Reader John Jenkins passes along the case of Wheeler v. Mississippi (536 So.2d 1341), in which the Mississippi Supreme Court threw out the capital murder conviction of a man (Wheeler) who was apprehended by police, got into a hand-to-hand struggle with three officers, stole one officer’s gun, then fired at a figure in the doorway. The figure turned out to be that of another cop who had come around from the back. Wheeler was determined to have knowingly fired the shot in the direction of the figure in the door way. The court upheld the murder conviction, but threw out the capital murder conviction (the willful and knowing murder of a police officer or fireman) because the justices found reasonable doubt as to whether or not Wheeler actually new the figure in the door way was that of a police officer.

Now, I don’t think Maye should be held even for murder. In fact, I think the cities and counties represented in the task force that conducted the raid owe him compensation. But if the Mississippi Supreme Court has ruled that there isn’t reasonable doubt to convict a man who — while in a hand-to-hand struggle with uniformed police officers — shot and killed a third officer standing in the doorway, of knowingly killing a police officer, seems to me there’s more than enough doubt to absolve Cory Maye.

This entry was posted on Saturday, December 10th, 2005 at 1:14 pm by Radley Balko and is filed under Cory Maye. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.