Verdict: self-defense. (Exercising the Right).(Brief Article)

On April 1, 2001, Ryan Naylor Palmer, 44, drove Janice Waites, a friend, to an apartment complex in Far North Dallas, Texas, to pick up her car. The vehicle, according to Waites, had been taken without her permission by a boyfriend, Jimmy Lee Earley, with whom she was breaking up.

Earley, 39, either followed the two or happened to drive by as they stood together outside an apartment. He reportedly became enraged and, after damaging the car he was driving -- according to Palmer, he punched a hole in the windshield, destroyed a radio, and yanked a door off its hinges -- charged toward the couple. Palmer pulled one of two handguns with which he was armed and yelled, "We are not going to do this Jimmy." When Earley menacingly continued to approach, Palmer fired twice, striking the irate man in his left leg and midsection. He died a few hours later at a Dallas hospital.

Palmer claimed that he had acted in self-defense, but prosecutors disagreed and charged him with murder. During the recent trial, Assistant District Attorney Kelly Ludy claimed that "he had no justification for shooting and killing" Earley. Indeed, Ludy accused him of ambushing Earley so he could have Waites, whom he ...