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Last week, I concluded a jury trial in a murder case. The verdict was not guilty guilty. My client had gone to the home of his girlfriend, where the two of them got into an argument. According to the girlfriend, my client violently assaulted her by, amongst other things, choking her, trying to suffocate her, and slamming her head into a wall. My client conceded there had been a verbal disagreement, but was quite adamant that he never assaulted the girlfriend. The young lady survived, but my client was charged with attempted murder. While my client and his girlfriend were arguing, the girlfriend's nephew, who was upstairs at the time, came downstairs, and eventually became engaged in a physical altercation with my client, the end result being that the nephew was fatally stabbed, for which my client was charged with murder. The defense to the murder charge was self-defense; I had evidence that 3 months prior to this incident, the nephew had attacked my client, causing my client to suffer a dislocated shoulder. My client also testified that on the morning of the incident in question, the nephew, after coming downstairs, attacked my client again, at one point placing his hands on my client's throat. I was also able to establish that when the police searched the nephew's belongings, they found a knife in his pocket. The verdicts: Not guilty as to the attempted murder of the girlfriend, and not guilty as to the murder of the nephew. This is now the 5th straight not guilty jury verdict I have received in a homicide, or attempted homicide case.
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