A white woman who fatally shot her Black neighbor through a locked door amid a neighborhood feud in Florida has been convicted by a jury of manslaughter.
The jury took less than three hours Friday to find 60-year-old Susan Lorincz guilty in the death of Ajike “AJ” Shantrell Owens, a 35-year-old single mother who was shot once in the right side of her chest with a .380-caliber handgun while standing outside Lorincz’s front door in June 2023. Owens’ death drew national attention and put a new spotlight on race, gun violence and Florida’s controversial “stand your ground” law.
The defense team offered no comment after the verdict, citing respect for the victim’s family. In a news conference outside the courthouse, Anthony Thomas, an attorney representing Owens’ family, called on Circuit Judge Robert Hodges to impose the maximum sentence of 30 years in prison.
I’m sorry, but maybe this is something I’m too European to understand, but:
How the fuck is shooting someone not murder?
It’s not like it’s fucking negligence to pick up a gun and pull a trigger on someone.
Fucking clown show you’re running over there
Manslaughter is a charge for one person killing another, although not necessarily on purpose— in this case, the offender shot through a door, killing the victim, however it can’t be proven beyond a reasonable doubt that the offender intended to kill the victim.
The offender was charged with Felony Manslaughter, which is both very serious and carries a much longer sentence than misdemeanor manslaughter, and is, basically, what prosecutors use when they can’t prove intent, a critical criterion for a murder conviction.
I read “manslaughter” in the NZ sense and was like WTF, how is this not murder.
Here manslaughter is a much lesser charge.
I get that.
Manslaughter is treated differently in every jurisdiction in the US, but the level of Manslaughter that the offender was changed and convicted with is legally adjacent to a murder charge. It’s just that the prosecutor didn’t believe that they could prove - beyond a reasonable doubt - that the offender actually intended to kill the victim rather than, say, frightening them or, perhaps, injuring them. So they went for a charge that they knew they could prove in court.
Colloquially speaking, this person murdered the other, no doubt. But what could be proven in court, given the evidence, was a degree of manslaughter.
Same in Canada, murder is automatic life, involuntary manslaughter can be 6 months jail
Each state has different names for certain crimes. “Murder” is not a standardized legal term.
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