# Michael Dunn, Steophan's hero, given life sentence **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [October 23, 2015, 5:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512 "2015-10-23T05:27:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2015, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/21 "2015-10-23T22:03:52Z")
> [@VinylTurnip](#): > > So how’s the pen pal exchange going? That’s easy. It’s the conjugal visits that take forever. ---
**Author:** ![Steophan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steophan/32/9595_2.png) [@Steophan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steophan)\ **Post date:** [October 23, 2015, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/22 "2015-10-23T23:37:52Z")
It’s amazing how people seem to wilfully misunderstand “correctly jailed for attempted murder” as “wants to have sex with”. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2015, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/23 "2015-10-24T00:58:30Z")
> [@Steophan](#): > > It’s amazing how people seem to wilfully misunderstand “correctly jailed for attempted murder” as “wants to have sex with”. I clicked a little in the older thread, since the charge against you here seemed so outrageous. I discovered that - Since it is hard to prove a negative, i.e. that Davis didn’t threaten Dunn, you thought Dunn deserved acquittal – there was a reasonable doubt that the murder was not “in self-defence.” This despite that no gun ever turned up. This seems the wrong standard: couldn’t almost all murderers be acquitted this way? (OJ Simpson: “I just wanted to chat with my ex-wife but that whatshisname brandished a machine gun, so I had to kill them both. No, I don’t know what happened to the machine gun; one of the neighborhood kids must have pilfered it.”) - - While I just skimmed the other thread, much of your posting was devoted to how obnoxious loud music is, and how thuggish it is to refuse to turn it down. It seemed a more important theme for you than murder. True, you never explicitly claimed that loud music was justification for shooting, but these threads emphasize emotional response rather than rational thought. Your invective semed far more concentrated against the black thug with loud music than the white murderer. (You said your stance would be the same, were colors reversed. Only a fool could believe that. Prove my point: Do you believe it yourself? 🆒 ) ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2015, 3:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/24 "2015-10-24T03:34:34Z")
> [@Steophan](#): > > It’s amazing how people seem to wilfully misunderstand “correctly jailed for attempted murder” as “wants to have sex with”. So then you never said you saw no reason to upset by what happened because “thug got killed”? Sorry but when you automatically consider him a “thug” it’s pretty obvious that you have a bit of a bias. ---
**Author:** ![canned\_mayhem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/53a042/32.png) [@canned\_mayhem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/canned_mayhem)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2015, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/25 "2015-10-24T03:45:43Z")
So instead of my tax dollars going to fund this aspiring rappers welfare career, it instead will be used to fund the asshole who killed him? That’s like waking up from a nightmare and then realizing you’re a Clinton supporter… ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2015, 3:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/26 "2015-10-24T03:49:12Z")
Wait, so this thread isn’t about the guy who played Dr. Loveless on _The Wild Wild West_? ---
**Author:** ![Club\_33](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/df705f/32.png) [@Club\_33](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Club_33)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2015, 7:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/27 "2015-10-24T07:16:38Z")
Just curious - was a new edition of _Trolling for Dummies_ recently released. ---
**Author:** ![Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f475e1/32.png) [@Jimmy\_Chitwood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jimmy_Chitwood)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2015, 11:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/28 "2015-10-24T11:34:11Z")
> [@Club\_33](#): > > Just curious - was a new edition of _Trolling for Dummies_ recently released. No, pretty sure this is from the 1994 ed. ---
**Author:** ![BrotherCadfael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@BrotherCadfael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrotherCadfael)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2015, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/29 "2015-10-24T13:18:33Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > Wait, so this thread isn’t about the guy who played Dr. Loveless on _The Wild Wild West_? Nah. It was the guy who played Alexander in the Plato’s Stepchildren episode of TOS. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [October 24, 2015, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/30 "2015-10-24T13:30:31Z")
> [@canned\_mayhem](#): > > So instead of my tax dollars going to fund this aspiring rappers welfare career, it instead will be used to fund the asshole who killed him? > > That’s like waking up from a nightmare and then realizing you’re a Clinton supporter… Oh, you’re going to have to troll better than that. Why not start an MPSIMS thread asking for advice on how to clean blood-spatter off a Klan hood? ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2015, 4:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/31 "2015-10-25T16:11:08Z")
> [@Steophan](#): > > The music _was_ turned down, if I remember correctly by the guy who’s car it actually was. Davis then allegedly threatened Dunn, which is why Dunn shot him. > > I’ve argued that that is possibly self defence (and that possibly is all you need to be acquitted) You [actually argued](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=729907&page=11) that it _should_ have been brought in self-defence because the witnesses’ statements to the contrary should have been automatically discredited, according to an imaginary principle of jurisprudence that AFAICT isn’t actually accepted in law: > [@Steophan](#): > > His innocence doesn’t need to be proven, it is assumed. Anyone who kills, and claims self defence, should be presumed innocent until proven otherwise. > > Witness statements by the friends of the dead man don’t cut it. He should not have been convicted of murder. […] > > The law should protect those who have to defend themselves, not punish them. It’s that simple. And unless proven otherwise, someone who claims to have defended themself did so. > [@Bricker](#): > > Except that the jury, not you, got to see the witness’ demeanor and hear them testify. They are in a far better position to judge the credibility of each witness. > [@Steophan](#): > > I disagree that, based solely on the witness statements, a reasonable jury could find him guilty beyond reasonable doubt. If the law allows that, the law is wrong, and the decision the jury made was morally, if not legally, wrong. > [@Bricker](#): > > Do you understand that the jury may choose to believe or disbelieve any witness, as long as that witness’ testimony is not incredible as a matter of law? > > What, specifically, do you believe prevented a reasonable jury from finding guilt? […] > > You’re free to adopt whatever moral rules you like, but the rest of the country has no mandate to disregard the current rules and adopt ones based on your concept of morality. > [@Steophan](#): > > It is not reasonable to find guilt based solely on uncorroborated witness statements by potentially biased witnesses. […] > > Compare that to the attempted murder charges that Dunn was convicted of. There, he also claimed self defence, but the remainder of his statement along with the physical evidence showed that it was not reasonable to be threatened at that point, as they were leaving. > [@iiandyii](#): > > So you’re fine with the jury deciding he was lying in those cases, but in the other case, after already determining Dunn is a liar from his other claim, they _must accept his story and disregard the others?_ Wow that’s weird. > > You don’t think it might be reasonable that the jury says “we know he has a history of lying about self-defense, so we don’t find this claim of self-defense credible at all”? […] > > It’s not purely one person’s word against another – Dunn admits he shot the deceased. There’s no doubt Dunn pulled the trigger. The only question is whether the deceased threatened Dunn – and it’s entirely reasonable that the jury might choose to believe the witnesses, or believe Dunn’s story. They believed the witnesses, and concluded that Dunn was lying – probably because they already determined he was a liar about self-defense. […] > > Dunn lied about self-defense with regards to the shots he fired as the witnesses fled. > > Why can’t the jury decide he was lying about self-defense with regards to shooting the deceased? > [@Steophan](#): > > The point is that uncorroborated testimony from potentially biased witnesses is not, in my opinion, sufficient for proof of guilt. > > If a jury decides a witness is lying, they may ignore his testimony, but may not consider it evidence for the opposite of what he claims. I think another remark from **Bricker** sums it up fairly neatly: > [@Bricker](#): > > I disagree with your opinion, and more to the point: your opinion isn’t the law. > > In the real world, the jury is free to find guilt solely from witness statements. You’re welcome to insist it should be otherwise, but not welcome to suggest it IS otherwise. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2015, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/32 "2015-10-25T16:44:48Z")
I would have to review the thread, but was he maintaining that the evidence was only eyewitness testimony? Wasn’t there also a coroner’s report, pictures of a dead body, pictures of bullet holes in the side of a car, a weapon, a ballistics report…? ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2015, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/33 "2015-10-25T17:04:43Z")
What he is saying is that shooting victims’ testimony should be considered not credible as a matter of law because they have a motive to lie. Applying such a standard to witness testimony would turn our criminal law standard upside down. It would be pathetically easy to get away with murder or lethal assault. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2015, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/34 "2015-10-25T17:26:42Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > What he is saying is that shooting victims’ testimony should be considered not credible as a matter of law because they have a motive to lie. Applying such a standard to witness testimony would turn our criminal law standard upside down. It would be pathetically easy to get away with murder or lethal assault. And the shooter doesn’t have that same motive to lie? This is basically the strawman used by the other side, that you can just go around shooting people, and, as long as you claim self defense, there’s nothing they should be able to do about it. That’s insane. ---
**Author:** ![bup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6bbea6/32.png) [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2015, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/35 "2015-10-26T16:01:49Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > And the shooter doesn’t have that same motive to lie? > > This is basically the strawman used by the other side, that you can just go around shooting people, and, as long as you claim self defense, there’s nothing they should be able to do about it. > > That’s insane. Do you think you’re arguing with \*\*Ascenray \*\*or something? ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2016, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/36 "2016-11-17T14:29:48Z")
Update: the (Florida) First District Court of Appeal [upheld all four of Dunn’s convictions](https://edca.1dca.org/DCADocs/2014/4924/144924_DC05_11172016_081416_i.pdf) today. It’s worth noting that the court referenced the testimony of one distinterested witness as well as that of Dunn’s co-occupants. ---
**Author:** ![muldoonthief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muldoonthief/32/3188_2.png) [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2016, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/37 "2016-11-17T16:19:52Z")
There appears to be a fairly major typo/error in the linked document - it said “Dunn” (the shooter) at one point where it clearly should have been “Davis” (the victim). Could that become grounds for another appeal? > [@](#): > > Thompson and Stornes testified that they did not see or hear **Dunn** attempt to get > out of the Durango. Brunson testified that Davis tried to exit the Durango, but that the child locks prevented him from opening the door. The bolded word clearly meant to refer to Davis, since he’s the one who was in the Durango. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2016, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/38 "2016-11-17T17:01:13Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > You > > I think another remark from **Bricker** sums it up fairly neatly: I want to respond to this because the juxtaposition of quotes might lead readers to conclude I am denying the accuracy of one statement of **Steophan** ’s that is correct. > [@Steophan](#): > > The point is that uncorroborated testimony from potentially biased witnesses is not, in my opinion, sufficient for proof of guilt. > > If a jury decides a witness is lying, they may ignore his testimony, but may not consider it evidence for the opposite of what he claims. > [@Me](#): > > I disagree with your opinion, and more to the point: your opinion isn’t the law. > > In the real world, the jury is free to find guilt solely from witness statements. You’re welcome to insist it should be otherwise, but not welcome to suggest it IS otherwise. Steophan is correct when he says, “If a jury decides a witness is lying, they may ignore his testimony, but may not consider it evidence for the opposite of what he claims.” In the actual thread, my statement was not a direct reply to his. Not to belabor a point, but if a witness testifies, “I did not shoot Edgar,” the jury is completely free to disbelieve him, and conclude he’s a liar. But they cannot further conclude, “…so that means he DID shoot Edgar.” There must be other evidence to support the finding besides “He testified to the contrary and he’s an obvious liar.” [/legal geek hijack] ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2016, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/39 "2016-11-17T17:31:28Z")
> [@muldoonthief](#): > > There appears to be a fairly major typo/error in the linked document - it said “Dunn” (the shooter) at one point where it clearly should have been “Davis” (the victim). Could that become grounds for another appeal? > > The bolded word clearly meant to refer to Davis, since he’s the one who was in the Durango. I noticed that as well. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2016, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512/40 "2016-11-17T19:13:36Z")
> [@muldoonthief](#): > > There appears to be a fairly major typo/error in the linked document - it said “Dunn” (the shooter) at one point where it clearly should have been “Davis” (the victim). Could that become grounds for another appeal? No. It’s just a scrivener’s error - lawyerspeak for a typo - and will probably be corrected once the ruling becomes final in 30 days and the order is released for publication. Which is not to say that there won’t be another appeal; Dunn is likely to appeal to the Florida Supreme Court. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/michael-dunn-steophans-hero-given-life-sentence/735512.md?page=1)