Over-armed Deedy meets Ha'ole hating Elderts

[geochem]

I guess I am missing something here... In the last couple of weeks we have had two Hawaii police officers fire off ten or more shots at motorists who were trying to escape - one survived and one didn't. Are those police officers guilty of attempted murder and murder respectively?

Just wondering how their cases were different from Deedy - except that he was being physically assaulted - whereas the Hawaii officers simply had to step out of the way to avoid injury - and these were "local" law enforcement people rather than from offshore.

[leilanidude]

He could have taken a beat down for a minute or two if he truly could not defend himself with all that high cost training he recieved?

@gypsy69 - I don't even know how to respond to your ridiculous comment.
Did you really mean to say he should have stood there and been beaten up, not just by Eldert, but Eldert's friends who were there as well?

[oink]

quote:

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JMHO, but 99% of time cops don't need guns and shouldn't carry them.

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You apparently have no idea. Actually the 99% is probably correct if it's even 1% but you never know when that 1% will be. I've never fired a gun in the line of duty* but I've used it countless times: Armed robberies, bank robberies, burglaries, arresting suspects for violent felonies, major trafficking, armed kidnapping in progress (caught that one half asleep on my way home from Mids), murders, attempted murders, etc. Yep, most of the time I was answering dog barking calls or neighborhood dispute calls, etc. but... Granted I wasn't working on the Big Island. You want the cops to be unarmed???

I don't know anything about the supposed "the latest trigger happy HPD incident" or much about the Deedy trial, so I won't comment on those, but past experience causes me to suspect most don't have much of an idea as to what really happened.

edit
* Well I have shot some dogs, euthanized and otherwise, euthanized wounded deer and hogs and even shot a feral cow that kept wandering into traffic and couldn't be caught after numerous attempts.
Pua`a
S. FL
Big Islander to be.

[opihikao]

I was hoping you would respond, oink. Thank you. Us wives (or husbands) can't speak for the "officer", until we stand in their shoes.

However, personally, during the 25 years my husband served this County (may he rest in peace), thank God he was armed. Especially in today's world. Like you, he never used it, but at 6.5/256lbs., no need. Thank God.

I listen to the scanner almost all the time, the calls here in Hawai'i County are escalating, and Puna has perhaps the bulk of calls (on a percentage).

Of interest, here is the latest in this trial:

http://www.hawaiinewsnow.com/story/26177...dy-retrial

HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) - Circuit Court Judge Karen Ahn ruled Friday to add a lesser offense to Christopher Deedy's murder retrial.

"I will deny the motion not to give manslaughter and I will give reckless manslaughter," she said.



(*Snipped - More at link - Also available at same link is the report on the officer shooting in Honolulu.)

No winners in this particular case. JMO.

[Kelena]

Unlike the HPD officers. Deedy was not at the McDonald's in his official capacity as security for the State Department. He didn't walk into get a Taro Pie with Hillary Clinton.

It is absolutely immaterial that he was a Federal Officer other than that it allowed him to carry a concealed weapon. Whether it was reasonable to use deadly force as a matter of self defense is a matter for the jury.

The jury may need to consider the extent to which Deedy was cruisin' for a bruisin'. That is to say, did he deliberately provoke the victim with the specific purpose of getting the victim to attack him?

Racism. by the way. has nothing to do with the decision the jury must make in any way, shape or form. Non-jury members may want to consider it in determining whether Elderts is a bad person and should die for calling Deedy a haole.

The judge in this case is not very bright. She failed to include manslaughter as an option for the jury to consider in the initial case and inexplicably has (thus far) suggested she might allow the jury to convict on assault in lieu of murder. Elderts was not assaulted. He was killed. Assault is not a lesser included offense to murder. That is to say, a jury may normally properly consider whether a person committed premeditated murder (a possibility in this case) or a murder in the heat of passion or anger.

The prelude to Deedy getting knocked down suggests that his testosterone was up and he invited an altercation knowing that he would prevail because he had a gun his big-assed Bermuda shorts (wrong island!). This big ole Federal agent getting knocked to the ground by some little local punk suggests our State Department officials are not as well-protected as we might like and that Deedy might have been really angry when he got up, and might have shot Elderts in a fit of anger.

We don't get to decide though. A jury does. You, me, and everyone else is just in the peanut gallery. Deedy better hope there are one or two white, male, military guys on the jury who think that when a local calls you a white guy, and you engage him and then he then knocks you to the ground that you are perfectly entitled to kill him if he acts like he might do it again.

That is to say, he had better hope that a juror thinks you should be able to fight back against racist sticks and stones and a humiliating punch to the ground with deadly force.

It looks like Deedy had nothing but deadly force to protect himself -- other than the ability to just walk out of the McDonald's without his Big Mac. He certainly was stymied at what to do if someone calls you a bad name and, after some discussion, looks like they are going to punch you. If I were John Kerry, I would order an immediate review of security for all State Department officials. If Deedy is representative, these guys are very soft and need a gun. And their asses look really broad and flat in those Bermuda shorts. Perhaps the State Department needs to hire a boatload of local bruddahs and then train them how to use a gun as a last, and not a first, resort.

[oink]

Not up to your usual standards there Glen. On the one hand you say it's a matter for the jury and on the other you make judgement.

Again, I don't know the facts of the case and I'm not making a judgement.

It very well may be material that he was a Federal Officer. If he determined that a crime was taking place and then properly identified himself as such, it's material. He ceases being a civilian at that point and is then "On Duty" (Some agency policy may play here).

I agree that racism shouldn't play a part here. If the deceased wasn't and was a defendant instead, it might.

I wouldn't know about the Judge. The above linked article didn't mention assault but did mention Manslaughter, although not requested by the prosecution.

Most of the rest of your post appears to be very biased prejudgment. Remember, as you repeatedly mention and then continuously forget, in our system it's the jury that decides.


Pua`a
S. FL
Big Islander to be.

[Kelena]

Sorry, Oink. I accept your criticism. I agree that we do not know the admissible facts of the case or the evidence that will be submitted to the jury and that they are the final arbiter.

As to the point about his being a Federal officer, I still think it is irrelevant to his actions, although obviously a point that the defense will want to make in order to put Deedy in the best possible light. He cleans up very well. I remember working on a case where a young man was accused of killing his girlfriend who wanted to leave him by fashioning a noose out of a coat hanger. He was trying hard to be a police officer but thankfully the psych profile filtered him out. He showed up in court wearing a baby blue sweater and talking sweetly and softly when he did talk. You absolutely would have no idea that he was a murderer. They often don't look the part.

Anyway, I can't imagine a scenario in which an officer on State Department security detail is privileged to arrest, detain, or use deadly force against a citizen of the State of Hawaii unless he is acting within the scope of his duties as an officer of the State Department (that is, protecting an employee or officer of the State Department). he may be able to arrest for a Federal crime committed in his presence. I doubt he has any privilege pertaining to his employment other than the right to carry a concealed weapon, which is why he has not been charged with that.

The prosecution may not wish to request a manslaughter instruction. The defense will surely want one. Manslaughter gives the jury an "out" that is short of murder. I have not seen any further reference to the judge including an instruction on assault. She was smacked by the Hawaii Supreme Court for failing to instruct on the lesser included offense of manslaughter. As so often happens, she overcompensated by suggesting she might include an instruction on assault, which is very clearly not a lesser included offense of murder. It might, for example, be a lesser included offense of mayhem or some other offense involving the infliction of great bodily injury short of death. It is not a lesser included offense of murder, meaning that the jury could not decide to convict Deedy of an "assault" if they were of the opinion that his actions did not arise to the killing of a person with malice aforethought.

In any case, as you point out, this is a job for the jury. Let's see what they say.

[protoss]

NOW I know why there is such an aggressive gun control legislation in Hawaii (you cannot even have a taser?!), it's so locals can get away with theft, beatings and the like because from what I've seen on this thread is that everything is acceptable besides gun violence.

Old people beaten in their homes and robbed = it is what it is right?

while all the crime is hidden with great tourism videos saying, Aloha except that Aloha sometimes means a 2x4 hitting you in the head while being robbed or being a lone female attacked on a beach.

THAT is cowardly not stand your ground laws

'Your whole idea about yourself is borrowed-- borrowed from those who have no idea of who they are themselves.'

[oink]

@ Glen
No problem.

I guess we'll see on the battery on LEO part. In general Feds can't enforce State and local laws but frequently provisions are made for that but my experience would be more with the DEA and Customs (Now ICE) guys. and that authority was given to them as a tool. Maybe the security detail guys get a cursory swearing in in the States they are in too. Otherwise if they do make an arrest, even after identifying themselves as Fed Officers they will be essentially making a citizens arrest. At least in Fla an out of jurisdiction officer's testimony is one of the misdemeanor arrest situations that don't have to occur in the officer's presence so things would work out well for the out of jurisdiction officer anyhow.

Defendants almost never look the part at trial. Well pretty much never but sometimes they can't help but act the part.

I would expect that the deadly force use part will have left the realm of citizens arrest and will by then be in the self defense category. At least that will be the defense.

The defense may well not want the lesser charge instruction if they feel confident the State can't make the murder charge. The all or nothing works well if you feel confident of that. I hate to bring up the subject but that's why the State tried so hard to get the lesser charges in the instructions during the Zimmerman trial. They knew by that point they were screwed on the murder charge (All non-emotional observers saw that much earlier). Maybe the Hawaii Supreme Court is foreseeing the same outcome and is wishing to avoid it.

I haven't read much on the trial and didn't see where the State was trying to add Assault. Maybe she was just being pissy after being smacked.

I've never been a big fan of the Feds the times I worked with them (large egos) although the Customs guys were pretty cool back then. It was the Blue Lightning guys on the interdiction boats. We worked together a lot at that time. Seems like they disappeared when they got sucked into ICE. But then I left the boats about then too.

Pua`a
S. FL
Big Islander to be.

[WillyHunglo]

Many of you are posting without really knowing the situation. Deedy was assaulted, which included a tackle and some ground and pound punches to the face. The Mcdonalds employee remarked, "he was taking some hard cracks" Translation: Deedy was outmatched physically. He was trying to control the situation with Elderts spreading his chaos throughout the restaurant and when Elderts came after Deedy aggressively for a second time after Deedy had his gun out and and presented his badge Elderts gets shot. It's clearly self defense. It's not just about the use of the word F-ing haole. KNOW THE FACTS BEFORE YOU POST. The fact that he shouldn't have been allowed to carry while drinking is separate issue. If this happened in the day when no drinking was involved, it wouldn't be a case.