A Bexar County jury on Wednesday acquitted Ezekiel Gilbert of murder in the death of a 23-year-old Craigslist escort.
Gilbert, 30, embraced defense attorneys Bobby Barrera and Roy Barrera Sr. with tears in his eyes after the not guilty verdict was read aloud by state District Judge Mary Román.
Outside the courtroom, Gilbert thanked God, the Barrera family and the jury for being able to “see what wasn't the truth” and for the “second chance.”
Had he been convicted, he could have faced up to life in prison for the slaying of Lenora Ivie Frago who died about seven months after she was shot in the neck and paralyzed on Christmas Eve 2009. Gilbert admitted shooting Frago.
“I sincerely regret the loss of the life of Ms. Frago,” Gilbert said Wednesday. “I've been in a mental prison the past four years of my life. I have nightmares. If I see guns on TV where people are getting killed, I change the channel.”
The verdict came after almost 11 hours of deliberations that stretched over two days. The trial began May 17 but had a long hiatus after a juror unexpectedly had to leave town for a funeral.
During closing arguments Tuesday, Gilbert's defense team conceded the shooting did occur but said the intent wasn't to kill. Gilbert's actions were justified, they argued, because he was trying to retrieve stolen property: the $150 he paid Frago. It became theft when she refused to have sex with him or give the money back, they said.
Gilbert testified earlier Tuesday that he had found Frago's escort ad on Craigslist and believed sex was included in her $150 fee. But instead, Frago walked around his apartment and after about 20 minutes left, saying she had to give the money to her driver, he said.
That driver, the defense contended, was Frago's pimp and her partner in the theft scheme.
The Texas law that allows people to use deadly force to recover property during a nighttime theft was put in place for “law-abiding” citizens, prosecutors Matt Lovell and Jessica Schulze countered. It's not intended for someone trying to force another person into an illegal act such as prostitution, they argued.
1. In Texas, it is legal to shoot people if they steal your stuff at night
2. If you're white enough, the jury will apply that law to hookers.
3. Texas wins the WTF Award, permanently.
Umm, since prostitution is illegal in Texas and you can't enforce an illegal contract, how the fuck is this anything but Jury Nullification? I mean she's just a whore, right?
We pissing our pants yet?
-Negan
You got your shittin' pants on? Because you’re about to Shit. Your. Pants!
-Negan
He who can, does; he who cannot, teaches.
-George Bernard Shaw
What an interesting legal tangle. So theft is illegal, prostitution is illegal, use of deadly force to recover property during night time is legal. Is intent to prostitute a crime?
So if she had had sex with him, illegal prostitution would have happened. If she had returned the money and left, a canceled prostitution would have happened (illegal?). Instead she took the money and left (illegal) from an intended prostitution (illegal?) and he used deadly force to recover it (legal).
I can see how the jury came to it's decision, since the attempted prostitution itself would probably be it's own case.
Regardless of weather his actions were legal, it's fucked up that anyone would shoot someone over 150 dollars or that the law would condone it.
The title of this thread is false. Shooting hookers is not legal. Shooting people over stolen property is. It's fucked up, but it's not what the OP claims it is. Also, while it wouldn't really surprise me if racism was involved, there is no evidence of that in the article, so assuming the guy got off because he was white is unwarranted unless fgalkin knows something he's not sharing with us.
The Romulan Republic wrote:Regardless of weather his actions were legal, it's fucked up that anyone would shoot someone over 150 dollars or that the law would condone it.
The title of this thread is false. Shooting hookers is not legal. Shooting people over stolen property is. It's fucked up, but it's not what the OP claims it is. Also, while it wouldn't really surprise me if racism was involved, there is no evidence of that in the article, so assuming the guy got off because he was white is unwarranted unless fgalkin knows something he's not sharing with us.
The thread title is only false to the extent that it is actually perceived hookers that can be shot. It is only stated that he believed sex to be part of the contract.
"Yeah, funny how that works - you giving hungry people food they vote for you. You give homeless people shelter they vote for you. You give the unemployed a job they vote for you.
Maybe if the conservative ideology put a roof overhead, food on the table, and employed the downtrodden the poor folk would be all for it, too". - Broomstick
This is a weird one. It seems like the defense played a few angles that worked out for them. Namely the insinuation that the original intention was to steal from Gilbert (and others) rather than offering services. The jury also had to contend with the dumbshit notion that since Gilbert didn't intend to kill anyone (merely firing his rifle recklessly into a fleeing vehicle and managing to hit someone in the neck) a murder charge shouldn't have been used, rather an aggravated assault. Also as part of this, the defense seems to have stated that since Frago was merely paralyzed, brain-damaged, and on a respirator, that Gilbert didn't actually murder her, since her family decided to take her off life-support: she dies by their hands, not Gilbert.
NOTE: I'm just conjecturing based on extremely limited information what with all the media aggregate BS reporting these days. The fucking UK has better info than local sources.
The whole case is pretty fucked up. I wasn't even aware you could claim defense of property during the (attempted) commission of a crime, namely prostitution. There was a case many years back where this line was tried when some weed dealer got robbed during a drug deal in his home. He tried to claim defense of property but was shut down.
How exactly can you shoot somebody in the neck without intent to kill him? At least the prosecutors seemed to know exactly what was wrong, in contrast to the mouthbreathers in the jury who essentially said 'good riddance to the whore'.
Carve another notch in the "legal system fuckup" baton.
Dr. Trainwreck wrote:How exactly can you shoot somebody in the neck without intent to kill him? At least the prosecutors seemed to know exactly what was wrong, in contrast to the mouthbreathers in the jury who essentially said 'good riddance to the whore'.
Carve another notch in the "legal system fuckup" baton.
The jury has always had the right to say not guilty, regardless of evidence. Them doing so is not a legal system fuckup. If this were an appeals court and the judges making a whacky ruling you might have a point.
TheFeniX wrote:Also as part of this, the defense seems to have stated that since Frago was merely paralyzed, brain-damaged, and on a respirator, that Gilbert didn't actually murder her, since her family decided to take her off life-support: she dies by their hands, not Gilbert.
I can't say I disagree with that reasoning. It's actually even more tenuous than you suggest: Gilbert didn't directly cause her brain damage* and neither her paralysis nor her brain damage directly caused her death.
*
She was dependant on a respirator, which became disconnected months after the shooting and caused brain damage.
Of course, we have only his word to go on that he didn't have sex with her, or that she purportedly agreed to sex at all. She could have agreed to do a striptease at his house for $150, he demanded sex afterward, she declined, and when she tried to leave, he shot "near" her.
Darmalus wrote:What an interesting legal tangle. So theft is illegal, prostitution is illegal, use of deadly force to recover property during night time is legal. Is intent to prostitute a crime?
So if she had had sex with him, illegal prostitution would have happened. If she had returned the money and left, a canceled prostitution would have happened (illegal?). Instead she took the money and left (illegal) from an intended prostitution (illegal?) and he used deadly force to recover it (legal).
I can see how the jury came to it's decision, since the attempted prostitution itself would probably be it's own case.
Since prostitution is illegal, it was not advertised in the escort ad. Thus, Gilbert's assumption that he was entitled to sex was just that, an assumption. The escort's manager explicitly denied that sex was included in the deal during the trial.
Thus, his claim of theft is entirely unwarranted, as nowhere was it specified that $150 would buy him sex. She DID perform a lapdance, which is what was mentioned in the ad. Since he could not show that a theft had occurred, the law should not have applied to him.
Darmalus wrote:What an interesting legal tangle. So theft is illegal, prostitution is illegal, use of deadly force to recover property during night time is legal. Is intent to prostitute a crime?
So if she had had sex with him, illegal prostitution would have happened. If she had returned the money and left, a canceled prostitution would have happened (illegal?). Instead she took the money and left (illegal) from an intended prostitution (illegal?) and he used deadly force to recover it (legal).
I can see how the jury came to it's decision, since the attempted prostitution itself would probably be it's own case.
Since prostitution is illegal, it was not advertised in the escort ad. Thus, Gilbert's assumption that he was entitled to sex was just that, an assumption. The escort's manager explicitly denied that sex was included in the deal during the trial.
Thus, his claim of theft is entirely unwarranted, as nowhere was it specified that $150 would buy him sex. She DID perform a lapdance, which is what was mentioned in the ad. Since he could not show that a theft had occurred, the law should not have applied to him.
Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin
Sounds like an "everyone knows" sort of problem. If "everyone knows" that prostitutes use escort ads to get business, just mentioning it was a Craigslist escort ad effectively told the jury she was selling sex no matter what else was actually said. Even happened to me, I read Craigslist escort ad and it became a "fact" that she was a prostitute and the promise of sex was assumed. If the prosecution didn't pick up on this, or failed to dispel this notion, it would explain the verdict.
TheFeniX wrote:Also as part of this, the defense seems to have stated that since Frago was merely paralyzed, brain-damaged, and on a respirator, that Gilbert didn't actually murder her, since her family decided to take her off life-support: she dies by their hands, not Gilbert.
I can't say I disagree with that reasoning. It's actually even more tenuous than you suggest: Gilbert didn't directly cause her brain damage* and neither her paralysis nor her brain damage directly caused her death.
*
She was dependant on a respirator, which became disconnected months after the shooting and caused brain damage.
Turns out if you shoot someone and it later causes them to die from complications you get charged with murder. And if a jury full of mouth breathers like you gets to oversee the case the murderer goes free.
We pissing our pants yet?
-Negan
You got your shittin' pants on? Because you’re about to Shit. Your. Pants!
-Negan
He who can, does; he who cannot, teaches.
-George Bernard Shaw
Flagg wrote:Turns out if you shoot someone and it later causes them to die from complications you get charged with murder. And if a jury full of mouth breathers like you gets to oversee the case the murderer goes free.
She didn't die from complications, she died because her family killed her. You don't see the problem with calling euthanasia or suicide murder?
Flagg wrote:Turns out if you shoot someone and it later causes them to die from complications you get charged with murder. And if a jury full of mouth breathers like you gets to oversee the case the murderer goes free.
She didn't die from complications, she died because her family killed her. You don't see the problem with calling euthanasia or suicide murder?
Prosecutors changing charges based on the survival or death of victims happens all the time for good reason, even if family was the one that "pulled the plug." After-all, being brain-dead and requiring drugs and a respirator to keep your heart going is being alive only in the medical and legal sense.
What seemed to cock things up was the "medical complication" that lead to the actual brain-death. The defense may have been slick enough to convince just one person on the Jury that Frago would have made a recovery if not for that, thus giving doubt to it being actual Murder in the 2nd. It's a shame they didn't give the jury a set of charges for them to deliberate on such as aggravated assault and/or criminally negligent homicide, although I'm not a lawyer so I don't know what's involved in that.
All that said, this is Bexar county, so it could just be idiots.
Flagg wrote:Turns out if you shoot someone and it later causes them to die from complications you get charged with murder. And if a jury full of mouth breathers like you gets to oversee the case the murderer goes free.
She didn't die from complications, she died because her family killed her. You don't see the problem with calling euthanasia or suicide murder?
Are you retarded? Wait, I already know the answer to that.
There is a fuckload of case law and precedent for charging someone with murder for a death due to complications. If he hadn't shot her in the neck she wouldn't have needed the respirator, she wouldn't have become braindead, and she wouldn't have fucking died. Do some fucking research before opening your idiot mouth and sticking your idiot foot in it.
We pissing our pants yet?
-Negan
You got your shittin' pants on? Because you’re about to Shit. Your. Pants!
-Negan
He who can, does; he who cannot, teaches.
-George Bernard Shaw
Actually, he does have a point. Gilbert should have been charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, not murder, as well as a slew of lesser charges, since he technically only turned her into a vegetable, not killed her.
fgalkin wrote:Actually, he does have a point. Gilbert should have been charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, not murder, as well as a slew of lesser charges, since he technically only turned her into a vegetable, not killed her.
Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin
It doesn't matter. If you shoot someone in the commission of a crime and they die from it, even years later, it's a murder charge. In fact if someone dies during the commission of a crime, even if it's your accomplice, in many states that's a murder charge for the surviving criminal. This is not controversial.
We pissing our pants yet?
-Negan
You got your shittin' pants on? Because you’re about to Shit. Your. Pants!
-Negan
He who can, does; he who cannot, teaches.
-George Bernard Shaw
California Code wrote:194. To make the killing either murder or manslaughter, it is not
requisite that the party die within three years and a day after the
stroke received or the cause of death administered. If death occurs
beyond the time of three years and a day, there shall be a rebuttable
presumption that the killing was not criminal. The prosecution shall
bear the burden of overcoming this presumption. In the computation
of time, the whole of the day on which the act was done shall be
reckoned the first.
Gaidin wrote:The jury has always had the right to say not guilty, regardless of evidence. Them doing so is not a legal system fuckup. If this were an appeals court and the judges making a whacky ruling you might have a point.
I'd call it a flaw if anybody in the entire process had the right to simply ignore evidence.
The jury is required to interpret the evidence in the first place, so whether or not they "ignored" it can be a matter of opinion in a lot of cases.
That may not be true here, but it's an ongoing issue: if you can't trust juries to decide whether the evidence justifies a conviction, you shouldn't use them at all.
Gaidin wrote:The jury has always had the right to say not guilty, regardless of evidence. Them doing so is not a legal system fuckup. If this were an appeals court and the judges making a whacky ruling you might have a point.
I'd call it a flaw if anybody in the entire process had the right to simply ignore evidence.
Jury Nullification is a pretty important thing even if it has the potential to be abused. The ability to vote your conscious is already attacked by prosecutors and judges enough without private citizens thinking it's a bad idea.
TheFeniX wrote:NOTE: I'm just conjecturing based on extremely limited information what with all the media aggregate BS reporting these days. The fucking UK has better info than local sources.
The whole case is pretty fucked up. I wasn't even aware you could claim defense of property during the (attempted) commission of a crime, namely prostitution. There was a case many years back where this line was tried when some weed dealer got robbed during a drug deal in his home. He tried to claim defense of property but was shut down.
According to the article the guy used a fucking assault rifle to shoot her
Don't suppose you have a link for that drug dealer? I did wonder if the same laws applied if a dealer made off with money without handing over the drugs and was shot.
EnterpriseSovereign wrote:According to the article the guy used a fucking assault rifle to shoot her
Don't read to much into that. The media misuses the AR label constantly, incorrectly attributing it to pretty much any semi-automatic rifle. "Assault Rifle" gets more hits and, as you demonstrated, a bigger reaction. They also claim shit like Barret .50 cals being able to shoot down aircraft.
Don't suppose you have a link for that drug dealer? I did wonder if the same laws applied if a dealer made off with money without handing over the drugs and was shot.
Unlikely. I dug up the article way back around 2000 for an assignment in Government. We had to find something where a law was used (successfully or not) against it's intended purpose or one that would target a group in a round about way, like the whole "no red lipstick in downtown" laws.
