A man accused of attempted murder wants help from a former police officer in his capacity of an expert witness, to convince a jury he was acting in self-defense when he shot someone at a protest of a statue in northern New Mexico.
The assertion that Martinez acted in self-defense when he shot activist Jacob Johns during a protest forms the basis of the defense's case. Video from the incident shows Martinez, armed with a concealed handgun, surging toward a peaceful group gathered to express their discontent over a city decision related to the statue of Juan de Oñate, a figure many associate with colonial violence. The defense plans to call as an expert witness a retired police chief who will explain the self-defense "principles" Martinez allegedly followed.
Martinez shot Jacob Johns, a Hopi, Akimel O’odham activist from Washington, once in the chest. He then allegedly pointed the gun at Malaya Peixinho. The gun jammed, and he fled the scene.
The prosecution argues that Fay is not relevant to this case and his expertise in the police use of force is not applicable. They emphasize that the legal standards for police are different and, in some respects, quite a bit different from the standards that apply to civilians. District Attorney Mary Carmack-Altwies expresses this concern rather well when she says that introducing Fay's testimony could "mislead the jury by conflating the distinct frameworks within which police and civilians operate." And indeed, this is a concern worth having because it is certainly the case that police operate under a different set of standards when it comes to the use of force.
Fay's qualifications go beyond law enforcement, the defense asserts. They counter that he is well-suited to instruct both police and civilians in self-defense. Their argument veers close to the accusation that the prosecution is attempting to frame Martinez's actions as something less than a natural, human response to being cornered and confronted by three men. It is an argument about whether using a weapon is a last resort—Eglash in his closing and Potter in his testimony both claimed that using a gun is never the answer—or whether it is sometimes the only way out when someone is trying to kill you.
First Judicial District Attorney Mary Carmack-Altwies wrote in a court briefing that Fay’s testimony would “undoubtedly confuse the jury by testifying to a police officer’s use of force when the Defendant is a private civilian.”
“A strict line falls between the use of force by law enforcement officers and private civilians: civilians are not authorized to use force,” Santa Fe’s top prosecutor wrote. “The standards of evaluation between the two are very separate and distinct.”
In response, Martinez’s attorneys Nicole Moss and Marshall Ray wrote Fay is certified to train both police and private citizens in the use of force in self-defense.
He’s qualified “by knowledge, skill, and training” to help the jury understand the “appropriate response to use of force by any human on another human,” they wrote.
Seth Stoughton, a former police officer, turned law professor, has shed much-needed light on the differences between civilian self-defense and police use of force, with an emphasis on the legal and ethical reasons for these differences. He reminds us that, although self-defense and use of force may look similar from the outside, "the rules are different." Enforced at our peril, these different rules are supposed to protect two of our nation's most cherished values: the rule of law and the right of individuals to govern their own lives without unreasonable interference by the state.
Stoughton refuses to take on self-defense cases for civilians because he sees the values in play as too unlike those that he and his colleagues uphold in the evaluation of police use of force. In a self-defense case, the jury is asked to consider the actions of the defendant from the perspective of a reasonable person. That is, they must decide whether the person being defended would have had a reasonable basis for thinking he or she was about to be harmed; and whether the person being defended, or the person doing the defending, acted in a way that a reasonable person would have acted under the same circumstances.
The controversies over the statue of the Virgin of Guadalupe and the ruling in the case of Martinez illustrate the dangers of mixing personal property disputes with larger social and political issues. They give the appearance of a struggle over fundamental democratic rights. Yet Stoughton and his team from the Defense of Human Rights Clinic at the Harvard Law School paint a somewhat different picture of the situation. They suggest there is no legal basis for using deadly force to protect a piece of property. They especially highlight the misunderstanding at the crux of the Martinez case: that one can use force to protect personal property and, by extension, a symbol imbued with deep political and social meaning.
The way Stoughton critiques violence as a way to settle disputes about monuments is especially effective. He depicts a brand of democracy that places dialogue, voting, and engagement above direct action. And when he calls violence 'fundamentally anti-democratic and un-American,' he reminds us that a democratic society is one in which we figure out how to get along without using force, and that the ability to do so is what makes us robust and what makes us a long-standing republic.
To wrap up, Stoughton pushes for a clearer contemplation of what it means to live in a democratic society and, especially, what it means to inhere the sort of responsibilities we are supposed to take on as individuals in a society governed by the consent of the governed. He nudges us to reflect on how we deal with the kind of really disrespectful behavior that a protest might represent if you happen to think the cause being protested is worthwhile. I should probably point out that the behavior of where and when to put a "protest" of any kind is itself a contentious issue.
E.G.Price
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Use_of_force
https://witnessdirectory.com/signup.php
