UPDATE: COA panel, headed by
Michael Talbot, one of the most racist, backward judges on the bench, has
denied the prosecution’s appeal of Judge Cynthia Gray Hathaway’s dismissal of
involuntary manslaughter charges against Aiyana Jones’ killer, Joseph Weekley.
The appeals court order was
posted in George Hunter’s article in the Detroit News before it was even up on
the court website, indicating that he got it from his usual source, defense
attorney Steve Fishman. The decision is at Weekley final COA order.
Supporters of Aiyana Jones and
her family are calling for all to come out to Ferguson, MO this weekend, Oct.
10-13 for a national protest against police killings and the disregard for
Black lives in this country, called by the Organization for Black Struggle. See
post below at
http://voiceofdetroit.net/2014/10/06/ferguson-weekend-of-resistance-justice-for-mike-brown-oct-10-13-2014/
for all details.
VOD published stories months
ago that a scenario where Weekley would plead guilty to the high misdemeanor
charge of reckless use of a firearm
resulting in death, and get probation,
was being planned. See
http://voiceofdetroit.net/2014/04/18/dad-of-aiyana-jones-7-killed-by-detroit-police-sentenced-to-40-60-years-in-blake-killing.
AND
By Diane Bukowski
A state Court of Appeals panel
is currently reviewing the Wayne County Prosecutor’s office appeal of Judge
Cynthia Gray Hathaway’s order dismissing an involuntary manslaughter charge
against Detroit Police Officer Joseph Weekley in the death of Aiyana Jones, 7,
on May 16, 2010.
The panel is headed by Appeals Judge Michael
Talbot and includes Kurtis T. Wilder and Kirsten Frank Kelley.
In their appeal, Wayne County
Prosecutor Kym Worthy, Chief of Research on Appeals and Training Timothy
Baughman, and Asst. Prosecuting Attorney Thomas Chambers argue that the case
should go to the jury as presented. They say that Judge Hathaway’s ruling was a
“legal error” contrary to her actual finding in the case, and cite a 1995
Michigan Supreme Court opinion defining involuntary manslaughter.
Hathaway said as part of her
ruling that “the trier of fact can decide if the Defendantfailed to use the
ordinary care to avoid injuring another when to a reasonable person it must
have been apparent that the result was likely to be serious injury.”
The prosecutor then cites
People v. Datema, where the high court ruled that the crime of involuntary
manslaughter can be committed EITHER with the intent to injure OR in a grossly
negligent manner.
“In the latter instance,” it
says, criminal liability is imposed because, although the defendants’ acts are
not inherently wrong, the defendant has acted or failed to act with awareness
of the risk to safety and in willful disregard of the safety of others.”
According to the transcript of
the Oct. 3 arguments, Asst. Prosecutor Robert Moran said, “He [Weekley] knew
what the standard was, he knew what ordinary care was required because they go
in there with all this powerful equipment, an MP5 submachine gun, a ballistic
shield, vest, whatever the case may be, they’re trained how to use it, they’re
trained the proper way to use it. He could have avoided injury if he had
followed his training, he didn’t. As a result of not following his training and
not following the mandates of ordinary care, someone was killed.”
Numerous Special Response Team
members testifed earlier that they are repeatedly trained to keep their index
finger on the slide of the gun, off the trigger, even if involved in a
confrontation. One officer said the training results in automatic “muscle response.”
A weapons expert said Weekley’s
gun could not be fired accidentally, only by exerting eight to nine pounds of
pressure on the trigger.
Defense Attorney Steve Fishman
cited only the U.S. Supreme Court case, People V. Evans, which Detroit News
reporter George Hunter included in his Oct. 3 story, without acknowledging that
Fishman was his source for finding the case.
In that case, Fishman said,
“The United States Supreme Court has clearly stated that the trial judge’s
ruling cannot be appealed and that retrial on that count is prohibited by the
Double Jeopary clause of the United States Constitution. Therefore, the
prosecution’s emergency application for leave to appeal should be denied.”
However the Appeals Court
rules, courts have proven throughout this country that justice for people of
color in particular is rarely rendered, as in the acquittal of George Zimmerman
for killing Travyon Martin, and Oakland County Prosecutor Jessica Cooper’s
refusal to prosecute Northland Mall security officers who killed McKenzie
Cochran, 25, as he cried out, “I can’t breathe” and “I’m dying” while they held
him down.
Many hope that actions like the
protests in Ferguson, including the one planned for this weekend, cited below
in VOD’s post at http://voiceofdetroit.net/2014/10/06/ferguson-weekend-of-resistance-justice-for-mike-brown-oct-10-13-2014/,
will eventually provide justice.
