U.S. State Department Special Agent Christopher Deedy doesn’t want the jurors in his murder retrial to have the option to find him guilty of manslaughter, and his testimony in state court Wednesday emphasized that.
Deedy, 30, said it was no accident when he fatally shot 23-year-old Kollin Elderts in a Waikiki McDonald’s restaurant in November 2011. He said he drew his gun and fired it "to stop the threat, kill the assailant," as he had been trained to do as a federal law enforcement officer.
He was assigned to the State Department field office in Washington, D.C., but was in Honolulu to provide security for the 2011 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting.
Deedy is standing trial for murder in state court a second time because the first trial last year ended with a hung jury.
Legal observers and Elderts’ family were critical of the prosecutor for not pursuing the manslaughter option and of Circuit Judge Karen Ahn for not providing it to the jury. Given the all-or-nothing choice between guilty of murder and acquittal, four jurors favored murder while eight voted for acquittal.
Ahn told the jurors in the current trial that they can expect to have the case for deliberation Friday. Before then she will have to decide whether to give them the option to consider man- slaughter as well as murder.
Before trial, Deedy’s lawyers filed legal papers asking Ahn to exclude manslaughter from the jury’s consideration. They claim that when Ahn refused to include the manslaughter option in the last trial, she made a legal finding that it was not warranted. They claim that the finding is akin to a judgment and that Deedy should not have to face the charge again.
Ahn had scheduled a hearing on the request for Monday but rescheduled it to Thursday.
Deedy said he shot Elderts to stop him and the Kailua resident’s friend, Shane Medeiros, from continuing to assault him and his friend, Adam Gutowski.
He said he intervened when he noticed a potentially violent situation escalating between Elderts and Medeiros on one side and another restaurant customer, Michel Perrine, on the other. He said his hope to defuse the situation by showing and announcing his law enforcement credentials to Elderts and Medeiros had the opposite effect when Elderts reacted by challenging him.
Deedy said Elderts first asked him whether he had a gun and whether he was going to shoot him, then said, "Oh, you do have a gun. You’re going to need it, I’m going to get you."
He said Medeiros stood up and assumed what he recognized from his training as a pre-assaultive posture by tucking his chin and weighting himself. When Elderts moved forward, Deedy said he delivered a front kick with his right foot midway up Elderts’ body to create space between the two. He said Elderts tried to grab his leg but was only able "to scoop" his slipper off his foot.
Just then, Deedy said, Gutowski moved forward and Elderts punched Gutowski on the side of the face, knocking him backward into the restaurant’s side door frame. Then, as Gutowski stumbled forward, Deedy said, Medeiros tackled Gutowski.
Deedy said that as he was moving forward, a hit he didn’t see coming knocked him backward off his feet onto his head. He said Elderts then joined Medeiros in kicking Gutowski, who was propped up against the door frame.
He said he could see that Gutowski was facing serious injury or death because his head and body were propped up against the door frame and not able to move back with the kicks.
At that point, Deedy said, he realized that "this was a deadly force situation."
He said he got to his feet and gave the warning, "Stop or I’ll shoot," with one hand on his right hip where his gun was holstered and the other in front of him to maintain distance.
Instead of stopping, he said Elderts pressed forward up against his outstretched hand.
Deedy said he drew his gun and fired, aiming for center mass as he was trained to do. He said the shot missed and whizzed past Elderts’ face because Elderts turned his body and reached for the gun.
He said Elderts then pushed him backward and onto the ground, straddled him and while holding Deedy’s firing arm with one hand, repeatedly punched him in the face with the other.
"I was thinking I was going to die," Deedy said.
He said he struggled to maintain control of his gun and fired off two more shots. Deedy said Elderts then stopped punching and collapsed on top of him.
The state claims that Deedy did not identify himself as a law enforcement officer before shooting Elderts, and was drunk.
