Republican Texas Governor Greg Abbott announced he’ll pardon convicted murderer Daniel Perry, found guilty of shooting a Black Lives Matter demonstrator he claimed aimed an assault rifle at him, KXAN NBC-36 in Austin reports.
“I am working as swiftly as Texas law allows regarding the pardon of Sgt. Perry,” Abbott tweeted. A pardon must first go through the state’s pardon advisory board before Abbott can sign it.
During a July 2020 protest in Austin, Perry, working as an Uber driver, turned into the street where the protest was occurring. Instead of turning around, Perry proceeded toward the crowd and was quickly surrounded by demonstrators; prior to this night, there had been no fewer than 75 times drivers plowed into BLM protests in the Summer of 2020, killing two and injuring dozens; most of the drivers were angry racists who intentionally tried to harm or kill protestors.
Witnesses at the trial said the victim, Garret Foster, gestured with his weapon, an AR-15-style rifle, for Perry to turn around and leave the way he came. Perry claimed he interpreted the move as a threat and that Foster aimed the weapon at him; Perry fired five shots from a revolver, hitting Foster multiple times. Another protester fired three times at the vehicle, which ultimately turned and fled the scene. Foster never fired a shot.
Advocates for Perry claim Austin District Attorney Jose Garza intentionally withheld exculpatory evidence about Perry’s self-defense claim from the grand jury that indicted him, something that is not normally presented to a grand jury. In Texas, district attorneys are not required to present any exculpatory evidence, while in some other states, prosecutors are required to present “clearly exculpatory” evidence that directly refutes an aspect of prosecutor’s theory of the crime.
The case demonstrates why loose open carry laws and “stand your ground” laws don’t mix: an innocent move by anyone carrying a weapon would be interpreted by a different provably paranoid gun owner–you wouldn’t carry a gun if you didn’t think you needed to defend yourself every second of every day–as a threat. And the actual case can never be determined because one of the key witnesses typically ends up dead.