Brendan FulcherCase Brief 2Tor Wynn8 May 2013Case Brief 2This crime occurred on October 5, 1983. A man and his significant other (who occupy the same house) ate dinner together, and then met at a pool hall at separate times. The woman arrived first, when the man (also the defendant) arrived he saw his significant other talking to another man, he was angry because he thought that she was cheating on him. He states that the anger quickly subsided. He left the bar alone and walked home, 10 minutes later she arrived at their shared residence and told him that he had one week to find another place to live. He consented and w ...view middle of the document...
She had stabbed herself in the struggle for the knife.The man was convicted of manslaughter; he argues that it was self-defense and that the jury was not properly instructed on the stand your ground ruling in self-defense. The jury says that since he had an opportunity to get away, that deadly force was not needed, and it was no longer self-defense.The court disagrees, they stated that in Rhode Island the statute pertaining to self-defense states that if you have the opportunity to flee without being harmed, then you have no legal right to use deadly force on the assailant. There was no dissenting opinion.The legal issue here is the mens rea, the intent to end his significant others life. This is more of a justification defense, but it also uses the excuse that she was pulling the knife towards her and that he never intended to stab her in the first place.I personally think the court is out of line here. The stand your ground precedent in my mind makes what he did nothing more than an accident or self-defense. He never intended to end her life and he was only trying to keep himself from being stabbed. She started the fight in the bedroom up stairs, he left that fight, only to be met with a knife to the face, he was within his rights to take action in my opinion.
