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Nancy Grace
"Loud Music" Shooter Takes the Stand
Aired February 11, 2014 - 20:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
NANCY GRACE, HOST: Breaking news tonight, live, murder in Jacksonville. A 45-year-old man guns down a youth when they argue over the kid`s loud music at a gas station. After shooting the youth three times, including in the back, he speeds off two hours away, never even bothering to call 911. It`s George Zimmerman all over again, 45-year-old Michael Dunn claiming self-defense. We obtain the stunning 911 call and secret surveillance video.
Bombshell tonight. In a stunning trial strategy move, Michael Dunn takes the stand in his own defense. Did it work?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MICHAEL DAVIS, DEFENDANT: I asked for a common courtesy. Hey, could you turn that down, please?
(INAUDIBLE) called it rap crap. I should kill that (EXPLETIVE DELETED).
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Jordan Davis was never a threat to you, was he, Mr. Dunn.
DUNN: Absolutely, he was.
You`re not going to kill me, you son of a bitch.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Good evening. I`m Nancy Grace. I want to thank you for being with us.
Bombshell tonight, murder in Jacksonville. On the stand, Michael Dunn testifying in front of the jury under oath, giving them his story of self- defense. But did it work?
Straight out to Alina Machado at the courthouse, CNN correspondent. Alina, thanks for being with us. He was really between a rock and a hard spot, Alina, because they were waiting -- the defense was waiting to see if the state would introduce those police interrogation tapes, which basically gives his side of the story, but the state never did it. So the defense, basically, was in a corner.
Do you think they had to put Michael Dunn on the stand?
ALINA MACHADO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, that`s what several experts are saying, Nancy, that, in fact, Michael Dunn had to testify because he`s the only one who actually saw a gun, who says he saw a gun the night of the shooting. And that gun, the shotgun, as he called it, was the focus of much of his testimony.
He claims that he saw a gun in the SUV that had the teens the night of the shooting and that he felt threatened. But it wasn`t because of that gun that he says he started firing. In fact, he says it was a situation that continued to escalate. And he said the totality of the situation, the way that the people who were in the SUV, as he called it, the teens, were acting, that that contributed to his belief that what he had seen coming out of the back of the SUV was, in fact, a shotgun, and that then he says he saw Jordan Davis, who we now know as Jordan Davis, come out of the SUV...
GRACE: But Alina...
MACHADO: ... and that`s when the situation really escalated. Yes?
GRACE: But what`s so amazing is he tells the jury that he`s half deaf, that he had a scuba diving accident when he was a youth, so he can only hear out of his right ear. So he`s trying to tell this jury, with his windows up, that he could hear a kid in another car threaten to kill him, and he`s half deaf?
Not only that, Alina -- everyone, Alina joining me from the courthouse -- isn`t it true that he also says that this could have all been in his imagination? On cross-examination, Michael Dunn said, yes, I could have imagined I saw a gun.
MACHADO: There`s a lot of things that he said during the time that he was on the stand, Nancy. He spent several hours on the stand answering questions, and yes, he did entertain several possibilities. But he was very adamant. He believes that he saw a shotgun.
Now, police never found a weapon, never found a shotgun at the scene or in the vehicle, and that is something that has come up during this trial.
GRACE: With me at the courthouse, Alina Machado, CNN correspondent. Alina, what does he say? Michael Dunn, everybody, has been on the stand today. How did it rub the jury? Did it rub them the wrong way, or do they believe his story, that he unleashed a hail of 10 bullets on an unarmed youth, killing one of them. There were actually three more in the car that could have been killed.
You know, Alina Machado, interesting what he says was the turning point, the tipping point, because he says he`s so afraid of them, but he lets his window down and said, Hey, are you talking to me? I mean, if I had been afraid, I don`t know that I would have done that.
MACHADO: He did say that. He did acknowledge that he had his windows down and that he was asking them, he approached them and said, Are you talking to me? He even at one point mentioned, Nancy, that maybe he thought they were maybe singing or talking to somebody else. And it wasn`t, though, until he says he believes he saw Jordan Davis get out of the SUV...
GRACE: Wait! Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait!
MACHADO: ... that he felt threatened enough...
GRACE: Alina, Alina Machado, did I actually miss a tidbit? Did he say -- Michael Dunn say he didn`t know what the youths were saying, they could have been singing? And so he shoots them?
MACHADO: Nancy, yes, that`s one of the things that he said as a possibility. You know, he was asked, you know, Why did you ask them that? And he said, you know, I just wanted to make sure they were talking to me. And he said as the situation escalated, as the threats became more prominent, he became more concerned.
But it wasn`t until, he says, he believes he saw Jordan Davis get out of the SUV that he felt threatened enough to grab his gun and start shooting.
GRACE: What`s amazing, Alina Machado, is that -- and Liz, pull the sound for me. In the last hours, Michael Dunn takes the stand in his own defense. Good move, bad move? You decide because here he`s telling the jury that he`s basically half deaf. He`s saying he had a scuba diving accident when he was a child and that he can`t hear out of his right ear.
So he`s sitting in the car. They`re playing music. He`s got his windows rolled completely up. But yet half deaf, he could hear somebody in the back seat of a Durango parked next to him say, I ought to kill you, M- F?
Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you have any type of ear damage?
DUNN: I do.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Can you explain to the jury what damage you have and how you got that?
DUNN: Growing up in the Keys, scuba diving is a big part of life, and I actually have damage to my right ear -- I don`t know what the percentage is, but I do have a loss of hearing in my right ear, and consequently, my left ear kind of compensates for it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. As a matter of fact...
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Let`s go out to spokesperson for George Zimmerman, supporting "stand your ground" defense in Florida. Frank Taaffe is with me tonight, joining me also from Florida.
So Taaffe, your man is half deaf, and he can hear a kid in the car next to him, with his windows rolled up, with all that "rap crap" music, as he calls it, rap music -- but he could still hear Jordan Davis say, I ought to kill that M-F? Are you going along with that?
FRANK TAAFFE, FRIEND OF GEORGE ZIMMERMAN: Yes. You know what? He said that he was deaf in his right ear and that the left ear would overcompensate, which happens a lot, Nancy, in deaf people, OK?
GRACE: Really?
TAAFFE: The side -- the side in which...
GRACE: Are you sure about that, Taaffe?
TAAFFE: Huh? What did you say? Huh?
GRACE: Are you sure about that? Are you sure about that?
TAAFFE: Yes. It`s in my right ear. I can hear you perfectly. If you listen to...
GRACE: Let`s go to Dr. Mike Kaufmann, physician, joining me. Dr. Kaufmann, I`ve looked at his prior book-in sheets where he was arrested for a prior DUI. And I`m not talking about the time he got behind the wheel of an airplane and flew over Cape Canaveral and was dragged out of protected airspace. Not that time, it was the other time.
And his booking sheet says nothing about a hearing impairment whatsoever. I`ve been diving for many, many years, and I`ve never had an ear injury that left me half deaf, Dr. Kaufmann.
DR. MICHAEL KAUFMANN, PHYSICIAN (via telephone): Well, it`s possible to have a hearing deficit if he perforated his eardrum, which would be pretty easy to tell on exam. So it`s hard to say. You know, there are ear injuries with scuba diving, but you know, without an exam, it`s really hard to say.
GRACE: To Deborah Roberts, news anchor, Florida News Network. So let me get this straight. He`s half deaf, but he says he can hear all of this happening in a car parked next to him. Is that right, Deborah?
DEBORAH ROBERTS, FLORIDA NEWS NETWORK: Yes, that is exactly what Michael Dunn had to say, that he could repeat everything he heard these kids saying, he could repeat the threats, the escalation of the argument.
And like you said, Nancy, yourself, I`m not so sure if most of us would have gone up to a car with people we`re arguing with and said, Are you talking about me? But not only that, interestingly enough, when they asked him about the weapon that he saw in the back of that Durango, he not only said it was a shotgun, he said he thought he saw a stick.
GRACE: A stick.
ROBERTS: So is it a stick or is it a shotgun?
GRACE: OK, out to you, Frank Taaffe...
ROBERTS: A stick. That was one of he things he...
GRACE: ... taking the side of Dunn tonight. So now it`s gone from, It was a shotgun, I only saw 4 inches of it, to, It was a stick, to, Maybe it was just all in my imagination.
TAAFFE: You know what, Nancy? I`m going with Dunn on this one, and I`ll tell you why. Because his story is consistent. And like he told John Guy, you weren`t there. Neither were you, neither was I. So he had to take the stand today and depict the state of mind he was in, according with the statute. A lot of people say he was overcoached. I thought he was perfect. He depicted the scene of the crime.
GRACE: OK, I appreciate that, but that`s not what I asked you.
Let`s bring in Mo Ivory, attorney and radio personality. Mo, you hear Taaffe, all right? Every time I ask him a direct question, he goes off on something.
Mo, I want to hear your take on what went down in the courtroom. By the end of cross-examination -- and I thought the prosecution was very, very amicable toward Michael Dunn. But at the end of that cross- examination, he even admitted that, yes, maybe that whole thing was my imagination, maybe I just thought I saw a gun, Mo.
MO IVORY, ATTORNEY, RADIO PERSONALITY: Listen, the only thing that happened today in that cross-examination is that we figured out who the real thug is, that we figured out that Michael Dunn is the real thug.
It is so ridiculous for Frank to say that anything that he had to say today was consistent. He was all over the place. Every single time he was asked a question, he had a different answer. He was delusional.
TAAFFE: Hey, Mo, you were wrong...
IVORY: I panicked. I don`t know what I was saying.
TAAFFE: ... about Zimmerman, too.
IVORY: Maybe it was my imagination.
TAAFFE: You were wrong about Zimmerman, too, Mo.
IVORY: Hold on. Are you kidding me? No, the jury was wrong about Zimmerman. He is a murderer and so is Michael Dunn!
TAAFFE: Mo...
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: ... Zimmerman out of this!
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: I`m going to give you a moment to collect yourself before you respond. In the meantime, into the courtroom. Let`s hear Michael Dunn for ourselves.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DUNN: This is the point where my death is imminent. He`s coming to kill me. He`s coming to beat me. I`m not real sure what his intentions are. Actually, he made it real clear what his intentions were. This was, like, clear and present danger. And I said, You`re not going to kill me, you son of a bitch.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: So here you`ve got Dunn saying, Frank Taaffe -- let`s see Taaffe and Mo again, please. You`ve got Dunn saying it was a clear and present danger, and I said, You`re not going to kill me, you son of a bitch. But according to his own testimony at that time, Jordan Davis had not pulled a gun on him. According to him when he started firing, Jordan Davis was out of the car, and we know that`s not true.
IVORY: Right and because at that point...
TAAFFE: OK, let`s go...
IVORY: ... he decided he was going to take the law into his own hands and do something absolutely...
TAAFFE: Take the law?
IVORY: Absolutely!
TAAFFE: Take the law?
IVORY: And shoot...
GRACE: OK, hold on!
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: Taaffe, go.
TAAFFE: OK, why did he take the law, OK? He was defending himself.
IVORY: Why didn`t he call the police? Why didn`t he call the police?
GRACE: No, I want to hear Taaffe.
TAAFFE: OK...
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: ... caught in a lie.
TAAFFE: I will if you give me a second to talk! Show me the book in a library that has a recipe what to do after you were just in a major traumatic situation, OK?
(CROSSTALK)
TAAFFE: Show me where the handbook is. Show it to me!
GRACE: Mo, wait!
IVORY: OK.
GRACE: Taaffe -- Taaffe, according to him, Michael Dunn on the stand -- and this is why you shouldn`t take the stand under a felony indictment because he says...
TAAFFE: He needed to! The defense did not...
GRACE: He says...
TAAFFE: ... lay out proper foundation for reasonable doubt! He had to go down swinging! I would have done the same thing! He had to...
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: You know what? Liz, cut his mike. Just cut his mike because I can`t explain what Michael Dunn said on the stand. Michael Dunn got on the stand, and he says Jordan Davis got out of the car and that`s when he started shooting. But the bullets and the angle of the trajectory path and the entrance wound, all three bullets went from back to front on this boy. He was not shot when he was standing out in front of that car! He was not shot at that time.
To you, Taaffe. I want to hear Taaffe try to dig himself out of this. The bullets...
TAAFFE: Yes, I will.
GRACE: ... themselves are to his back.
TAAFFE: I got a big...
GRACE: And there was...
TAAFFE: I got a big shovel...
GRACE: ... no way Jordan could...
TAAFFE: ... for it, too, OK?
GRACE: There was no way Jordan...
(CROSSTALK)
TAAFFE: ... for a long time.
GRACE: I`m listening.
TAAFFE: I`ve been shoveling a lot of bull. And here`s the story, OK? Those three impact shots and Dunn even questioned Guy, Did you see these shots? Did you see the impact? And they were at a 90-degree angle. And he did not get shot in the back. According to the medical examiner, it was a side entrance wound, which is consistent with the bullet coming...
GRACE: No.
TAAFFE: ... through the door. And another -- and you said to me that those doors were not able to open. Well, are the police lying? You`re telling (ph) the police are lying. That vehicle went right from the crime scene to the lab. It was in the care, custody and control of the Jacksonville sheriff`s office...
GRACE: OK...
TAAFFE: ... and you went on to tell me that...
GRACE: Out to you...
TAAFFE: ... anybody could have manipulated that door! Are you telling me the police lied? Tell me that!
GRACE: No, I`m telling you that the police told the truth that the child locks were on on that door and that when they got the Durango to the...
TAAFFE: But Nancy...
GRACE: ... to the crime lab...
TAAFFE: Nancy...
GRACE: ... they tested the locks. No. We`re going to Clark Goldband.
TAAFFE: According...
GRACE: Clark, explain what we`re talking about.
CLARK GOLDBAND, NANCY GRACE PRODUCER: Yes, Nancy. We`ve got some crime scene photos that may actually help our viewers understand. You take a look in the first photo behind me, it`s a wide shot of that Gate convenience store we`ve heard so much about. You can see the vehicle here. The other vehicle, Nancy, would have been parked right next door.
And what you see on the ground over here are the shell casings. If we advance up to the next screen, you can take a look at where the victim was dead and also all of the case markings. Ten shots total, nine of them hitting the vehicle.
Now, let`s advance onto the next screen. This may help you understand even further. Here`s a diagram our staff has made. You can see the car Jordan Davis would be in. You can see the car that Dunn would be in.
Now, if Davis was as upset as Dunn said and flow (ph) open that door, there`s no mark on Dunn`s car if they were really parked that close. Certainly, food for thought, no matter what side you`re taking in this case.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DUNN: More (ph) elevated (ph) voice (ph). I hear, I`m should (EXPLETIVE DELETED) kill that (EXPLETIVE DELETED). And now he`s screaming.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So the reason you left the gas station is because you knew you had shot into a car of four unarmed teenagers.
DUNN: That`s incorrect. It was Jordan Davis who kept escalating this to the point where I had no choice but to defend myself. It was life or death.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: Had no choice to defend yourself? Against what? Because on cross-examination, Michael Dunn, who takes the stand, admits that seeing the gun may have all been his imagination. And now a boy, unarmed, is dead.
Now, back to the car doors. There`s no way that Jordan Davis could have gotten out, and nobody there that night saw Davis get out except Michael Dunn`s testimony. Take a listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Isn`t it true you also tried to tell the police that the safety, the child locks were on, right?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now, is it child locks for the door or child locks for the window? What`s your definition of the child locks on?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The child locks were on the door and the window.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So you`re saying you can`t get out of that car because the child locks were engaged, is that fair?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And you`re saying that was that night?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All right. And is it your testimony that`s why Jordan Davis couldn`t get out of the vehicle?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: And isn`t it true -- to Deborah Roberts, Florida News Network -- that on the stand, in the last hours, Michael Dunn says that he saw Jordan Davis, like, get one foot out and saw his head just above the windshield?
ROBERTS: He gave three different stories, Nancy. He said at one point, Jordan Davis had jumped out of the back of that Durango and was coming to kill him. He also said, Well, maybe it was just his legs he saw dangling from the Durango, or maybe Jordan Davis hadn`t actually exited the Durango.
We don`t know which one it was. He was the only one there along with the kids that night, and he hasn`t given a consistent story yet.
GRACE: And did Michael Dunn send a letter trying to coach his fiancee what to say? First of all, let`s go back in the courtroom, Michael Dunn on the stand. You judge for yourself.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DUNN: I had to lean forward once to pop the glove box.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK.
DUNN: And then bounced back and leaned forward again to grab the pistol, like, leaning forward a little bit farther.
I grabbed the whole thing and I threw the holster down at my feet in the car.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And is this a very quick action that you`re doing?
DUNN: Absolutely. I`m in a panic. To recreate it, I grabbed the gun and I stripped off the holster, and I put the pistol up into the window and cocked it and then turned to my left. I`m just pointing at the direction of my attacker at that point.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. And that`s the last place you saw this person who said...
DUNN: This (EXPLETIVE DELETED) going down now, is the last thing he said to me.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: With a firearm or deadly weapon in his hand?
DUNN: Yes. I mean, everything he had said and did cemented the fact that whatever he threw up against that looked like a gun was a gun.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. And at that point, were you shooting only to defend yourself?
DUNN: Yes, I was.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Did you have any malice intent outside of what you`ve already testified to and while you grabbed your pistol?
DUNN: No, I do not.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GRACE: In the last hours, Michael Dunn on the stand. And this is what else we learned. Let`s see the letter he wrote to his fiancee, Rhonda Rauer (ph). "I realize we haven`t discussed what happened. We haven`t really discussed it as we were more occupied -- concerned with whether anyone was hurt. Let me assure you there was a weapon. I cannot say for sure what it was, as I only saw the top portion of the barrel. It looked like a shotgun."
And then on the stand, we find out that he`s writing her, saying, Hey, I heard you told people that I never mentioned they had a gun. He is trying to coach people from behind bars, Frank Taaffe.
TAAFFE: Yes, well, guess what? You know, the state did a good job coaching their witnesses, too. Can you really blame him?
GRACE: Can you address this?
TAAFFE: Did you see -- did you see her testimony, how whimsical she was...
GRACE: No. I didn`t think she was whimsical.
TAAFFE: ... and how distraught with emotion. She -- listen, she was...
GRACE: Yes, I guess so. Her fiance...
TAAFFE: ... serendipity at best.
GRACE: ... just shot a kid down, an unarmed kid down.
TAAFFE: Look...
GRACE: But can I get you back in the middle of the road, Taaffe? I`m asking you about...
TAAFFE: Yes, come on.
GRACE: ... him trying to coach her from behind bars.
TAAFFE: So what? It happens every day.
GRACE: In some jurisdictions, you`d call that tampering with a witness.
TAAFFE: OK, well, why isn`t he charged with that if it was so malicious, huh?
GRACE: Well, maybe he...
TAAFFE: Why not?
GRACE: ... will be.
TAAFFE: Why didn`t the state charge him...
GRACE: And you know what?
TAAFFE: Why didn`t he plead criminally insane?
GRACE: Speaking of the fiancee -- you`re just saying that -- you`re just saying that because she...
TAAFFE: I`m not just saying that.
GRACE: ... says under oath he never mentioned they had a gun. He only came up with that later.
TAAFFE: Listen, in her -- she admitted under oath in her hysterical state -- and you know what?
GRACE: She wasn`t hysterical.
TAAFFE: Who`s to say what she did hear? You know what? Do you listen to everything your husband tells you? Don`t we have selective hearing at times? I know I do, OK?
GRACE: I don`t think...
TAAFFE: Maybe...
GRACE: If he shot somebody down dead, I think I would pay...
TAAFFE: It doesn`t matter!
GRACE: ... attention. Well, you know what?
TAAFFE: It doesn`t matter.
GRACE: Let`s hear it...
TAAFFE: It`s at that moment...
GRACE: ... from the horse`s mouth.
TAAFFE: We weren`t there!
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did the defendant ever tell you he saw a gun in that red SUV?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did the defendant ever tell you that he saw a weapon of any kind in that SUV?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There was no mention of a stick?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There was no mention of a shotgun?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There was no mention of a barrel?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There was no mention of a lead pipe?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Back in the hotel room, Ms. Rauer, that same night, did the defendant ever tell you that he saw the boys with a firearm?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did he ever tell you that he saw the boys with a weapon?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: On the two-hour ride back to Brevard the following morning, did the defendant ever tell you he saw a gun in the SUV?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And on that two-hour drive, did he ever tell you he saw a weapon of any kind in that SUV?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you have any physical sensations about this bumping (inaudible)?
DUNN: It actually started a few seconds after she went in the store. There was music, but then it got really loud.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Okay. And by really loud, was it just kind of annoying, or were there -- was your rear windshield --
DUNN: Body panels on the SUV were rattling, my rearview mirror was shaking, my eardrums were vibrating. And this was ridiculously loud music.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: His eardrums were vibrating. What? In the last hours, Michael Dunn takes the stand in his own defense. Right, wrong, hurt, help, you`re going to decide. We`re showing you the testimony. Dunn charged with gunning down an unarmed youth, claiming they got into a fight over loud rap music, and then he sees a gun.
All right, Taaffe, Frank Taaffe, supporting stand your ground laws, spokesperson for George Zimmerman. With me Renee Rockwell, veteran defense attorney, Atlanta. Michael Mazzariello, defense attorney, New York, and also with me, well-known radio personality and lawyer, Mo Ivory.
OK, guys, take a listen to this. Here`s Dunn on the stand and here we hear him describing when he saw the shotgun that later on cross exam he says, hey, maybe I imagined the whole thing. But listen to this. Roll it, Liz.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DUNN: It was against the door.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Could you see something against that door?
DUNN: Yes, I saw sticking above, like, the windowsill about four inches of a barrel.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And you said it looked like a barrel of a gun or shotgun?
DUNN: It was thick enough, profile, it was, to my eye, a .12-gauge, maybe .20. He slammed something against the door and said, yes, I`m going to [ bleep ] kill you. Because when I asked him, are you talking about me? He was just saying, I should kill that mf-er.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: So according to him, Taaffe, when he sees a boy with a shotgun -- if I had seen a shotgun, the first time I got a gun pulled on me as a prosecutor, I and my investigator both jumped, we jumped off the front porch of that apartment complex, because we saw a gun coming up from behind a screen door. Now, his testimony is he sees a shotgun, which police never found, he sees a shotgun and he goes, he rolls down his window and he says, are you talking to me? What about that, Taaffe?
TAAFFE: Well, you know, let`s look at the statute. It says a person is presumed to have held a reasonable fear. And in his testimony today, and correct me if I`m wrong, he stayed adamant over the fact that he felt that he had -- he was in imminent fear of loss of life of himself. Look at it for what it`s worth. He stayed true to his testimony.
GRACE: I am. And what rings in my ear is he says he may have imagined, Michael, may have imagined the shotgun?
MICHAEL MAZZARIELLO, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: He did not say that, Nancy. He said he saw it. He said what he believed to be a .12-gauge or .20- gauge.
GRACE: That`s not right. On cross-examination, he said he may have imagined it.
(CROSSTALK)
TAAFFE: After John Guy was trying to go Colonel Jessup on him, why didn`t he just ask him to order a code red? He was trying to bring out what he wanted the jurors to see, that he was some psychopath, but it didn`t work.
(CROSSTALK)
MAZZARIELLO: Nancy, his testimony was he saw a .12-gauge or it could have been a .20-gauge. Right there he saw it, he`s allowed to be there, he had no responsibility whatsoever to leave, call the cops. He had the right to be there, and that`s what everyone here is forgetting. This is an innocent person sitting in his car minding his own business. The guy is minding his own business.
GRACE: Let me deal with Mazzariello first. First of all, nobody is saying he didn`t have a right to be in the parking lot. Nobody said that.
MAZZARIELLO: Nancy, all I`m hearing is if the cars were parked so close enough that if he opened the door he would have dented it, if they were parked that close enough, he could have heard it even with a bad ear, correct?
GRACE: Half deaf, windows rolled. Out to you, Renee. Let me see if I can get you to answer the question that Mazzariello and Taaffe have danced around.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, we actually have the answers, Nancy.
GRACE: Oh, it`s you again. Let`s give Renee a chance. Renee, you tried plenty of homicide cases. Let me ask you this. He`s now saying he may have imagined seeing it, but what you just heard, he says he thinks he sees a shotgun and he rolls the window down and goes, you talking to me? Renee, you and I practiced at the same courthouse the first time a gun was pulled on me, and I dove off, right into the bushes head first when I saw that gun, and I remember it like it was yesterday. And now he`s confused, he`s like, it could have been my imagination. You don`t forget that, Renee.
ROCKWELL: Nancy, he said it and he said straight on, a .12-gauge or a .20-gauge. It was only after he was on cross that he said, well, maybe you could have imagined it? That`s enough, Nancy, if he imagined it.
GRACE: Out to you, Mo. The reality is, Renee is articulating, which I understand where she`s going, even if he imagined it, he still would have been afraid, which justifies the shooting. You know what? That is B.S. That is not washing here, all right? If you can say you imagine a gun and you can unload on a boy? Mo?
IVORY: A proper defense can be that you imagined that there was a gun so now it gives you the right to shoot ten times into a car filled with teenagers? I mean, what is the law coming to if imagination is enough.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That is law in most states.
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: I can`t hear any of you. She sat by and let you go on and on, and now it`s her turn. And the other thing, Michael Mazzariello, it doesn`t make sense. It doesn`t make any sense. You are arguing he had a right to be there. That`s not even what we`re talking about. The other thing to you, if someone got into your car and said, someone just pulled a gun on me. He never mentioned that Jordan Davis had a gun. Why? Because he didn`t have a gun.
IVORY: Because he didn`t have a gun. That is what he made up.
MAZZARIELLO: Nancy, Dunn had it right. The totality of the circumstances, the totality of that time and place of occurrence, you guys are forgetting about all this stuff. Let`s go with the totality.
(CROSSTALK)
MAZZARIELLO: He proceeds a risk, Nancy. If I walk up to you -- Nancy.
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: Show Mazzariello and Taaffe what the fiancee has said. So he had just been threatened with a shotgun? He never mentions it when she gets back in the car. Take a listen at this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did the defendant ever tell you he saw a gun in that red SUV?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Did the defendant ever tell you he saw a weapon of any kind in that SUV?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There was no mention of a (inaudible)?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There was no mention of a shotgun?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There was no mention of a barrel?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There was no mention of a lead pipe?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DUNN: I was in fear for my life, absolutely. I`m in a panic. And I put the pistol up into the window and cocked it. This (bleeP) is going down now is what he said.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Were you shooting always to defend yourself?
DUNN: Yes, I was.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Do you have children?
DUNN: They`re all grown.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Does Miss Broward (ph) have children?
DUNN: Yes, they`re all grown as well.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Was this dog (inaudible) child?
DUNN: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What was his name?
DUNN: His name is Charlie.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Obviously, you were close with Charlie after seven months with him?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GRACE: He`s crying about his dog? Okay. The whole time during his testimony when they are describing a boy, a 17-year-old, unarmed, that night he and his little friends are getting all fixed up and going to the mall to meet girls. They all had on different cologne. Each one of them would talk about how they smelled or looked better than the other one, and they were walking around the mall trying to blend in and meet teen girls.
And he never cried. He never snuffled up. The whole time they`re talking about this boy taking three shots until he`s dead, gasping for air. His friends tried to pick him up, and there was blood all over their hands, and they pulled him out of the car, and he died right there in the parking lot of a gas station. No tears. But he`s crying about his dog, Dr. Ramani Durvasula. What about that?
DURVASULA: The fact is he feels no remorse about what went down with this boy, so why would he cry? He`s going to cry for the things he cares about. He doesn`t care, and he keeps twisting the story every which way he needs to, to make it come out the way he wants. He doesn`t feel bad. He should shed a tear, that wouldn`t make psychological sense. He wouldn`t be crying, but he doesn`t care.
GRACE: Liz, let me see that shot where Jordan is getting his tie put on. One of my favorite pictures, and I remember the moment it happened, was when my son, who`s 6, wore a tie for the first time to church. Of course it was a clip-on, but I remember the moment that I put it on him. And when I see that, that`s what I think of. Now, Deborah Roberts, this jury is made up of 16, that includes 12 and four alternatives, there`s 10 women. And if any of them ever put a tie on one of their sons, you know, they`re never going to see this shot, we`re going to see it. They`re never going to see it. But to me, you know what got lost here is Jordan, this child. He`s 17. Just 17 years on this earth, and to me, that picture right there that the jury will never see, that says it all to me.
ROBERTS: And it says it to me as well, Nancy. Regardless of whether Michael Dunn`s children are grown, he`s still a father, he`s still a father to someone who was a teenage boy or a teenage girl, and for him to not even shed a tear as a father of his own children, to me just shows the callousness of character.
GRACE: Now, as you all know, Michael Dunn on the stand in his own defense. Unleash the lawyers. With me Michael Mazzariello, defense attorney in New York. Veteran trial lawyer Renee Rockwell out of Atlanta. Lawyer and well-known radio personality, Mo Ivory. And somewhere is Frank Taaffe. Let me know when we get Taaffe back. So to you, Taaffe, your man breaks down and cries about his dog, but the whole time he`s listening to this kid having bullets tear through his body, he never shed a tear?
TAAFFE: He didn`t know what happened. He didn`t know about it until the next day.
GRACE: They heard it in the courtroom, didn`t he?
TAAFFE: But let`s get he facts straight. You know, he sat in jail for 15 months. He`d been on a no-bond status. This is the first time-- he didn`t know what he did that night.
GRACE: He didn`t know he shot into a car 10 times?
TAAFFE: He did not know--
GRACE: But what I`m telling you, Mo, is he sat through the whole trial and saw crime scene photos of this boy`s dead body, there on the parking lot on the ground, and he never cried, he never even reached for a Kleenex. But then they talk about his dog and he cracks up. I don`t get it.
IVORY: Because it shows the kind of person that he is, the same person that could drive into a gas station and gun down a 17-year-old.
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: I can`t hear any of you. Hold on, Mazz, your turn, go.
MAZZARIELLO: How about a man who`s been incarcerate for 15 months, who has a heart, whose whole life is in a shambles here? Why is it that you keep having it (inaudible) that this man`s argument is not plausible? You saw him on the stand.
(CROSSTALK)
GRACE: Out to you, Renee. What I`m saying, and I`m not saying this proves guilt or innocence. But I am noting, I am observing that when I look at the boy getting the tie clapped on, that makes me want to cry. But he sees all these pictures of the child`s dead body, the boy`s dead body, and the only time he snuffles up, talking about his dog, Renee.
ROCKWELL: And Nancy, his lawyers may have said don`t you dare cry when you see pictures of the dead child, because somebody on that jury may take it that you`re sorry about it, or you resent it or you regret it or something.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GRACE: In the last hours, Michael Dunn on the stand. Matt Zarrell, I noticed something. When he was on the stand, he testified to something that was not in any of his police interrogations. Forget he didn`t tell his fiancee, hey, somebody just pulled a shotgun on me and I shot at him. But he said that Jordan Davis, this 17-year-old boy, gets out of the Durango. Although, we know there was the child locks on the door, he gets out and says, this (bleep) is going down now. Well, I didn`t hear that in the police investigation. This is a new part of the story?
ZARRELL: Yes, Nancy, he admits he never told police. In fact, he never told police there were two guys in the back seat with menacing looks. He actually claimed he thought the information was not relevant.
GRACE: Okay. Frank Taaffe, I would think it`s highly relevant as to why I kill somebody if they said this (bleep) is fixing to go down right now, and pulls a gun on me. He never told police that. Why?
TAAFFE: Well, you know what, as he discussed, you know, was he, I think Strolla asked him, were you rationally thinking at that time? He said, no. You know, he had 15 months to reflect on this incident, whereby he says that his life was in danger. How many times --
GRACE: You know what else he said?
TAAFFE: -- did he say it and reiterate it on the stand?
GRACE: Cut his mike. Because he said earlier, what I told police is more believable than what I`m saying right now, because my memory was better then. So you can`t have it both ways. To Dr. Robert Kaufmann. Dr. Kaufmann, you reviewed the autopsy and information. What did Jordan Davis go through as he died? Police say he was gasping for breath. What happened to him physically?
KAUFMANN: The bullet wound went through his chest into his aorta, which is the main blood vessel in the body. So that bleeds very fast, and he died. But he also punctured through his lung, so he died quickly, but those last few minutes were very painful for him.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
GRACE: In the last hours, Michael Dunn is on the stand. But it didn`t end there. Out to you, Clark Goldband. After Dunn was on the stand, witnesses were brought on, rebuttal witnesses were brought on by the state. A lot of it dealt with that parking lot and what the fiancee was told by Dunn. How did the state follow Dunn`s testimony?
GOLDBAND: Well, Nancy, they put back on the fiancee, and she says she does not recall them ever mentioning a gun. You see this scene right behind me. Folks, take a look. You can see where the two cars would have been parked there at that Gate gas station convenience store. If you take a closer look, you can see right there, with all the shell casings were littered all over the scene, certainly, dramatic pictures coming from outside of the convenience store.
GRACE: To Deborah Roberts, news anchor, Florida News Network. They brought on the fiancee, following him, to solidify that he never told her he was in danger. He never told her specifically that he saw a gun. She never came off that. And they asked her about that letter he wrote from behind bars saying, hey, I hear you are telling people I never mentioned a gun.
ROBERTS: No, and also, as part of today`s testimony, Nancy, quite interesting, was when Michael Dunn said that his fiancee doesn`t really understand self-defense. So he really wouldn`t expect her to get from where he was coming from.
GRACE: That`s why, Deborah, us women, we just don`t get it, I guess.
Let`s stop and remember American hero, Army Sergeant Ian Gelig, just 25, Stephenson Ranch, California, Bronze Star, Purple Heart, Army Commendation Medal, from a military family. He dreamed of a nursing career. Parents, Tim and Delia. Sisters Vanessa and Leanna. Ian Gelig, American hero. Drew up next. I will see you tomorrow night 8:00 sharp Eastern. Until then, good night, friend.
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