Argumentative Essay: Proceeding In The Courtroom

Proceeding When I entered the court room, the defendant’s girlfriend was on the witness stand. She was the first individual on record that received a call from the defendant after the murder. She described the defendant’s condition as “distraught”, “all over the place” and “frantic” during the phone call. She exclaimed that the first words that came out of the defendant’s mouth were “I just shot him and I’m scared!” She tried to defend the father of her children by claiming he was in a disoriented mental state and was scared for his life. Even though he admitted to committing the crime to her, she did not report to the authorities with information. The district attorney brought up her while questioning her, since it was the vehicle driven
during the crime. She told the attorney that she allowed the defendant to drive her car that day and several other days in the past. The defendant’s girlfriend was a valuable witness because the phone call she had with the defendant after the crime was labeled as a confession. When the defense attorney approached the witness stand, she asked some of the same questions like “How did the defendant sound on the phone?, “What were his exact words?”, “Did you know the victim?” and “Did you believe the defendant when he told you he shot the victim?” She replied “He (the defendant) was scared for his life. I could hear it in his voice and he even told me he felt somebody was after his a couple weeks ago. He had been acting paranoid for a while. When he called me that’s all I could hear, the paranoia in his voice. He told me the whole story. He said that the other guy (the victim) kept asking him to buy some weed. He told him he might get some and that he would let him know. He went inside the gas station to get some chips and cookies; it was a snack that he routinely got. The other guy said something to him in the store, but I can’t remember his exact words, it’s been a while. When he got to the register, some of the other guys friends were talking behind him. He went outside to his car when the other guy approached him. They got into some type of argument and the other guy got too close, so he pulled out his gun (the defendant). Then the other guy reached for something but he couldn’t see what it was, so he shot him 3 times.” She said she didn’t know the victim and neither did the defendant. During her statement, she was asked if she knew of the unfamiliar object that the defendant claimed to see but she said she did not. The defendant also denied knowing or seeing the object. He just claimed to be scared and acted out of fear. They also asked her if the defendant pointed his gun first and she admitted he did. Before answering the question “Did you believe that the defendant shot the victim”, the defense attorney objected the question claiming it to be irrelevant. The next witness was the expert witness with the company AT&T. Before being asked any question about the trial, the defense attorney wanted him to prove himself as an expert. She asked how many year he has been in this field and has he ever testified as an expert. With pride, the expert witness mentioned that he had been working with cell phone coordination for about 16 years, 7 years with AT&T, and has served on 4 trials as an expert witness. The judge ruled him as an expert and asked them to continue with the case. He gave the coordinates of the defendant’s phone after the shooting and discovered a call before the shooting. The witness’s duration on the stand wasn’t long, because they just wanted to prove that the defendant did receive a call before the shooting and he did make the call to his girlfriend afterwards. The leading detective in the case was the next witness to be called to the stand. He was asked questions pertaining to the area he investigated, what he saw arriving to the scene, how long it took him to convict and arrest the defendant and what proof and evidence was found. The detective exclaimed that he investigated all around the gas station but also looked across the street on the gas station and other unrecorded areas but found nothing. He said that he just saw the body, the officer who were called to the scene and many citizens surrounding the body. It only took the detective a week to collect evidence and arrest the defendant. He arrested the defendant after spotting the car that was used the time of the shooting. A day before finding the defendant, the detective received a written statement from the defendant’s girlfriend, who owned the car, and the defendant’s mother, who possessed his cell phone at the time. When asked where the4 defendant was the girlfriend replied “I don’t know, but he is going to turn himself in as soon as he finds the money for an attorney.” The detective even admitted people were calling the police station giving them hints that the defendant was the one that committed the crime. During the detective’s testimony, he was asked what evidence he found and he answered with the gas station video.
The video was openly viewed in the court room for everyone to see.
In the video, the defendant and the victim exchanged words outside of the gas station and again in the store. The victim’s entourage surrounded the defendant in the store and they also exchanged words. The video did not possess any sound and was only video footage, so the jury wasn’t able to hear or make out the spoken words. The defendant was followed outside the store to his car by the victim and his friends. They seemed to have a heated argument and then shots were fired. In the video, the victim did not pull out or attempt to show any type of weapon but he did possess a gun. The victim bled out for for approximately 30 minutes before another person appeared in the footage and an estimate of 45 minutes before a law enforcer arrived. During the video, the audience in the court room gave off sounds of sadness, shock, and disappointment. One of the men that sat in the row across from me was enraged by the duration the victim laid there. He announced “That is my son. I can’t believe y’all let him die like that. Just left him for dead” giving me the impression that he was the father of the victim. He was excused by the bailiff and the duration of the vide continued just to show people standing around the
body.