Tuesday, February 03, 2015

David Codrea: ‘Vindictive prosecution’ subjects self-defense to ‘community standards'



A Marin County doctor who had charges dismissed against him earlier this month is still facing a grand jury indictment obtained by a prosecutor determined to see him convicted, the San Francisco Chronicle reported Thursday. Dr. James Stephen Simon, a surgeon and occupational medicine and aerospace medicine practitioner with no criminal history, had more than 50 registered firearms, the majority being sporting weapons and collector’s items, and 200 boxes of ammunition, seized by police following a self-defense shooting in 2014.

Marin County District Attorney's Office (YouTube screen capture)

Simon had already been acquitted of” attempted voluntary manslaughter and assault with a firearm” on January 7, when Marin County Judge Kelly Simmons “dismissed charges against [the] 71-year-old doctor accused of shooting a 70-year-old man who followed him to his Corte Madera home in a road-rage confrontation.” The ruling, following a two-day preliminary hearing, appeared to be the end of a “case [that] had been prosecuted personally by Marin County District Attorney Ed Berberian.”

The shooting itself seems understandable, regardless of any “offending” traffic maneuver that precipitated it, which reportedly was pulling his Smart Car around a Mercedes stopped at an intersection when it did not proceed after the light turned green. The doctor, with his wife in the car, was followed home by 69-year-old retired mortgage broker William Osenton, who, after “tailgating and accelerating and driving extraordinarily aggressively,” drove his car so doggedly in pursuit that it was struck by the garage door when Simon tried to close it. Rushing into the house to retrieve a handgun, Simon fired a warning shot, and then fired two shots that struck the trespasser.

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