Father indicted in death of drunk driver
 

http://www.chron.com/news/houston-te...er-4270089.php

Alvin is 10 minutes from here. Very tragic, it will be interesting to see how a jury views this.

I'd like to be in that jury!

The guy shouldn't have been out, free, to be shot.

Tricky one.
Temporary insanity is the most likely route, though walkng to get the weapon then disposing of it shows a level of calculated action.
Looks like a verdict of murder is the likely outcome, lets just hope they don't have mandatory sentencing.

Could well be but a big part of me sympathises with the father of the two children.

Me Too!

I agree with Tribesman. The action was calculated.

I think just about everyone rightly sympathises with the father, but at the end of the day what has that really got do do with it?
That is why the "I want to be on the jury" comments don't make sense, sympathising with either the victim or the accused or the victim who is the accused should play no actual role in an impartial verdict.

Yeah, i know your right Tribe. The comment doesn't make sense with respect to the law, but made me feel a little better saying it also. Being the father of three girls, there is no way i could be impartial, ever. :nope:

Similar here.

My heart is with the father, but my brain is with the law this time. As I see it, it was calculated action. Despair does not save you from penalty. To let this one get away would mean to open the door wide for lynching and mob law.

Floppy & Berbunch. I know, I have attacked people after an accident without even the added weight of personal fatalities involved, it is easy to flip out. In one case I still wish I had actually killed the bastard involved.
But the core of the issue is that you must still be held accountable for your actions.

This is true sir. Hell, I wouldn't have even bothered to dispose of the weapon afterwards. As, i don't think after that, i would have cared what was going to happen to me. Would have just waited for the officers to show up and take me away.

Of course, this is all speculation, as I hope something like that never happens. But, for this guy it has, and no one can really know what he is going through. Darn SAD situation no matter how you look at it. :down:

But if you were thinking clearly you would have thought about what would happen to your wife and surviving daughter. Which is why temporary insanity might work.

Sympathizing has everything to do with this case because the jury will be made of other humans. If ONE of them decides the drunk deserved it, he walks. We could argue technical guilt, but it will be decided by 12 citizens, logic and the law be damned. The DA is holding the guy accountable by charging him, but the jury can do whatever they like.

Calling it premeditated because of the effort to walk the short distance home, then come and shoot the guy might be technically accurate, and will result in the appropriate charge, but convincing a jury to put him away on murder might be a stretch. Sometimes DAs need to think tactically, and in this case sympathy is probably high enough that they'd do better to push a much lesser charge as he did society a favor by killing this drunk POS.

Here in NM, the news is filled with DUI cases where the idiot perp has literally dozens of prior stops.

It will be deemed as a crime of passion. Such sudden rage he took the route he did.

Dunno what the deal would be in TX about lesser, included charges. Doesn't seem far-fetched that many in a jury might not want a murder charge.

If I had to find it murder or nothing, I'd pick "nothing." I'd be open to a lesser charge of manslaughter. I think that is possible most places.

Society must be protected so my mind says that the shooter must be punished. My heart would probably go with the shoot the drunk driver sob solution that the poor father ended up with. What a tragedy, though.

Agreed :yep:

Whenever firepower trumps the law you no longer have a society, you have anarchy. This father merely created more victims and did not even allow for due process to run its course.

What happened was terrible and as a father I can understand but never condone vigilantism without legal consequences. I hope he gets death but instead he'll be acquitted, become a hero and make a gazillion bucks on the daytime talkshow circuit and for selling his version of events as the movie of the week.

I disagree.

His actions were against the law. However, the law was created to protect the innocent. The law failed - resulting in the death of his two sons. An impotent law is no law at all.

Charge him for murder. In the US - he would likely go free. The reason - jury nullification. If the law failed him and his family - why should it stand to further punish him and his family for its own failure.