Racially charged NY trial ends with conviction

[flashl]

Man Convicted for Shooting Teenager

A Suffolk County jury on Saturday night found a black man guilty of manslaughter for shooting of an unarmed white teenager outside the man’s house last year, ending a racially charged trial.

The jury began deliberating on Wednesday, and on Friday indicated that it was deadlocked and racked with discord. But late Saturday night, it delivered its verdict: The man, John H. White, 54, was guilty of the second-degree manslaughter charge that prosecutors had sought, and of criminal possession of a weapon. Mr. White was allowed to remain free until sentencing, when he will face a maximum term of 5 to 15 years in prison.

Mr. White was convicted of shooting Daniel Cicciaro, 17, point-blank in the face on Aug. 9, 2006. Daniel and several friends had left a party and showed up Mr. White’s house just after 11 p.m. to challenge his son Aaron, then 19, to a fight, and had used threats, profanities and racial epithets. Mr. White awoke and grabbed a loaded Beretta pistol he kept in the garage of his house in Miller Place, a predominantly white hamlet on Long Island.

“We are elated and relieved and feel that Daniel has been vindicated and that justice has been served,” said Gregg Sarra, a longtime friend of the Cicciaro family and Daniel’s godfather.

“This situation was never about race, and we hope this verdict finally dispels the notion that any racism was involved,” he said. “The defense wanted to play the race card, and there was nothing there and the jury saw through that.”

NY Time - Read Full Text

[pnorman]

1. "This situation was never about race ...."

Whenever I see something like that, I try to imagine how it would play out had the colors (aka: "races") been reversed.

pnorman

[flashl]

2. In some ways, its the reverse of the case in Texas.

[flashl]

3. Juror claims he was 'pressured' to convict

A juror who helped convict a black man of fatally shooting a white teenager said he felt pressure from other jurors and the judge to change his vote to guilty during a marathon deliberating session over the weekend.

The jury convicted John White of second-degree manslaughter in the August 2006 shooting of 17-year-old Daniel Cicciaro Jr. White, 54, remains free on bail until sentencing, when he faces a prison term of five to 15 years. He plans to appeal.

The case drew national attention after the defense argued that White had feared a "lynch mob" had come to attack his family when a group of angry white teenagers gathered outside his home. The teens had come to fight White's son.

Juror Francois Larche, who is white, said he and another holdout juror changed their votes Saturday evening after enduring "a lot of psychological tactics" from fellow jurors on an unusual weekend session ordered by the judge over jurors' protests.

Larche, 46, said the stress had become unbearable.

"It was a huge burden to bear," Larche told the New York Post in Monday's editions. "It got heated. Some of the men lost their cool. I took a lot of heat."

The jury forewoman, Maureen Steigerwald, denied that the judge, a 12-hour deliberating session on Saturday—the fourth day of deliberations—or the holidays played a role in the jury's decision.

Read Full Text

[justanaveragedude]

4. Was it reasonable self defense?

This topic was covered in GD so forgive if I am being repetitive. However, let's look at the facts. You are at home. Safely locked in your home. Some high school kids come to your house looking to have a throw with your 19 year old son. Not the best thing for them to be doing for sure, but kids none the less. They are unarmed, they are not actively trying to break into your home, and they are not burning a cross in your front yard or stringing a rope to a tree to hang you. So what do you do? Do you call the cops? No, that would just be stupid and unnecessary. What you do is go outside and wave a gun in the face of some 17 year old kid. You think this was the right and reasonable thing to do? Come on, who is the adult here? This kid is dead for no good reason.

This wasn't a race issue, but his lawyers sure seemed to want to make it one. This was no white "lynch mob". Hell the dead kid was latino, not white.

Would he have been treated differently if he were a white guy that shot some black kid? Maybe. But that does not excuse Mr. White's actions. He is an idiot.