Jury Finds Yanez Not Guilty In The Death of Philando Castile
After approximately 29 hours of deliberations, the jury in the manslaughter case of St. Anthony, Minnesota police officer Jeronimo Yanez has returned a verdict of not guilty. Yanez was also charged with two felony counts of intentional discharge of a firearm that endangers safety for firing his weapon. When he shot and killed Philando Castile, Castile’s girlfriend and her 4-year old daughter were passengers in the car. Bullets barely missed both of them.
During deliberations, the jury requested to review the transcript of Yanez’s interview with the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension. Judge William H. Leery III denied their request. By Wednesday, the jury was deadlocked, but the judge sent them back to keep deliberating.
Kare11 reports that this morning, the jury handed a note to Judge Leary III requesting to have the transcript of Yanez’s testimony while on the stand and the cross examination read aloud in court. The judge denied their request.
We followed the trial at this link.
If there are press conferences filmed later where the videos are on Youtube so they can be embedded here, I will post them in the comment section.
UPDATE:
The Star Tribune reported that Yanez has been terminated from his position.
“The City of St. Anthony has concluded that the public will be best served if Officer Yanez is no longer a police officer in our city,” the statement said. “The city intends to offer Officer Yanez a voluntary separation agreement to help him transition to another career other than being a St. Anthony officer.”
Yanez will not return to active duty.
Posted on 06/16/2017, in Philando Castile, Trial Videos and tagged Jeronimo Yanez, manslaughter, Minnesota, not guilty, Philando Castile, terminated, verdict. Bookmark the permalink. 50 Comments.
http://time.com/4397086/minnesota-shooting-philando-castile-role-model-school/?xid=tcoshare
Excerpt:
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😥
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I’d say I’m surprised but I’m not.
*Bleeping* Cops can do whatever they want
and if we don’t like it, too *Bleeping* bad.
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Hi Jim.
I have to get back to completing a post I started last year about police discretion. I saw that happening in this case when the judge denied the requests of the jury to have access to transcripts. Judges also have discretion.
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Apparently the Police have the discretion to do whatever they dam well want to.
Sorry about the language/attitude but this sort of thing is becoming way too commonplace and there are too many people who are willing to sit back and let it happen as long as it isn’t happening to them.
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Jim,
Yes — as officers of the court, they have discretion to make any decision they want to make, even deadly decisions.
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Let’s see the three lines of defense that keeps cops from being convicted of crimes:
1) DAs
2) Purposely incompetent prosecution
3) Judge placing his thumb on the scale in favor of the accused cop
Did I miss anyone? oh yeah a jurors who lie to get on the jury knowing they won’t convict an officer regardless of the evidence.
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Roderick, those are good bullet points. There is one that is hidden from the public and jurors, but prosecutors and judges know about it. Cases involving law enforcement using deadly force are not litigated on the standard of beyond a reasonable doubt. They are litigated on the standard of abuse of discretion. Law enforcement are including among those called “officers of the court” and all officers of the court are given discretion in the decisions they make.
That is why prosecutors bring forth witnesses to talk about training that is thrown to the side by the defense in favor of presenting that the officer had discretion to use deadly force.
For juries, it then comes to the argument that the officer was given authority to use deadly force, rather than if the officer was reasonable in doing so.
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Exactly!
“Kare11 reports that this morning, the jury handed a note to Judge Leary III requesting to have the transcript of Yanez’s testimony while on the stand and the cross examination read aloud in court. The judge denied their request.”
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I ache for Philando’s mother.
Thanks for posting her response. People can gain much understanding if they listen to her every word.
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Here’s the full video of Valerie Castille’s reaction to the verdict with my transcript below:
Philando Castile’s mother reacts to verdict:
Transcript:
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how can there be peace when people breaking no laws and complying with instructions are murdered on video and the JUDGE sees to it that they walk?
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Bill,
I ask how can there be trust under the circumstances you give. Had I been on that jury and the judge denied me access to evidence entered at trial, I would not have made any verdict decision.
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https://twitter.com/xfilestrustno1/status/876400090822434817
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Something to think about….
dean James @dean8669 16s17 seconds ago
What’s more likely? Jurors of #PhilandoCastille have more access to info than us? Or that they are all racists?
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The jury made two requests for transcripts. The judge denied them both times. So, I would say that no, the jury did not have access to info so they could apply the facts and evidence to the law. Since the trial was not live streamed, we do not have the ability to look back at videos to re-hear what the jury wanted given to them by way of transcript.
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At the bottom of this moving piece of art are the words Created by so many beautiful hands for Philando Castile
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Beyond words….
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I wish that just once those who basically execute innocent and unarmed people would be held accountable. It is deplorable. Thank you as always for your report.
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While this verdict is disgusting, it will end up just being the tip of the iceberg due to tRump working so hard to return the equality movement to some where south of 1955! Well under a year in office he has managed to destroy many if not most of the gains that we had made over so many painfully long years… I am beyond disgusted with what our nation is becoming!
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Mothman,
What upsets me along with what you’ve pointed out is that people are not organized to be on the same page and work together to effectively advocate for equal justice. Training that teaches shoot to kill as if human beings are rapid animals without regards to the actual situation is, in my opinion, absolutely wrong.
Assigning officers to communities where they have no connection other than to get a paycheck is wrong, in my opinion. Officers need to understand the communities they serve beyond presumptions that everyone is a criminal or would-be criminal.
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Xena, A ship with no rudder is unable to be steered! The Democrats have NO leadership and thus have no real direction, and are floating around unable to go in a direction that would help or assist in resolving the problems in this nation. One large and as of yet unaddressed problem that creates the environment for racial divide is the rural vote, that the GOPTP is consistently controlling. While we can use gerrymandering as the excuse, and assign blame on the redistricting as the reason, but is that really the sole reason? When I look at the demographics of many rural voting districts and see that the population in the district is largely black or other minorities, yet the district voted solidly Republican, am I the only person that questions why? Could it be that the candidates offered by both sides do not represent the voters in the district and thus the voters simply abstain from voting? If we truly want change in this nation the we must make the effort to take control of the political process, and that my friend starts with the individual! It is easy to sit back and whine and cry and blame this and that for all of our problems, but until we are ready to get down into the ditches of the process nothing will change…
We have the need for change, we have the desire, but do we have the courage to actually act on the need and desire? Or will we continue to sit back and blame everyone and everything for the problems we face instead of assigning blame to the person staring back at us in the mirror!
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Mothman,
I don’t disagree with you. Historically, when people do not believe that any candidate is beneficial, they don’t vote for the lesser of two evils. I don’t necessarily agree with that and there have been times when I wrote in “Mickey Mouse” to reflect my disappointment in those on the ballot.
We do need candidates beyond the two major parties, and we also need candidates from the very districts that they are running to represent.
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Philando was polite and followed Ofc. Yanez’s instructions, but was killed anyway.
https://twitter.com/ShaunKing/status/875807902103207936
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Philando followed the law and told Ofc. Yanez he had concealed gun and permit.
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Just sickening! Now the dashcam video has been released and it is even more infuriating.
https://apple.news/AOQUAU1bZSUWdBoVjG3clZA
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Hi Caleb! I’d like to hear from the jurors and hopefully, at least two will come forth and say what happened during deliberations. By the judge denying them transcripts they requested, it conveys that jurors who wanted to vote guilty were going to depend on the transcripts and without them, they lacked support for a verdict of guilty. It could be the inconsistent statements made by Yanez.
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I wouldn’t be surprised if one of them comes out with a book in about 2-3 years.
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Here’s the dash cam video.
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Ofc. Yanez, was not even convicted of reckless discharge of a firearm, and yet the officer who had been standing on the passenger side of the vehicle scrambled back away to safety. That action by that officer tells me that Diamond Reynolds, like that officer, was also in danger of being hit by a stray bullet. (We already know that a bullet landed 16 inches from her four year old daughter in the backseat.)
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Yes, Yahtzee, I thought they would find guilt for the reskless discharge of a firearm, but hang on the manslaughter. Did you see the video of the jurors? It’s amazing that they would decide based on what they couldn’t see, rather than what they could. It’s also amazing that the juror interviewed would bring up racial profiling during deliberations when that had not been discussed during trial. It appears that she was looking for a reason to have a mistrial declared on that issue alone.
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https://twitter.com/webster/status/877251443056619522
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We now hear from 2 jurors. It sounds as if they acquitted based on what they could not see, rather than what they could see and testimony.
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The jury did not see Yanez’s interview.
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Attorney for Philando Castile’s Family Talks about the settlement.
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Id be honoured if you’d check this out https://tanyatale.wordpress.com/2017/07/07/bridge-of-eternal-love/
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Tanya, thanks for the link to your blog. I want to let you know that your comment was in the spam folder. That seldom happens with comments submitted by signing-in with your WordPress account. I’ve read where that happens to others when they post the same comment to lots of blogs on the same day. I don’t know if that is what you did, but wanted to give you a head’s up in the event you have posted to other blogs and your comment is not appearing on the public board.
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Ok thanks for letting me know
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