Oh Honey Pie, (aka @CurrentlyHorseless), that movie in your head is so funny.
Shell casings came from that gun, sure.
Oh wait, that is the two shell casings when your star witness claimed there were three shots, right?
Those shell casings prove that someone, anyone since the police did no forensics, shot that gun twice (did not even have to be there, because heck, shell casings are easy to pick up and move).
So using your theory on liability, every person who gets shot on a street corner in any given city can simply sue the city because they dared to allow a person with a gun to shoot another person on their property. Got it.
Interesting theory to liability.
Here is some reading for you to carefully consider.
Key portion to take note of, and really think about…
Credibility in Question
When a plaintiff takes a civil lawsuit to trial, unlike in a criminal case, testifying on your own behalf is less of a risk. However, when a plaintiff (or anyone for that matter) takes the stand, their credibility or trustworthiness can be called into question.
If that plaintiff, or witness, has been previously convicted of a crime involving dishonesty, like fraud or even just passing a bad check, evidence of that conviction, and potentially the details surrounding the charges, can be raised during the case, just like at a criminal trial.
Impeachment
Another way criminal convictions can get used in an injury case involves another way to discredit a plaintiff (or defendant or any witness) called impeachment. Impeachment is basically the legal term for catching a witness in a lie. For example, if a person is testifying about their safe driving habits and claims to not be a speeder, evidence that the person has received speeding tickets could be admitted to prove the individual was lying about their safe driving habits.
Soooo, let’s say Lauren tries to testify about how she is a reasonable, non violent person, and she did not make the first move to threaten or assault MB that day at the farmhouse…
Uh oh. In a civil trial, if she tries to testify like that on the stand, the door will potentially open for MBs attorneys to bring in evidence that she has been convicted of simple assault, assault with a deadly weapon, and communicating threats. And once the jury hears that? They are going to doubt her story, and believe self defense was a possibility.
My mobile home had popcorn ceilings when I bought it, and they were coated with cigarette smoke. I was able to scrape them and repaint them with Kilz and two coats of white paint. There was no way they were staying and adding another layer of drywall would have been much more expensive and more work.
Getting that place cleaned up with the walls and ceilings ready for paint is going to be a major project.
The oft repeated theory of self defense is a variant of what you describe — MB brought the gun for some reason other than to attempt to kill then. There’s a confrontation, perhaps RG jumps MB (before or after MB brandishes the gun) and then MB uses the gun in self defense. (Was MB aiming at the scary ex-Marine, but accidentally pumped two bullets into LK? These proposed scenarios would need specifics.)
Even if MB shot in self defense at a moment when he feared his life was in danger, I think it will be hard to establish self defense when MB drove himself over there will a loaded gun.
Therefore, you should be working on a much more complicated scenario in which LK in her Ninjs costume stole the gun from the locked safe the night before (like all responsible gun owners, MB would pronounce the safes combination audibly and loudly every time he opens the safe to stash additional guns brought in from out of state illegally), and had the gun, along with her book, on the porch at the time she telepathically summoned MB that afternoon. MB, having been telepathically summoned, starts a polite conversation, RG or LK jumps him, and since LK was beating him about the head with her phone (despite having the gun), he grabs the gun and shots her.
Boy, I hope the trial is televised.
No, I am not operating under the assumption that negative information on LK and RG will be kept from the jury. I think MBs lawyers will bring the information in as much as they are allowed in order to paint the gun shot victim as unsympathetic, just as you are doing.
In my opinion, the various defendants should still be liable for for the injuries caused to a gun shot victim. Regardless of whether the victim is Simone Biles or Amber Heard.
When I was about 15 we moved into a newer house… and I had permission to decorate my room however I wanted as long as I did all the actual painting etc. So, I did. No shag carpeting or stuffies glued everywhere… but I labored long hours on a step ladder to do a popcorn ceiling (called decorator texture or something fancy like that) - the kind with silver sparkles in it. Oh, how I loved that room - denim blue walls, grey trim and white sparkly popcorn ceiling. And small silver gray horse silhouettes that I drew and carefully painted running around the room in a line at about the 3 foot level.
Apologies to whoever moved into that house years later and hated that room. I loved it. It was my Sistine Chapel…
Your whole post made me laugh, but this line made me laugh really hard.
(For those who do not get my amusement, CH refused to watch the other trial, and then talked about reading transcripts or something, blah, blah, blah.)
2 shell casing were found, but no, what are they called, projectiles. They went missing along with the 3rd casing and projectile and finger prints and GSR and basically all other forensics.
That’s right, the shell casings prove she was shot with the gun recovered at the scene, which was owned by RC, and which she testified she handed to MB prior to the shooting.
I think you will find that it is much harder to sue a municipality or other public entity such as a state than it is to sue a private property owner or private company. So I’m not endorsing your wild extrapolation of what I said concerning the legal liability of a private property owner.
You still don’t seem to get it. This is a civil trial, and Lauren is the plaintiff this time. She has to prove her case. Michael doesn’t have to go so far as to prove the affirmative defense (self defense) this time. Nope. This time, his attorneys will have the option of going after Lauren’s credibility and character, and introducing relevant evidence that speaks to it.
And geez… her lengthy history of violent assaults? It’s relevant. It’s a bad look. And it’s going to make a jury doubt her story.
And even though she only has to prove her case by a preponderance of the evidence… reasonable doubt with respect to her claims still applies.
As soon as anyone hears all about her criminal past, they have reasonable doubt with respect to EVERYTHING she says.
That was the point. Any scenario in which the gun was brought to the scene by someone other than MB (which would be necessary to establish self defense) is laughable. Literally.
I’m hoping the trial is televised so I could listen to Bilinkas propose that theory with a straight face. Then say the theory satisfied the principle of Occam’s razor!
Even if LK or RG at some moment was the aggressor, the fact that MB brought a loaded gun to the scene is going to make it really difficult to succeed with a self defense claim.
He pled self defense at the criminal trial, and did not succeed in establishing self defense there. Does he have a better defense team in the civil trial?
Oh no, your movie is coming apart again. I was laughing at how out there your theories are and how you keep trying to make those theories into something that will stick.
Good try @CurrentlyHorseless, good try.
Do you think if this trial is televised that you will watch any of it, or will you make your broad statements of truth based solely on what you assumed happened? Ya know, like you did with the criminal trial and with the that darn police report you posted about?
It is roll on the floor laughing that one, well you @CurrentlyHorseless, can proclaim that if a man carries a gun on his own property, to his own house, that he assumes is empty that he can not possibly be defending himself if someone gets shot.
Wasn’t creative the word the state’s expert used to describe good 'ol Lauren Kanarek at the criminal trial? It so fits @CurrentlyHorseless and the movie they are telling us about.
@CurrentlyHorseless, you are not saying anything that is any different and you are still wrong.
You do realize that at the criminal trial the judge did not allow self defense, right? It is not that no one succeeded or did not succeed at establishing self defense, it is that they were not allowed to bring it up.
Maybe if you actually watched the trial you would realize this.
But the jury will be asked to determine which of the four parties, including LK herself, is responsible for causing her injuries.
I don’t think that will be hard to establish, again. I don’t think that the jury will think she faked a 911 call saying she’d been shot by Michael Barisone, given that the police arrived minutes later to find her bleed out from gun shot wounds and a guy named Michel Barisone pinned on the ground 10 feet away on top of the gun used to shot her.
