"Loud Music" Murder Charge to be retried
CUOMO: Welcome back to NEW DAY. The so-called loud music trial, we have our verdict. It was incomplete. There was no verdict yet on the death of Jordan Davis, but the prosecutor says they will retry the case for the young man's death. So the jury deadlocked on whether Dunn murdered 17-year-old Jordan Davis. He could still, however, face 60 years in prison because of the multiple counts of attempted murder and the other charge that he was convicted of. The case, of course, has sparked debate that goes way beyond the courtroom. This is about race. It's about prejudice. It's also about Florida's self-defense laws more than anything else and comparisons, of course, to George Zimmerman's acquittal seven months ago. Let's discuss these issues in the courtroom and how they extend out of it. We have HLN's Nancy Grace. Nancy Grace, great to you have you here. Thank you for joining this conversation.</s>NANCY GRACE, HLN HOST: Good morning.</s>CUOMO: Let's start with the specific with this actual verdict. Can you make sense of it?</s>GRACE: Well, I've really wrestled with it, and I think I can make sense of it. That doesn't mean I disagree -- that agree with it. What I think happened is this. I think that even though we don't believe there's a self-defense theory here, I do not believe there was a gun there, I don't think Jordan Davis or any of his friends had a gun, I think that they were four kids going out to the mall to try to meet girls. They had been talking about what cologne they were going to wear that night. I don't think they were interested in gun play. But I think that some of the jurors, maybe one of them, thought even though it doesn't make sense to us did he think he was defending himself against Jordan Davis? If they believe that, then I could understand how they came back hung on count one, which dealt specifically with Jordan Davis. But as to the other three young boys in that car, absolutely no self-defense. Again, I don't agree with it, but I'm trying to understand it and make sense of it. Now what is Dunn looking at? He's actually looking at over 90 years behind bars. This is why. The charges carry a penalty of 20 to 30 on each of those three attempted murder twos. In Florida -- you probably already know this -- there is a statute that says if a gun is involved in certain crimes, they gotta run consecutive, 30, 30, 30 or 20, 20, 20 plus firing into a car. This is a life sentence for him. I still want a murder trial on Jordan Davis. As a crime victim myself, I wouldn't want to go to my grave saying, "My son's case never had a verdict." Right or wrong, guilty or not guilty I want a verdict.</s>CUOMO: Right.</s>GRACE: That would just be the way I look at it.</s>CUOMO: I think you have to have it. I mean I thought the father was very eloquent and the mother as well saying that certainly he didn't get away with it. This is another situation like George Zimmerman for the family of that victim. However there's still no resolution on the message that must be sent about the value life. So hopefully Angela Corey rethinks her strategy, brings the case -- we see what happens. Obviously, we want fairness to prevail. Let me ask you this, on the issue of the gun, it seems to me that one of two things has to be true for this jury or whoever deadlocked it, Nancy Grace, which is one, they believe that a car full of black kids was likely to have had a gun with them and I wonder if they would have thought that if it was a car full of white kids. Or someone on that jury believed that Michael Dunn would have never done this if his life wasn't in fear because he'd never done anything like it before. Someone must believe one or both of those suppositions -- do you agree. Because there was no proof of the gun offered.</s>GRACE: I think that could be true.</s>CUOMO: There's no proof.</s>GRACE: I think that could be true. But I also think that the fact that they came back on guilty against, with the other three victims, means that they knew that he was not exercising self-defense against those three victims. I mean come on.</s>CUOMO: Right.</s>GRACE: Bottom line in his police interview he says he may have even imagined the gun.</s>CUOMO: Right.</s>GRACE: I mean the fact that there was no gun, you know, that just goes without saying there was no gun. Police said it, crime scene tech said it, witnesses said it --</s>CUOMO: Right.</s>GRACE: -- the boys in the car said it. The girlfriend, the fiancee gets in the car. I mean when I was a prosecutor I had a gun pulled on me and my investigator once. We dove off the front porch of that apartment complex when I saw the barrel. I'll never forget it, the first thing I said was "That guy pulled a gun on us."</s>CUOMO: Right.</s>GRACE: When she got in the car after trotting in to get ever more booze he never said "Those kids pulled a gun on me."</s>CUOMO: That's right. And --</s>GRACE: Why? Because they didn't pull a gun on him.</s>CUOMO: And everything that happened afterwards, not calling 911, not doing anything that seems like common sense follow up. Look the jury you got to give them credit they were sophisticated to come up with the attempted murder -- those convictions. That showed a lot of thought and dedication. Now, let's get to the main issue. This happened because this law is a tough law -- this Florida self-defense law, forget about stand your ground. It creates too low a bar for self-defense in my opinion. Do you see this case as being a reflection of the need for change where someone again, makes bad assumptions and gets bailed out by the law just like in the George Zimmerman case?</s>GRANCE: Well, the reality is that self-defense it is subjective, it's what the defendant thought. Did they feel that they were being threatened? Now, to me this is just as absurd as me saying well I thought you were going to shoot me through the camera so I shot you back.</s>CUOMO: Right.</s>GRACE: That doesn't make sense just like in this case. I think it's more a matter of the way the evidence is presented. And the way you strike your jury. If you get one nut on a jury you can have the greatest laws in the world and you're still going to get a bad verdict. But again, this jury worked like mad.</s>CUOMO: They worked hard.</s>GRACE: And I'm frankly grateful that they came back on anything Zimmerman.</s>CUOMO: Right.</s>GRACE: I mean how many times do I have to see that man trace a picture from AP and then sell it for $100,000 online? I mean he needs to just go away and be quiet.</s>CUOMO: I understand completely how you feel Nancy. But again, you have two cases here where guys made bad suppositions but because of a law where there's no duty to retreat and there's no punishment for being stupid in a situation they both wind up with no acquittal certainly until it gets retried.</s>GRACE: You know the law and the reality is you can only under all law including Florida, you can only use as much force as is necessary to defeat the attack.</s>CUOMO: Right.</s>GRACE: And here it's like if I slap you, you can't shoot me with an Uzi --</s>CUOMO: Right.</s>GRACE: -- and that's what happened in this case. The Florida law covers that. Do I think that it gives the defendant an advantage? Yes, I do -- an unfair advantage.</s>CUOMO: Yes, I totally agree Nancy Grace. Thank you very much for joining. Of course, we can all watch you.</s>GRACE: Thanks for inviting me.</s>CUOMO: Oh, it's a pleasure -- need your perspective always. We can watch you on Monday through Friday at 8:00 p.m. Eastern on HLN -- Kate.</s>KATE BOLDUAN, CNN HOST: Coming up next on NEW DAY he's a silver medalist with a heart of gold. Find out what one U.S. Olympian is doing to help save the stray dogs of Sochi. The good stuff is next.