as I was not privy to their deliberations.....I watched the trial as you know.....and in the prosecutors summation.....he kept telling the jury...watch the video, watch the video....now why was he so emphatic that they watch the video...he well knew they would watch the video....he did not have to tell them to watch the video....I am convinced the reason he kept telling them that was to get them to focus so intently on the video that they would forget their primary duty under the law....to ascertain whether or not Drejka had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily injury.

Also it was brought out in the trial that intelligent people after watching the video disagree on whether or not the black guy was retreating....now this concept of retreating has coinfused most of the posters on here. They are absolutely convinced that just because upon seeing the weapon come out that the black guy stopped advancing on Drejka(yes even after he had violently slammed drejka to the ground...he kept advancing obviously intent on doing further damage to Drejka. We have all seen the videos that circulate on the internet of black thugs kicking people to death...and most likely drejka had seen those videos also.

but to get back to the black dude....after he saw the weapon come out....he stopped advancing and took a couple of steps backward and turned to the side....was he trying to retreat?

I do not think so and the defense's expert witness did not think so citing such things as the position of his feet, his stance etc. the guy was very knowledgable about self defense, body language etc. He made a couple of halting backward steps out of reaction to seeing the weapon like one jerks their hand back when they touch a hot stove. He turned slightly to the side to present a smaller target according to the expert and that is just common sense.

Now another thing most posters do not get is that he was still within striking distance...still very close to where his victim was...so close he could have quickly been on top of drejka if he so chose. Thus he was still a threat.

Now as I have also pointed out....drejka being in not the best state of mind....slightly dazed, disoriented, and at least in a mild state of shock was thus not in a state of mind where he would notice or pay any attention to some small movement backwards by the black guy...drejka had one major motivation....one goal....to remove the threat to his life...the black guy.

Thus with difficulty he raised his weapon...had to use his left hand to support the weapon because of his injured right arm and sighted on the center mass of his target...now all of this happened very, very quickly...it was not in slow motion like the video the jury saw. drejka had to make an extremely fast life or death decision...to shoot or not to shoot...at the most he probably had about 2 seconds to make this decision.

Now back to the black guy...the toxicoogy reports clearly showed he had a huge amount of 2 drugs in his body...that is beyond dispute. The states expert witness on the possible effects of these drugs showed that they are capable of making a person very aggressive. So in this state of being under the influence...one cannot predict with any certainty or accuracy what the black guy would have done had he not been shot...he might have run off or he might have decided to rush his victim and he could have done that very,very quickly as the distance between him and his victim has been cited as being approx. 10 to l2 ft. One could cover that distance in a split second.

Also...the black guy had a history of commiting assault...so you take a guy that obviously has a pre-disposition of violence and fill him up with 2 drugs(he had a very high level of the drugs in his system) and you want to predict what he will or will or will not do? Get real.

Thus obviously if drejka had chose not to shoot he would have been gambling with his life. Not something I or any reasonable person would want to do.


Sure it is easy for all these posters (monday morning quarterbacks)to say what they would have done....of course...with hindsight and a slow motion video to enlighten them.

drejka did not have hindsight to guide him nor a slow motion video...he was living and reacting to a threat in real time....and time was of the essence. He had to act quickly if he wanted to do his best to make sure he survived.

Would you gamble with your life? I do not think any reasonable person should or would.

Thus I am convinced drejka had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

I didn't hear any of the court proceedings so you may have better information than I do.

However, I did see the video. To me it looked like the thug had tried to retreat. I suspect that is what the jury saw and the reason Drejka was found guilty.

By the way, I served on a six man murder trial back in the 1980s. I was the jury foreman. It was Second Degree murder.

I think in Florida for murder the Defendant always has the right to request a 12 man jury. However, it could just be for 1st degree.

I am a strong supporter of the right to carry. I also teach responsible firearm use as a Firearms Instructor and Range Officer. I am a strong supporter of SYG. However, I don't think I would ever use a firearm for somebody pushing me down. I would need to perceive a greater threat to my life.

When I teach a concealed carry class I advise the students to be very careful about drawing a firearm. It will be a life changing experience. Drejka found that out the hard way.

To me Drejka was an asshole that didn't have the common sense to mind his own business. He met another asshole and now one asshole is dead and another asshole will be spending most, if not all, of the rest of his life in a state prison.

Assholes give responsible gun owners a bad name.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

"It says nothing about the defendants judgement....it deals strictly with the defendants state of mind, his perception..........aka..............did the defendant have a REASONABLE fear that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm."

This is the dumbest shit I've read on this thread.

A defendant in such a case has to have a reasonable fear of imminent death or great bodily harm. It's in the hands and hearts of the jury to decide if that fear was reasonable. It's not the jury's job to mindlessly accept a defendant's claim that his fear was reasonable. If that were the case, one could shoot and kill a jaywalker and explain to a jury they should be acquitted because they had a reasonable fear of death or great bodily harm from the person crossing a street illegally.

The jury in this case weighed the evidence and determined Drejka's claim of such fear of imminent death or great bodily harm .... was ... not reasonable.

I have pointed out more than once that it is the jury's obligation and duty by law to determine whether or not the defendant was in reasonable fear of his life and or grievious bodily harm....try and keep up.

Unfortunately, the jury did not consider all the evidence that would indicate Drejka could have been and most likely was in fear of his life and so forth.

What the jury did was to go by their perception that the black guy was retreating. Thus they erroneously concluded Drejka should not have fired....what they should have been doing in order to follow the law would have been to weigh all the reasons that indicated drejka was in fear of his life....instead they focused on their perception when they should have been focusing on Drejkas perception or belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

I have posted all the reasons why he should have been considered in fear of his life. I am not going back over all that. It has been posted and can be seen. The jury did not consider all of these reasons that would support drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life and most likely was.

I will mention one major thing they definitely overlooked...drejas's mental impairment as a result of all the trauma he had experienced. That alone is enough to over-rule the b.s. of the black guy retreating as in drejka due to his mental condition did not notice that the black guy had taken a few steps backward which was irrelevant anyhow....as he was still in striking distance and thus still a threat.....Drejka he had more important things on his mind like what he must do to eliminate the threat to his life.

The jury foreman has come out now and said that the jury's perception that the black guy was retreating was why they voted to convict.

That proves my point...they focused on their perception and not the perception of the defendant when the law on self defense plainly states it is the belief or the perception of the defendant that determines whether or not he can justifiably use lethal force.

The jury was in error and the statement by the jury foreman proves that.

All of this will come out in the appeal process. If the jury had an adequate understanding of the law on self defense they would have not made such a mistake.

If a guy is not coming at you, you can't just blow him away. No threat=no threat.

In your house or yard or car you could, but not out in the street. Drejka did wrong, he'll pay for it.

Regardless of the law, there's the morality/justice factor as well.

 

[TheGreenHornet]

Well, of course everyone knows the shooter was convicted but the controversy is whether or not the jury got it right.

And the ball game is not over until the appeal is dealt with.

This is a much more important case than most realize because if the jury verdict is allowed to stand it will fundamentally change the law on self defense as has been pointed out previously.

Well you're not exactly winning an argument while our side of the argument prevailed in court.

And no, it doesn't change self-defense laws. Self defense laws were never intended to allow people to murder someone in retreat.

You lack of a good analytical ability interferes with your perception of the reality of this case. Aka...what and how it all went down. Obviously you have never been under attack as well.

First of all--the law on self defense has always centered on the perception of the victim aka whether or not the victim has a reasonable belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

The key element in this case is of course whether or not the drugged up black thug was actually retreating.

The next thing to consider is what constitutes retreating?

Now as we have seen the video was slowed down to the slow motion mode for the jurors and in slow motion mode the following can be seen: first of all of course the black thug high on drugs as proved in court by toxicology reports rushes out of the store after a white guy comes in and says there is a problem on the parking lot.

Now what is the first thing seen by the thug on exiting the store---a white dude arguing with his g/f. The black guy does not ask any questions, does not try to find out what the argument is about as would any reasonable person...he just rushes up and violently assaults the white guy.

And then.....this is critical........and then...he continues to advance towards the white guy he has knocked to the ground. Why did he continue to advance? Obviously he meant to do more harm to his victim i.e. kick him in the head or whatever....we have all seen the videos of scenarios like this...some black thug or a gang of black thugs beating some hapless victim to death...these videos are all over the internet...and it is reasonable to conclude the Drejka had seen such vidieos.

It is highly likely that after getting knocked to the ground that his first thought was that his assailant would do to him like what he had seen happen to other victims in his situation...on the ground and highly vulnurable to further attacks by his assailant.

The video then shows Drejka manage with some difficulty to get his weapon out as his right arm had been injured in the assault. Upon sight of the weapon the black guy stops his advance and in slow motion you can see he takes a couple of halting backward steps whilst still facing his victim and then turning slightly in order to present a smaller target.

Now the question arises was he actually 'retreating' and that is the basis on which the prosecution was able to sway the jury to vote for a conviction....that the perp was retreating from the scene of his crime...but was he?

The defense brought in a expert witness a black guy with much experience and knowledge of what constitutes self defense,body language and retreat.

He made a very good case that the black guy was not retreating and that he remained within striking distance of his victim....which means that if he so wanted he could have easily rushed the defendant and continued his assault.

Now we must not forget he was high on drugs and in such a impaired condition it is difficult to predict with any accuracy what he might have done if he had not got shot.

Meanwhile, of course his victim was dazed, disoriented, injured and undoubtedly in a mild state of shock at least. He did realize that if he wanted to protect his life that he had to make a very fast decision.

He only had a couple of seconds to make this life or death decision and in such a state of disorientation and stress he chose to shoot and anyone who has been in such a similar life threatening scenario knows that one misses a lot of details in such a scenario and that their main objective being-- to get the weapon out and prepare to fire it --which means getting the weapon into a firing mode, clicking the safety off, aligning and sighting the weapon on his assailant and then pulling the trigger.

Whilst being focused on doing all that it is not to be reasonably expected that the victim would note the movement of his assailants feet. He is aiming his weapon at the center mass of his victim...lining up the sights on the gun and then pulling the trigger. All this takes some time and a lot of concentration on his target.

Now most people will run if someone pulls a gun on them, why wait around to get shot? Makes no sense. But as we know the thug with a history of assault was high on a couple of drugs....thus his judgement was impaired.

The very drugs that very likely had put him into such an aggressive mode also prevented him from understanding that he needed to flee in order to avoid getting shot. Like you see his buddy running to hide behind some cars as soon as he sees the weapon pulled out.

Anyhow for whatever reason he does not retreat until he is shot then he takes off running....that is actually retreating but he waited too long to do that. It cost him his life.

You're making up more nonsense to justify your misunderstanding of events.

Ecstacy is what was found McGlockton's system. Ecstacy is not a drug that makes one aggressive.

You should have watched the trial ....the defense with the help of an expert on the subject of ectasy went into great detail on how in many cases it does cause extreme agressiveness...and he was loaded with the drug exceeding high dose in his system and that combined with his known predisposition for violence(he had a history of assault) was not a good combination

The prosecution claimed that ectasy was a love drug that it makes people all lovey dovey etc.

If so why did the black dude slam drejka to the ground? he demonstrated no desire to even try and find out what was going on...just rushed out and comitted assault.

Now it does make some people very sociable, understanding aka empathetic...but it affects different people in different ways as most drugs do.

Of course the defense put up witnesses to take their side.

Just like the prosecution....that is the way it works. Intelligent people disagreeing.

 

[Faun]

Oh, for ****'s sake, grow a pair. When someone announces they're a racist by posting, "another dead magic Negro.. Who cares," they should expect to be called a racist. And calling that racist a racist didn't shut down the argument -- that poster didn't have an argument to begin with. He's just a racist troll who couldn't resist expressing his racism. Meanwhile, the argument goes on around him anyway.

Oh, and by the way, the argument is actually going our way... the shooter was convicted.

Well, of course everyone knows the shooter was convicted but the controversy is whether or not the jury got it right.

And the ball game is not over until the appeal is dealt with.

This is a much more important case than most realize because if the jury verdict is allowed to stand it will fundamentally change the law on self defense as has been pointed out previously.

Well you're not exactly winning an argument while our side of the argument prevailed in court.

And no, it doesn't change self-defense laws. Self defense laws were never intended to allow people to murder someone in retreat.

You lack of a good analytical ability interferes with your perception of the reality of this case. Aka...what and how it all went down. Obviously you have never been under attack as well.

First of all--the law on self defense has always centered on the perception of the victim aka whether or not the victim has a reasonable belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

The key element in this case is of course whether or not the drugged up black thug was actually retreating.

The next thing to consider is what constitutes retreating?

Now as we have seen the video was slowed down to the slow motion mode for the jurors and in slow motion mode the following can be seen: first of all of course the black thug high on drugs as proved in court by toxicology reports rushes out of the store after a white guy comes in and says there is a problem on the parking lot.

Now what is the first thing seen by the thug on exiting the store---a white dude arguing with his g/f. The black guy does not ask any questions, does not try to find out what the argument is about as would any reasonable person...he just rushes up and violently assaults the white guy.

And then.....this is critical........and then...he continues to advance towards the white guy he has knocked to the ground. Why did he continue to advance? Obviously he meant to do more harm to his victim i.e. kick him in the head or whatever....we have all seen the videos of scenarios like this...some black thug or a gang of black thugs beating some hapless victim to death...these videos are all over the internet...and it is reasonable to conclude the Drejka had seen such vidieos.

It is highly likely that after getting knocked to the ground that his first thought was that his assailant would do to him like what he had seen happen to other victims in his situation...on the ground and highly vulnurable to further attacks by his assailant.

The video then shows Drejka manage with some difficulty to get his weapon out as his right arm had been injured in the assault. Upon sight of the weapon the black guy stops his advance and in slow motion you can see he takes a couple of halting backward steps whilst still facing his victim and then turning slightly in order to present a smaller target.

Now the question arises was he actually 'retreating' and that is the basis on which the prosecution was able to sway the jury to vote for a conviction....that the perp was retreating from the scene of his crime...but was he?

The defense brought in a expert witness a black guy with much experience and knowledge of what constitutes self defense,body language and retreat.

He made a very good case that the black guy was not retreating and that he remained within striking distance of his victim....which means that if he so wanted he could have easily rushed the defendant and continued his assault.

Now we must not forget he was high on drugs and in such a impaired condition it is difficult to predict with any accuracy what he might have done if he had not got shot.

Meanwhile, of course his victim was dazed, disoriented, injured and undoubtedly in a mild state of shock at least. He did realize that if he wanted to protect his life that he had to make a very fast decision.

He only had a couple of seconds to make this life or death decision and in such a state of disorientation and stress he chose to shoot and anyone who has been in such a similar life threatening scenario knows that one misses a lot of details in such a scenario and that their main objective being-- to get the weapon out and prepare to fire it --which means getting the weapon into a firing mode, clicking the safety off, aligning and sighting the weapon on his assailant and then pulling the trigger.

Whilst being focused on doing all that it is not to be reasonably expected that the victim would note the movement of his assailants feet. He is aiming his weapon at the center mass of his victim...lining up the sights on the gun and then pulling the trigger. All this takes some time and a lot of concentration on his target.

Now most people will run if someone pulls a gun on them, why wait around to get shot? Makes no sense. But as we know the thug with a history of assault was high on a couple of drugs....thus his judgement was impaired.

The very drugs that very likely had put him into such an aggressive mode also prevented him from understanding that he needed to flee in order to avoid getting shot. Like you see his buddy running to hide behind some cars as soon as he sees the weapon pulled out.

Anyhow for whatever reason he does not retreat until he is shot then he takes off running....that is actually retreating but he waited too long to do that. It cost him his life.

"Upon sight of the weapon the black guy stops his advance and in slow motion you can see he takes a couple of halting backward steps whilst still facing his victim..."

That is incorrect. He is seen on the video backing up even before Drejka pulled his gun out. Before drawing his gun, Drejka reached in his clothes for it. It was then that McGlockton began backing up, taking 2 steps backwards. THEN Drejka brandishes his firearm, at which point McGlockton takes 2 more steps backwards and begins turning. That took about 4 seconds to transpire. Drejka had ample opportunity to see McGlockton was backing away from him.

As far as McGlockton being on drugs, that's irrelevant from Drejka's perspective because he had no knowledge of McGlockton's toxicology.

As far as McGlockton potentially lunging at Drejka, that didn't happen and McGlockton was far enough away that Drejka, his firearm trained on McGlockton, would have had an opportunity to shoot had McGlockton actually lunged at him.

And you're getting g many facts of this case wrong.

You claim McGlockton only took 1 or 2 steps back; when in fact, he took 4.

You claim Drejka didn't see him stepping back; when in fact, the video shows Drejka looking directly at McGlockton from the moment he sat up.

You claim McGlockton advanced on Drejka until he saw the firearm; when in fact, he began backing up the moment Drejka reached for his weapon.

You cannot get those basic facts wrong and then claim you know better than the jury.

You are either lying or are simply ignorant of the facts. It is plainly seen in the video that the black does not begin to back up until the gun is displayed.

Whether he took 2 or 4 steps is irrelevant....the relevant point being he was still in striking distance and a potential threat.

The reasons drejka did not notice the black backing up have been explained.

Why do you think that drejkas lack of knowledge of the black guy being high on drugs makes any difference? Ridiculous thought on your part.

Damn...your reasoning is laughable...are you drinking?

Of course the black guy did not lunge but if he had not been shot he may have. There is no possible way you can accurately predict what he may or may not have done since he was so impaired with drugs you cannot expect him to act in a rational manner.

I watched the trial...you did not and that is very obvious.

"You are either lying or are simply ignorant of the facts. It is plainly seen in the video that the black does not begin to back up until the gun is displayed."

Nope, you're lying. It's plainly visible in the video I posted....

1:46 - McGlockton shoves Drejka, knocking him to the ground

1:48 - Drejka sits up and is looking directly at McGlockton

1:49 - Drejka, still looking at McGlockton, reaches into his clothes. McGlockton sees this and takes 2 steps backwards.

1:50 - Drejka pulls out a gun while still looking at McGlockton. McGlockton takes 2 mores steps backwards

1:51 - McGlockton turns away from Drejka to his right

1:52 - Drejka shoots McGlockton on his left side.​

... it's on video. McGlockton starts backing away when he sees Drejka reaching into his pocket, before the gun is drawn.

That you deny what's plainly visible goes a long way in explaining why you're so wrong with your assessment.

 

[Marion Morrison]

Well, of course everyone knows the shooter was convicted but the controversy is whether or not the jury got it right.

And the ball game is not over until the appeal is dealt with.

This is a much more important case than most realize because if the jury verdict is allowed to stand it will fundamentally change the law on self defense as has been pointed out previously.

Well you're not exactly winning an argument while our side of the argument prevailed in court.

And no, it doesn't change self-defense laws. Self defense laws were never intended to allow people to murder someone in retreat.

You lack of a good analytical ability interferes with your perception of the reality of this case. Aka...what and how it all went down. Obviously you have never been under attack as well.

First of all--the law on self defense has always centered on the perception of the victim aka whether or not the victim has a reasonable belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

The key element in this case is of course whether or not the drugged up black thug was actually retreating.

The next thing to consider is what constitutes retreating?

Now as we have seen the video was slowed down to the slow motion mode for the jurors and in slow motion mode the following can be seen: first of all of course the black thug high on drugs as proved in court by toxicology reports rushes out of the store after a white guy comes in and says there is a problem on the parking lot.

Now what is the first thing seen by the thug on exiting the store---a white dude arguing with his g/f. The black guy does not ask any questions, does not try to find out what the argument is about as would any reasonable person...he just rushes up and violently assaults the white guy.

And then.....this is critical........and then...he continues to advance towards the white guy he has knocked to the ground. Why did he continue to advance? Obviously he meant to do more harm to his victim i.e. kick him in the head or whatever....we have all seen the videos of scenarios like this...some black thug or a gang of black thugs beating some hapless victim to death...these videos are all over the internet...and it is reasonable to conclude the Drejka had seen such vidieos.

It is highly likely that after getting knocked to the ground that his first thought was that his assailant would do to him like what he had seen happen to other victims in his situation...on the ground and highly vulnurable to further attacks by his assailant.

The video then shows Drejka manage with some difficulty to get his weapon out as his right arm had been injured in the assault. Upon sight of the weapon the black guy stops his advance and in slow motion you can see he takes a couple of halting backward steps whilst still facing his victim and then turning slightly in order to present a smaller target.

Now the question arises was he actually 'retreating' and that is the basis on which the prosecution was able to sway the jury to vote for a conviction....that the perp was retreating from the scene of his crime...but was he?

The defense brought in a expert witness a black guy with much experience and knowledge of what constitutes self defense,body language and retreat.

He made a very good case that the black guy was not retreating and that he remained within striking distance of his victim....which means that if he so wanted he could have easily rushed the defendant and continued his assault.

Now we must not forget he was high on drugs and in such a impaired condition it is difficult to predict with any accuracy what he might have done if he had not got shot.

Meanwhile, of course his victim was dazed, disoriented, injured and undoubtedly in a mild state of shock at least. He did realize that if he wanted to protect his life that he had to make a very fast decision.

He only had a couple of seconds to make this life or death decision and in such a state of disorientation and stress he chose to shoot and anyone who has been in such a similar life threatening scenario knows that one misses a lot of details in such a scenario and that their main objective being-- to get the weapon out and prepare to fire it --which means getting the weapon into a firing mode, clicking the safety off, aligning and sighting the weapon on his assailant and then pulling the trigger.

Whilst being focused on doing all that it is not to be reasonably expected that the victim would note the movement of his assailants feet. He is aiming his weapon at the center mass of his victim...lining up the sights on the gun and then pulling the trigger. All this takes some time and a lot of concentration on his target.

Now most people will run if someone pulls a gun on them, why wait around to get shot? Makes no sense. But as we know the thug with a history of assault was high on a couple of drugs....thus his judgement was impaired.

The very drugs that very likely had put him into such an aggressive mode also prevented him from understanding that he needed to flee in order to avoid getting shot. Like you see his buddy running to hide behind some cars as soon as he sees the weapon pulled out.

Anyhow for whatever reason he does not retreat until he is shot then he takes off running....that is actually retreating but he waited too long to do that. It cost him his life.

"Upon sight of the weapon the black guy stops his advance and in slow motion you can see he takes a couple of halting backward steps whilst still facing his victim..."

That is incorrect. He is seen on the video backing up even before Drejka pulled his gun out. Before drawing his gun, Drejka reached in his clothes for it. It was then that McGlockton began backing up, taking 2 steps backwards. THEN Drejka brandishes his firearm, at which point McGlockton takes 2 more steps backwards and begins turning. That took about 4 seconds to transpire. Drejka had ample opportunity to see McGlockton was backing away from him.

As far as McGlockton being on drugs, that's irrelevant from Drejka's perspective because he had no knowledge of McGlockton's toxicology.

As far as McGlockton potentially lunging at Drejka, that didn't happen and McGlockton was far enough away that Drejka, his firearm trained on McGlockton, would have had an opportunity to shoot had McGlockton actually lunged at him.

And you're getting g many facts of this case wrong.

You claim McGlockton only took 1 or 2 steps back; when in fact, he took 4.

You claim Drejka didn't see him stepping back; when in fact, the video shows Drejka looking directly at McGlockton from the moment he sat up.

You claim McGlockton advanced on Drejka until he saw the firearm; when in fact, he began backing up the moment Drejka reached for his weapon.

You cannot get those basic facts wrong and then claim you know better than the jury.

You are either lying or are simply ignorant of the facts. It is plainly seen in the video that the black does not begin to back up until the gun is displayed.

Whether he took 2 or 4 steps is irrelevant....the relevant point being he was still in striking distance and a potential threat.

The reasons drejka did not notice the black backing up have been explained.

Why do you think that drejkas lack of knowledge of the black guy being high on drugs makes any difference? Ridiculous thought on your part.

Damn...your reasoning is laughable...are you drinking?

Of course the black guy did not lunge but if he had not been shot he may have. There is no possible way you can accurately predict what he may or may not have done since he was so impaired with drugs you cannot expect him to act in a rational manner.

I watched the trial...you did not and that is very obvious.

"You are either lying or are simply ignorant of the facts. It is plainly seen in the video that the black does not begin to back up until the gun is displayed."

Nope, you're lying. It's plainly visible in the video I posted....

1:46 - McGlockton shoves Drejka, knocking him to the ground

1:48 - Drejka sits up and is looking directly at McGlockton

1:49 - Drejka, still looking at McGlockton, reaches into his clothes. McGlockton sees this and takes 2 steps backwards.

1:50 - Drejka pulls out a gun while still looking at McGlockton. McGlockton takes 2 mores steps backwards

1:51 - McGlockton turns away from Drejka to his right

1:52 - Drejka shoots McGlockton on his left side.​

... it's on video. McGlockton starts backing away when he sees Drejka reaching into his pocket, before the gun is drawn.

That you deny what's plainly visible goes a long way in explaining why you're so wrong with your assessment.

That video is not really helping your argument as fast as it goes. Not saying I disagree, just that it runs too fast to properly support your argument.

 

[Faun]

Well you're not exactly winning an argument while our side of the argument prevailed in court.

And no, it doesn't change self-defense laws. Self defense laws were never intended to allow people to murder someone in retreat.

You lack of a good analytical ability interferes with your perception of the reality of this case. Aka...what and how it all went down. Obviously you have never been under attack as well.

First of all--the law on self defense has always centered on the perception of the victim aka whether or not the victim has a reasonable belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

The key element in this case is of course whether or not the drugged up black thug was actually retreating.

The next thing to consider is what constitutes retreating?

Now as we have seen the video was slowed down to the slow motion mode for the jurors and in slow motion mode the following can be seen: first of all of course the black thug high on drugs as proved in court by toxicology reports rushes out of the store after a white guy comes in and says there is a problem on the parking lot.

Now what is the first thing seen by the thug on exiting the store---a white dude arguing with his g/f. The black guy does not ask any questions, does not try to find out what the argument is about as would any reasonable person...he just rushes up and violently assaults the white guy.

And then.....this is critical........and then...he continues to advance towards the white guy he has knocked to the ground. Why did he continue to advance? Obviously he meant to do more harm to his victim i.e. kick him in the head or whatever....we have all seen the videos of scenarios like this...some black thug or a gang of black thugs beating some hapless victim to death...these videos are all over the internet...and it is reasonable to conclude the Drejka had seen such vidieos.

It is highly likely that after getting knocked to the ground that his first thought was that his assailant would do to him like what he had seen happen to other victims in his situation...on the ground and highly vulnurable to further attacks by his assailant.

The video then shows Drejka manage with some difficulty to get his weapon out as his right arm had been injured in the assault. Upon sight of the weapon the black guy stops his advance and in slow motion you can see he takes a couple of halting backward steps whilst still facing his victim and then turning slightly in order to present a smaller target.

Now the question arises was he actually 'retreating' and that is the basis on which the prosecution was able to sway the jury to vote for a conviction....that the perp was retreating from the scene of his crime...but was he?

The defense brought in a expert witness a black guy with much experience and knowledge of what constitutes self defense,body language and retreat.

He made a very good case that the black guy was not retreating and that he remained within striking distance of his victim....which means that if he so wanted he could have easily rushed the defendant and continued his assault.

Now we must not forget he was high on drugs and in such a impaired condition it is difficult to predict with any accuracy what he might have done if he had not got shot.

Meanwhile, of course his victim was dazed, disoriented, injured and undoubtedly in a mild state of shock at least. He did realize that if he wanted to protect his life that he had to make a very fast decision.

He only had a couple of seconds to make this life or death decision and in such a state of disorientation and stress he chose to shoot and anyone who has been in such a similar life threatening scenario knows that one misses a lot of details in such a scenario and that their main objective being-- to get the weapon out and prepare to fire it --which means getting the weapon into a firing mode, clicking the safety off, aligning and sighting the weapon on his assailant and then pulling the trigger.

Whilst being focused on doing all that it is not to be reasonably expected that the victim would note the movement of his assailants feet. He is aiming his weapon at the center mass of his victim...lining up the sights on the gun and then pulling the trigger. All this takes some time and a lot of concentration on his target.

Now most people will run if someone pulls a gun on them, why wait around to get shot? Makes no sense. But as we know the thug with a history of assault was high on a couple of drugs....thus his judgement was impaired.

The very drugs that very likely had put him into such an aggressive mode also prevented him from understanding that he needed to flee in order to avoid getting shot. Like you see his buddy running to hide behind some cars as soon as he sees the weapon pulled out.

Anyhow for whatever reason he does not retreat until he is shot then he takes off running....that is actually retreating but he waited too long to do that. It cost him his life.

You're making up more nonsense to justify your misunderstanding of events.

Ecstacy is what was found McGlockton's system. Ecstacy is not a drug that makes one aggressive.

You should have watched the trial ....the defense with the help of an expert on the subject of ectasy went into great detail on how in many cases it does cause extreme agressiveness...and he was loaded with the drug exceeding high dose in his system and that combined with his known predisposition for violence(he had a history of assault) was not a good combination

The prosecution claimed that ectasy was a love drug that it makes people all lovey dovey etc.

If so why did the black dude slam drejka to the ground? he demonstrated no desire to even try and find out what was going on...just rushed out and comitted assault.

Now it does make some people very sociable, understanding aka empathetic...but it affects different people in different ways as most drugs do.

Of course the defense put up witnesses to take their side.

Just like the prosecution....that is the way it works. Intelligent people disagreeing.

Of course, just like the prosecution.

 

[Marion Morrison]

You lack of a good analytical ability interferes with your perception of the reality of this case. Aka...what and how it all went down. Obviously you have never been under attack as well.

First of all--the law on self defense has always centered on the perception of the victim aka whether or not the victim has a reasonable belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

The key element in this case is of course whether or not the drugged up black thug was actually retreating.

The next thing to consider is what constitutes retreating?

Now as we have seen the video was slowed down to the slow motion mode for the jurors and in slow motion mode the following can be seen: first of all of course the black thug high on drugs as proved in court by toxicology reports rushes out of the store after a white guy comes in and says there is a problem on the parking lot.

Now what is the first thing seen by the thug on exiting the store---a white dude arguing with his g/f. The black guy does not ask any questions, does not try to find out what the argument is about as would any reasonable person...he just rushes up and violently assaults the white guy.

And then.....this is critical........and then...he continues to advance towards the white guy he has knocked to the ground. Why did he continue to advance? Obviously he meant to do more harm to his victim i.e. kick him in the head or whatever....we have all seen the videos of scenarios like this...some black thug or a gang of black thugs beating some hapless victim to death...these videos are all over the internet...and it is reasonable to conclude the Drejka had seen such vidieos.

It is highly likely that after getting knocked to the ground that his first thought was that his assailant would do to him like what he had seen happen to other victims in his situation...on the ground and highly vulnurable to further attacks by his assailant.

The video then shows Drejka manage with some difficulty to get his weapon out as his right arm had been injured in the assault. Upon sight of the weapon the black guy stops his advance and in slow motion you can see he takes a couple of halting backward steps whilst still facing his victim and then turning slightly in order to present a smaller target.

Now the question arises was he actually 'retreating' and that is the basis on which the prosecution was able to sway the jury to vote for a conviction....that the perp was retreating from the scene of his crime...but was he?

The defense brought in a expert witness a black guy with much experience and knowledge of what constitutes self defense,body language and retreat.

He made a very good case that the black guy was not retreating and that he remained within striking distance of his victim....which means that if he so wanted he could have easily rushed the defendant and continued his assault.

Now we must not forget he was high on drugs and in such a impaired condition it is difficult to predict with any accuracy what he might have done if he had not got shot.

Meanwhile, of course his victim was dazed, disoriented, injured and undoubtedly in a mild state of shock at least. He did realize that if he wanted to protect his life that he had to make a very fast decision.

He only had a couple of seconds to make this life or death decision and in such a state of disorientation and stress he chose to shoot and anyone who has been in such a similar life threatening scenario knows that one misses a lot of details in such a scenario and that their main objective being-- to get the weapon out and prepare to fire it --which means getting the weapon into a firing mode, clicking the safety off, aligning and sighting the weapon on his assailant and then pulling the trigger.

Whilst being focused on doing all that it is not to be reasonably expected that the victim would note the movement of his assailants feet. He is aiming his weapon at the center mass of his victim...lining up the sights on the gun and then pulling the trigger. All this takes some time and a lot of concentration on his target.

Now most people will run if someone pulls a gun on them, why wait around to get shot? Makes no sense. But as we know the thug with a history of assault was high on a couple of drugs....thus his judgement was impaired.

The very drugs that very likely had put him into such an aggressive mode also prevented him from understanding that he needed to flee in order to avoid getting shot. Like you see his buddy running to hide behind some cars as soon as he sees the weapon pulled out.

Anyhow for whatever reason he does not retreat until he is shot then he takes off running....that is actually retreating but he waited too long to do that. It cost him his life.

You're making up more nonsense to justify your misunderstanding of events.

Ecstacy is what was found McGlockton's system. Ecstacy is not a drug that makes one aggressive.

You should have watched the trial ....the defense with the help of an expert on the subject of ectasy went into great detail on how in many cases it does cause extreme agressiveness...and he was loaded with the drug exceeding high dose in his system and that combined with his known predisposition for violence(he had a history of assault) was not a good combination

The prosecution claimed that ectasy was a love drug that it makes people all lovey dovey etc.

If so why did the black dude slam drejka to the ground? he demonstrated no desire to even try and find out what was going on...just rushed out and comitted assault.

Now it does make some people very sociable, understanding aka empathetic...but it affects different people in different ways as most drugs do.

Of course the defense put up witnesses to take their side.

Just like the prosecution....that is the way it works. Intelligent people disagreeing.

Of course, just like the prosecution.

The prosecution won the case, right?

 

[Faun]

I didn't hear any of the court proceedings so you may have better information than I do.

However, I did see the video. To me it looked like the thug had tried to retreat. I suspect that is what the jury saw and the reason Drejka was found guilty.

By the way, I served on a six man murder trial back in the 1980s. I was the jury foreman. It was Second Degree murder.

I think in Florida for murder the Defendant always has the right to request a 12 man jury. However, it could just be for 1st degree.

I am a strong supporter of the right to carry. I also teach responsible firearm use as a Firearms Instructor and Range Officer. I am a strong supporter of SYG. However, I don't think I would ever use a firearm for somebody pushing me down. I would need to perceive a greater threat to my life.

When I teach a concealed carry class I advise the students to be very careful about drawing a firearm. It will be a life changing experience. Drejka found that out the hard way.

To me Drejka was an asshole that didn't have the common sense to mind his own business. He met another asshole and now one asshole is dead and another asshole will be spending most, if not all, of the rest of his life in a state prison.

Assholes give responsible gun owners a bad name.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

I didn't hear any of the court proceedings so you may have better information than I do.

However, I did see the video. To me it looked like the thug had tried to retreat. I suspect that is what the jury saw and the reason Drejka was found guilty.

By the way, I served on a six man murder trial back in the 1980s. I was the jury foreman. It was Second Degree murder.

I think in Florida for murder the Defendant always has the right to request a 12 man jury. However, it could just be for 1st degree.

I am a strong supporter of the right to carry. I also teach responsible firearm use as a Firearms Instructor and Range Officer. I am a strong supporter of SYG. However, I don't think I would ever use a firearm for somebody pushing me down. I would need to perceive a greater threat to my life.

When I teach a concealed carry class I advise the students to be very careful about drawing a firearm. It will be a life changing experience. Drejka found that out the hard way.

To me Drejka was an asshole that didn't have the common sense to mind his own business. He met another asshole and now one asshole is dead and another asshole will be spending most, if not all, of the rest of his life in a state prison.

Assholes give responsible gun owners a bad name.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

I didn't hear any of the court proceedings so you may have better information than I do.

However, I did see the video. To me it looked like the thug had tried to retreat. I suspect that is what the jury saw and the reason Drejka was found guilty.

By the way, I served on a six man murder trial back in the 1980s. I was the jury foreman. It was Second Degree murder.

I think in Florida for murder the Defendant always has the right to request a 12 man jury. However, it could just be for 1st degree.

I am a strong supporter of the right to carry. I also teach responsible firearm use as a Firearms Instructor and Range Officer. I am a strong supporter of SYG. However, I don't think I would ever use a firearm for somebody pushing me down. I would need to perceive a greater threat to my life.

When I teach a concealed carry class I advise the students to be very careful about drawing a firearm. It will be a life changing experience. Drejka found that out the hard way.

To me Drejka was an asshole that didn't have the common sense to mind his own business. He met another asshole and now one asshole is dead and another asshole will be spending most, if not all, of the rest of his life in a state prison.

Assholes give responsible gun owners a bad name.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

Yes, I pointed that out....he was found guilty because of how the jury members perceived the video.

That is not following the law.

I do not think you are comprehending what I have been saying nor do I think you understand the law on self-defense in the state of Florida. Why that is I have no friggin idea...have you ever actually read the Florida Statutes on Self-Defense?

Again and I am getting tired as hell of having to back over a plowed field.

But one more time and I think this is the last time I am going to explain this.........The florida law on self defense says anyone is justified to use lethal force if they have a REASONABLE fear their life is in danger or that they may suffer grievious bodily harm....do you get that?

It says nothing about the defendants judgement....it deals strictly with the defendants state of mind, his perception..........aka..............did the defendant have a REASONABLE fear that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

Of course the jury had the responsibilty of finding him guilty or not guilty...there is no doubt about that. Yet....that does not mean just because they voted to find him guilty....that does not make him guilty.

As you point out....juries are wrong too many times as the cases you mention demonstrates. No doubt there are many innocent people in jail. No doubt innocent people have been executed.

Now I think we agree on that at least.

But then you get off track by bringing up different kinds of assault.....yes Drejka was assaulted but that in and of itself is irrelevant.....again....the critical point to understand is whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life or of great bodily harm as the Florida Law says he must be in order to be justified to use lethal force.

Now, I do not know if you read the part where I laid out all the reasons why Drejka should have been considered to be in REASONABLE fear of his life...did you read any of them? If you read all the reasons I posted ...do you disagree with any of them? I think what we have here is a failure to communicate...who said dat?

Then to further compound your errors you bring up your evaluation of his mental health. Not knowing the man I do not know his mental state....but if he had any record of mental illness I think his lawyers would have brought that up.

I do know he had a degree in math and physics...so he definitely was not mentally retarded....though even people at the genius level can be mentally unstable....but since the possibility of that was not brought up in the trial I think we have to preclude considering that.

Then you go even further adrift when you bring up your belief that Drejka made some very bad choices or decisions...which I would not deny but that has nothing absolutely noting to do with whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life or of grievious bodily injury.

I would not and most pepole I am sure would not bother to tell anyone that they were illegally parked in a handicap spot. I would agree that was not a smart thing to do...as in there are crazies out there lots of them...some of them would you shoot you for cutting them off on the freeway...we hear about stuff like that all the time.

Drejka went into that store all the time and the owner told him after a previous episode on the parking lot that he should not be doing that...it was not worth it. aka....informing folks that they should not be parfking in a handicapped spot unless they were actually handicapped.....what was Drejka's answer....he agreed but said he could not help it...that it was a pet peeve of his because he had a family member that was handicapped.

Now that sounds like he had some sort of obsession that he called his pet peeve. Now I would not deny that is not a mental problem at some level but it is again....irrelevant to whether or not he was in REASONABLE fear of his life.



Then you bring up the judgement thing again and say that his judgement in essence did not make him innocent or guilty.

Again......you may think of it as judgement.....but I think the more correct term is perception....whether or not he had a reasonable belief....again whether or not he had a REASONABLE belief as in perceived that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

That is what the law says.....he must have a Reasonable belief....not that he must have good judgement ....but he must have a REASONABLE belief that his life is in danger or that he may suffer grievious bodily harm.

Now obviously the key woid being REASONABLE.....who decides whether or not he had a reasonable belief?....not him, not you, not me....no one except the jury has that obligation or that duty......and what I am saying is that they--the jury-- failed in their duty to ascertain whether or not he had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer
grievious bodily harm.

The next question being why did they fail? I have spelled it out before....now this of course is my opinion as I was not privy to their deliberations.....I watched the trial as you know.....and in the prosecutors summation.....he kept telling the jury...watch the video, watch the video....now why was he so emphatic that they watch the video...he well knew they would watch the video....he did not have to tell them to watch the video....I am convinced the reason he kept telling them that was to get them to focus so intently on the video that they would forget their primary duty under the law....to ascertain whether or not Drejka had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily injury.

Also it was brought out in the trial that intelligent people after watching the video disagree on whether or not the black guy was retreating....now this concept of retreating has coinfused most of the posters on here. They are absolutely convinced that just because upon seeing the weapon come out that the black guy stopped advancing on Drejka(yes even after he had violently slammed drejka to the ground...he kept advancing obviously intent on doing further damage to Drejka. We have all seen the videos that circulate on the internet of black thugs kicking people to death...and most likely drejka had seen those videos also.

but to get back to the black dude....after he saw the weapon come out....he stopped advancing and took a couple of steps backward and turned to the side....was he trying to retreat?

I do not think so and the defense's expert witness did not think so citing such things as the position of his feet, his stance etc. the guy was very knowledgable about self defense, body language etc. He made a couple of halting backward steps out of reaction to seeing the weapon like one jerks their hand back when they touch a hot stove. He turned slightly to the side to present a smaller target according to the expert and that is just common sense.

Now another thing most posters do not get is that he was still within striking distance...still very close to where his victim was...so close he could have quickly been on top of drejka if he so chose. Thus he was still a threat.

Now as I have also pointed out....drejka being in not the best state of mind....slightly dazed, disoriented, and at least in a mild state of shock was thus not in a state of mind where he would notice or pay any attention to some small movement backwards by the black guy...drejka had one major motivation....one goal....to remove the threat to his life...the black guy.

Thus with difficulty he raised his weapon...had to use his left hand to support the weapon because of his injured right arm and sighted on the center mass of his target...now all of this happened very, very quickly...it was not in slow motion like the video the jury saw. drejka had to make an extremely fast life or death decision...to shoot or not to shoot...at the most he probably had about 2 seconds to make this decision.

Now back to the black guy...the toxicoogy reports clearly showed he had a huge amount of 2 drugs in his body...that is beyond dispute. The states expert witness on the possible effects of these drugs showed that they are capable of making a person very aggressive. So in this state of being under the influence...one cannot predict with any certainty or accuracy what the black guy would have done had he not been shot...he might have run off or he might have decided to rush his victim and he could have done that very,very quickly as the distance between him and his victim has been cited as being approx. 10 to l2 ft. One could cover that distance in a split second.

Also...the black guy had a history of commiting assault...so you take a guy that obviously has a pre-disposition of violence and fill him up with 2 drugs(he had a very high level of the drugs in his system) and you want to predict what he will or will or will not do? Get real.

Thus obviously if drejka had chose not to shoot he would have been gambling with his life. Not something I or any reasonable person would want to do.


Sure it is easy for all these posters (monday morning quarterbacks)to say what they would have done....of course...with hindsight and a slow motion video to enlighten them.

drejka did not have hindsight to guide him nor a slow motion video...he was living and reacting to a threat in real time....and time was of the essence. He had to act quickly if he wanted to do his best to make sure he survived.

Would you gamble with your life? I do not think any reasonable person should or would.

Thus I am convinced drejka had a REASONABLE belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

I didn't hear any of the court proceedings so you may have better information than I do.

However, I did see the video. To me it looked like the thug had tried to retreat. I suspect that is what the jury saw and the reason Drejka was found guilty.

By the way, I served on a six man murder trial back in the 1980s. I was the jury foreman. It was Second Degree murder.

I think in Florida for murder the Defendant always has the right to request a 12 man jury. However, it could just be for 1st degree.

I am a strong supporter of the right to carry. I also teach responsible firearm use as a Firearms Instructor and Range Officer. I am a strong supporter of SYG. However, I don't think I would ever use a firearm for somebody pushing me down. I would need to perceive a greater threat to my life.

When I teach a concealed carry class I advise the students to be very careful about drawing a firearm. It will be a life changing experience. Drejka found that out the hard way.

To me Drejka was an asshole that didn't have the common sense to mind his own business. He met another asshole and now one asshole is dead and another asshole will be spending most, if not all, of the rest of his life in a state prison.

Assholes give responsible gun owners a bad name.

You betray your lack of knowledge of the law on self defense in Florida as most on here do. I have only noticed 3 or maybe 4 posters who seem to have a good understanding of the law on self defense in Florida.

First of all what you saw or what any of the jurors saw on the video is of little relevance....the law of self defense in Florida is based on the perception of the defendant....as in...'was he in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm?'

That is the essence of the law on self defense in Florida....now very intelligent people can and do have different perspectives on whether or not the black thug was retreating.

But that is neither here nor there....what the jurors should have concentrated on was whether or not Drejka had a reasonable fear of his life being in danger or of great bodily harm.

All this b.s. we see on here of folks going on and on about he had no business pointing out to someone they were illegally parked is irrelevant...has no legal bearing on this case at all.

I think where the jurors dropped the ball was that they were concentrating on their own opinions of whether or not the black guy was retreating.

What they should have been concentrating on was whether or not there was enough evidence to indicate Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm. That would have been following the law.

In the prosecutors summation he kept going on and on about how they should watch the video...of course watch the video but do not let your opinion of what happened divert you from your real duty............of determing whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm.

But the prosecution did not try to enlighten the jury on that they just harped on watch the video, watch the video...understanding the jurors would forget what they were really supposed to to do as in to concentrate on whether or not Drejka was in reasonable fear of life.

Here are the facts that need to be considered in regards to whether or not Drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life or of great bodily harm

First of all he had been assaulted---slammed to the ground without reason. He was doing nothing illegal and had done nothing illegal. All he had done or was doing was within the parameter of the rights of any citizen.

Now what was Drejka likely to have thought about that? The jurors should have considered how that could have affected Drejka......violently slammed to the ground....very definitely it most likely put him in fear....how could it not...he did not even know who it was. When he is able to raise up he sees a black guy still hovering around him. It is only natural and reasonable to believe that put him in fear of life or at least of great bodily harm.

I think it is perfectly reasonable to believe he may have been in fear of his life or of great bodily harm....very possible and reasonable that he was in fear of his life.

Maybe not everyone would be...maybe none of you would be ...but we have to remember you and the jury have the benefit of hindsight and watching a slow motion video.

Drejka did not have the benefit of hindsight nor the ability to watch a slow motion video to figure out what was happening. All he knew was that he had been slammed to the ground for no justifiable reason and the perp was still very,very close the estimates range from 10 to l2 ft. how much time would it have taken the black guy to cover that distance...he could have been back on top of Drejka in a split second. That is the reality of the scenario on that parking lot.

Also they should have considered but I really doubt they did that Drejka had been dazed and was disoriented and at least in a mild state of shock. Did this affect his ability to determine whether or not the black guy was retreating?...of course it would and most likely did....but also we must remember that what Drejka was concentrating on was---how to neutralize the threat...that was his number one responsibility in order to preserve his own life.

To do that he had to get his weapon out which was difficult for him because his right arm had been injured....but he did managed to get it out and as soon as the black guy saw the weapon he stopped his advance on drejka....that is correct ...even after he had already slammed drejka to the ground he was still going towards Drejka...that is on the video as well but most seem to have not seen that. Why would he be doing that...he had already seperated Drejka from his wife which some claim is all he wanted to do.....nonsense....he wanted to inflict more damage on drejka as in kick him in the head etc.

Drejka fter getting his weapon out he had to bring it up to sight it on the threat...since his right arm was injured he had to use his left arm to support the weapon as he sighted it on the target. After doing all that he only had a couple of seconds to make a life or death decision.....to fire.....or not to fire.

What any of you or any of the jurors would do is irrelevant....the only relevant thing is was Drejka in reasonable fear of his life?

I think you are a little confused.

First of all you seem to not understand how juries look at evidence. It is obvious to me that Drejka was found guilty because the jury perceived McG to be retreating. That is the only logical reason to find him guilty.

Juries do weird things all the time. Look at OJ walking free and the Casey Anthony case. I did listen to most of the Anthony trial and it was obvious to me that the ***** was a murderer but 12 other people decided differently.

Assault is a bad thing. We all can agree on that. However, there are different kinds of assault. If somebody assaults me with a baseball bat and I can get to my carry weapon the sonofabitch is going to die. If he pushes me down I will be pissed but probably not kill him.

Drejka may have been a stupid shithead that didn't understand what was going on. He may have been scared to death or he may have just thought he had the right to kill the thug and did it. I think he was simply beaucoup dinky dau.

Where you are obviously confused is thinking that it was Drejka's judgement that made him guilty or not guilty. It was not his judgement. It was the jury's judgement and they listened to all the evidence and found him guilty. If you or I were on the jury we may have voted differently but we weren't were we?

This case is a great examples of why you need to be very careful if you ever decide to use your carry weapon. If you chose badly you could be spending the rest of your life in jail. Drejka chose badly. He chose badly in initiating a confrontation over a stupid thing and he chose badly when he pulled the trigger.

Drejka was a piece of shit. He was a known hothead and probably crazy. If he was pissed about somebody parking in a handicap spot then he should have copied down the tag number and reported it to the police. Instead he got in a big argument and killed somebody and now he is facing 20+ years in jail. Dumbass!

Also that thug who attacked him was also a piece of shit. He had a rap sheet a mile long. He could have shoved twenty other people and went home that afternoon. But he shoved the one guy with a gun that was willing to use it and now he is dead.

Plenty of dumbassery to go around.

"It says nothing about the defendants judgement....it deals strictly with the defendants state of mind, his perception..........aka..............did the defendant have a REASONABLE fear that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm."

This is the dumbest shit I've read on this thread.

A defendant in such a case has to have a reasonable fear of imminent death or great bodily harm. It's in the hands and hearts of the jury to decide if that fear was reasonable. It's not the jury's job to mindlessly accept a defendant's claim that his fear was reasonable. If that were the case, one could shoot and kill a jaywalker and explain to a jury they should be acquitted because they had a reasonable fear of death or great bodily harm from the person crossing a street illegally.

The jury in this case weighed the evidence and determined Drejka's claim of such fear of imminent death or great bodily harm .... was ... not reasonable.

I have pointed out more than once that it is the jury's obligation and duty by law to determine whether or not the defendant was in reasonable fear of his life and or grievious bodily harm....try and keep up.

Unfortunately, the jury did not consider all the evidence that would indicate Drejka could have been and most likely was in fear of his life and so forth.

What the jury did was to go by their perception that the black guy was retreating. Thus they erroneously concluded Drejka should not have fired....what they should have been doing in order to follow the law would have been to weigh all the reasons that indicated drejka was in fear of his life....instead they focused on their perception when they should have been focusing on Drejkas perception or belief that his life was in danger or that he might suffer grievious bodily harm.

I have posted all the reasons why he should have been considered in fear of his life. I am not going back over all that. It has been posted and can be seen. The jury did not consider all of these reasons that would support drejka could have been in reasonable fear of his life and most likely was.

I will mention one major thing they definitely overlooked...drejas's mental impairment as a result of all the trauma he had experienced. That alone is enough to over-rule the b.s. of the black guy retreating as in drejka due to his mental condition did not notice that the black guy had taken a few steps backward which was irrelevant anyhow....as he was still in striking distance and thus still a threat.....Drejka he had more important things on his mind like what he must do to eliminate the threat to his life.

The jury foreman has come out now and said that the jury's perception that the black guy was retreating was why they voted to convict.

That proves my point...they focused on their perception and not the perception of the defendant when the law on self defense plainly states it is the belief or the perception of the defendant that determines whether or not he can justifiably use lethal force.

The jury was in error and the statement by the jury foreman proves that.

All of this will come out in the appeal process. If the jury had an adequate understanding of the law on self defense they would have not made such a mistake.

"I have pointed out more than once that it is the jury's obligation and duty by law to determine whether or not the defendant was in reasonable fear of his life and or grievious bodily harm....try and keep up."

And they did. Their conclusion was Drejka's fear was not reasonable.

"Unfortunately, the jury did not consider all the evidence that would indicate Drejka could have been and most likely was in fear of his life and so forth."

So you say. The video shows otherwise.

The video also shows you're dead wrong on a number of points.

You claim McGlockton didn't step back until he saw a gun. The video shows he began stepping back as soon as Drejka reached into his pocket.

You claim McGlockton wasn't retreating. Thd video shows McGlockton taking 4 steps backwards and then turning away from Drejka.

You claim Drejka was injured and had difficulty grabbing his gun. The video shows it took Drejka no more than one second to draw his firearm.

That you can view that video and see things in it that are plainly not there goes a long way to dismiss your case that the jury got this one wrong.

 

[Faun]

Admiral's running his mouth about things he doesn't know.

See Pinellas County sheriff's active service calls

Did you intend to prove yourself wrong? Not a single service call is in Clearwater.

Introduce yourself to the other members of the self-inflicted racist dumbass club!

I would, but I am not a member!

Right now..give it time..

Here's one.

CAD Event Details

LOLOLOL

You dumbfucking moron, that's the Putnam County Sheriff's Office, not the Pinellas County Sheriff's Office; and that address is in Satsuma, in Putnam County.

105 Clearwater Road, Satsuma, FL

Yeah, Putnam is a long ways from Pinellas, oops.
That doesn't change what I've experienced over the years, ******.

One day we played the little brothers football right behind the surfside.

There was the kickoff, and I blew past all defenders and stuck the holy crap out of the poor kid that caught the ball. They made 0 yards on return. Aannnnd I was worried about his health for around 10 minutes.

We won, too. I do remember huddling and gasping for breath, though.

The lil bros were around 21, we were pushing 26-ish around then.

Just lick your wounds and **** off, Mary.