The New York Analysis of Policy and Government is honored to present this guest editorial by retired Judge John H. Wilson.
On July 1, 2015, Kate Steinle, a 32 year old native Californian, was shot and killed with a bullet fired from a gun held by Jose Garcia Zarate. This incident occurred on Pier 14 in San Francisco, a popular tourist attraction in the Bay area. Mr. Garcia Zarate was arrested and tried for this offense, and was recently acquitted of murder. The jury found him guilty of only one count of felony gun possession.
Not since the acquittal of OJ Simpson for the murder of his wife Nicole has a verdict caused such controversy. “A disgraceful verdict” President Trump tweeted. (as noted in the LA Times) “I definitely feel the system failed her,” a woman in San Francisco said. Others felt that the trial had been fair, and the jury knew the evidence better than they
But did they? Let us put aside the political issues involved in this case – whether Garcia Zarate was a previously deported illegal alien, and a previously convicted felon has no bearing on whether or not he was guilty of the murder of Kate Steinle. Legally, letting a jury know about factors such as the defendant’s previous convictions and immigration status have a prejudicial effect, and may blind a jury to their task – the review of the facts, and only the facts. Rather than convict a defendant for the crime alleged, hearing of the background of the accused, the jury may convict them for being a bad person – something which would be abhorrent to our system of justice.
Instead, let us focus on the evidence that was presented to the jury, and determine just what might have “gone wrong.”
Garcia Zarate states that he found a gun, and was either shooting at a Sea Lion, or the gun went off accidentally (he had told both stories) while he was handling the unfamiliar weapon. However the gun came to be fired, the bullet struck Ms Steinle in the back, causing her death, while she was in a public place.
“The prosecutor presented evidence that the pistol that killed Steinle required a firm pull of the trigger to fire and that Garcia Zarate threw the firearm into San Francisco Bay after Steinle fell, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. A crime-scene inspector also testified that the defendant had to have aimed the gun at Steinle for the bullet to follow the path it did.”
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However, “the defense called an expert who testified that an unintentional ricochet shot killed Steinle. They argued that the weapon went off in their client’s hands in what was a tragic accident.” To unintentionally cause the death of another human being is the standard definition for involuntary manslaughter.
Thus, most legal experts in Criminal Law would believe that the Prosecution had attempted to show that Garcia Zarate had intentionally caused the death of Kate Steinle, while the defense sought a verdict with a lesser degree of culpability – he may have fired the gun, but he didn’t intend to kill the victim.
So, again we ask – what went wrong? Under any reasonable view of the evidence, at the least, the verdict should have been one of involuntary manslaughter. The defendant fires a gun in a public place, and predictably enough, the bullet hits another person, causing their death.
One could blame the prosecution for failing to effectively counter the defense claim that Garcia Zarate was just a hapless fool, playing with an unfamiliar gun. But this is a matter of trial strategy. The prosecution played to a view of the facts that would result in a conviction for the most serious charge, and in turn, a maximum sentence from the Court. One could also blame the defense, but this would not be reasonable. The defense attorneys did their job.
The only reasonable conclusion leaves the blame with the jury. Under the California pattern jury instructions, a defendant is guilty of Murder when a person intentionally commits an act, the natural and probable consequences of the act were dangerous to human life, and the person acted with conscious disregard for human life. The California jury instruction for involuntary manslaughter states that to be guilty of this charge, a person is aware of the risk to life that their actions created and consciously disregarded that risk. Either standard would seem to apply, depending on your view of Mr. Garcia Zarate’s ability to appreciate the risk to human life of firing a gun in a public place.
Under no reasonable view of the evidence, then, could the jury have found this defendant not guilty of either Murder or Involuntary Manslaughter. Clearly, the jurors have their own reasons, and possibly their own agenda, for this verdict.