Editor’s note: Dean Obeidallah, a former attorney, is the host of SiriusXM radio’s daily program “The Dean Obeidallah Show.” Follow him @DeanObeidallah@masto.ai. The opinions expressed in this commentary are his own. view more opinions on CNN.
CNN
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Announced by Texas Gov. Gregg Abbott this weekend that he plans to pardon a defendant who was convicted last week in the shooting death of a US military veteran who participated in the 2020 Black Lives Matter protest.
Abbott’s planned pardon is a dangerous attack on the rule of law.
Why did the Republican governor — who pardoned only two people last year — rush to pardon the man convicted days ago of fatally shooting 28-year-old Air Force veteran Garrett Foster in the middle of a road in Texas?
Abbott’s apology announcement came after he was prompted to do so by figures on the right – from Fox News host Tucker Carlson to chairman of the Texas Republican Party of Kyle Rittenhouse. The latter was celebrated in right-wing circles when, as a teenager, he shot three people in 2020 – killing two and injuring another – during riots and protests against racism in Kenosha, Wisconsin. (Rittenhouse, who was acquitted of all charges in November 2021, testified that he acted in self-defense.)
The facts of the Texas murder case are quite straightforward: On the night of July 25, 2020, the accused Daniel Perry was working as an Uber driver in Austin while protests took place in the Texas capital due to the horrific murder of George Floyd. Foster, who was apparently carrying an AK-47, was among the protesters who joined the demonstrations.
According to Austin police, Perry was driving his car when he came to an intersection blocked by BLM protesters. He initially stopped for a few seconds to allow some demonstrators to cross the road, but after honking at them, he ran a red light. The prosecution argued that Perry started the encounter by running the lights and turning into the crowd, according to CNN affiliate KEYE. When the confrontation took place between Perry and Foster – both White and legally armed.
There are conflicting accounts as to whether Foster pointed his weapon at Perry or whether Perry made the first move. What is indisputable, however, is that Perry fired five shots from his .357 revolver through the window of his car, killing Foster. Perry fled the scene but later called police to report the shooting, saying he was acting in self-defense.
During the trial, the key question for the Texas jury was whether Perry’s shooting was justified under the state’s “Stand Your Ground” law, which allows deadly force to be used against those who feel their lives are at stake. in danger.
Prosecutors argued that Perry instigated the incident and introduced text messages into evidence that suggested the shooting was not an impulsive act but a planned one. One of the most damaging was Perry’s Facebook message to a friend before the shooting that he might “kill some people on my way to work. They’re rioting outside my apartment complex.” The lawyers The defense said Foster threatened Perry by pointing his gun at Perry.
During the eight-day trial, several witnesses testified, and forensic evidence was presented. After deliberating for 17 hours, the jury returned a unanimous verdict on Friday that found Perry guilty of murder. (A jury found him not guilty of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, and a deadly conduct charge is pending in the county attorney’s office.)
Then Carlson and others on the right began pressuring Abbott to issue an apology, because they disagreed with the ruling.
On his Fox News show Friday night, Carlson called on Abbott to pardon Perry, arguing that the defendant acted in self-defense — even though the jury rejected that argument. Carlson even attacked the prosecutor by describing him as a “Soros-funded Da,” invoking the Jewish billionaire philanthropist whose name is often used as an antisemitic putdown on the right. Carlson stated that the ruling “means that in the state of Texas, if you’re politically incorrect, you’re not allowed to defend yourself.”
The Fox News host is not alone in asking for Perry to be pardoned for killing a protester advocating for Black Lives Matter, an organization repeatedly demonized by the right, which was then President Donald Trump. 2020 called the words “a symbol of hatred” and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene in 2021 labeling the movement “the strongest terrorist threat” in the country.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton released a statement to Fox News Digital claiming that “the Soros-backed DA … cares more about the radical agenda of the dangerous Antifa and BLM mob than justice.” And another Texas Republican, US Rep. Ronny Jackson, Tweet he demanded that Abbott “FORGIVE Daniel Perry IMMEDIATELY!”
Did Jackson discuss the evidence that showed the jury had committed an error? No. But like other Republicans, he hissed the name Soros, saying, “don’t let a Soros-owned Austin liberal DA destroy our justice system.”
As campaign pressure mounted, Abbott announced he would ask the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles – whose members he appointed – to expedite the pardon paperwork for Perry, which he promised to sign as soon as it “hits my table.” The governor justified his work for a pardon by saying“Texas has one of the strongest ‘Stand Your Ground’ self-defense laws that cannot be struck down by a jury or a progressive District Attorney.”
But the jury knows the Stand Your Ground law. It examined the facts of the case and found Perry guilty. If the verdict is clearly wrong, then the defendant’s lawyers should appeal. (Perry’s attorney, Clint Broden, told CNN that his client plans to appeal the verdict.)
In fact, David Wahlberg, a Travis County criminal court judge, told the Austin American-Statesman newspaper that he couldn’t think of another case in Texas history when a governor apologized before formally appeal a judgment.
Trial verdicts are determined by judges and juries, and sentences should not be set aside by a governor – apparently for political reasons. What Abbott did was not just wrong, it was dangerous. His pardon, when it comes, is not what the rule of law looks like.
