Self-Defense or Murder? The Stillwater Bail Bonds Office Shooting

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"You're listening to 10-minute murder."

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August 9, 2017.

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Stillwater, Oklahoma.

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A man walks into a bail-bond's office, thinking he's there to talk about selling his car.

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Minutes later, he's trying to climb out of a window, trying to escape.

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Then a gunshot.

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He falls to the pavement outside, dying from a bullet wound to his back.

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The person who pulled the trigger, his own bail-bond'sman.

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And she walked away, a free woman.

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So let's talk about what happened in Stillwater, Oklahoma on a summer day in 2017.

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As this case is one of those stories that makes you wonder about the system we've built

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and who we trust with power.

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Brandon James Williams was 38 years old.

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He'd gotten into some legal trouble in late July 2017.

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Police arrested him for three counts of second-degree burglary and possession of marijuana.

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The burglaries were at a local restaurant in Stillwater.

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Freddie Paul's restaurant, Curly's old-fashioned hamburgers, and Palomino's Mexican restaurant.

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He needed to get out of jail while he waited for these court dates, so he turned to Chacity

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Dawn Carey's company, Signature bail bonds.

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Carey posted a $35,000 bond for Brandon on July 31.

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That's how the bail system works.

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You pay someone to guarantee you'll show up to court.

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Brandon owed Carey about $3,500 for doing that.

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If you don't show up, the bondsman comes to get you.

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And in Oklahoma, bail bondsmen have some pretty serious authority to do that.

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Carey was 41 years old.

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A licensed bail bondsman operating out of downtown Stillwater in the town center building on West

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7th Avenue.

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She had a 19 year old son named Justin Henderson, who sometimes helped her with the business.

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On the nights of August 8, Carey got a text from Brandon.

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It said, "Gone to Florida."

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According to Brandon's ex-wife Ashley, Brandon had told Carey that he needed to go to Florida

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for his mother's funeral.

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His mother had passed away the week before.

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Ashley apparently interpreted this differently.

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She thought Brandon was skipping town to avoid paying her and to avoid his court dates.

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So she came up with a plan.

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On the morning of August 9, Carey called Brandon and told him to come to her office.

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She didn't tell him that she was planning to revoke his bond and take him straight to

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jail.

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Instead, she told him her son Justin wanted to buy his Ford Mustang.

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Brandon had put up the car as collateral when he got the bond.

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So this seemed like a normal business conversation.

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Before Brandon arrived, Justin Henderson set up a GoPro camera in the corner of the office.

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It was running when Brandon walked in around 1145 in the morning.

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The video shows what happened next, and it's been released to the public.

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Brandon walks in and sits down.

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For a few minutes, everything seems casual.

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They're talking about cars, joking around.

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Then Carey stands up and walks over to the door.

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She locks it.

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The mood shifts immediately.

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She tells Brandon to put his hands behind his back.

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She tells him multiple times.

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Brandon starts to panic.

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What do you mean?

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He says, "What's going on here?"

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Carey and her son move toward him with handcuffs.

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Brandon tells him not to touch him.

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He backs away from them, asking, "What are you doing this for?"

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You can hear the confusion and fear in his voice.

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And I'll play some of the audio from the video clip so that you can hear exactly what I'm

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talking about.

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As he moves out of frame behind Carey's desk, there's a window there, about any window

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with curtains.

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You can see the curtain swing outward.

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Brandon is trying to climb out the window to escape.

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Carey runs over to her desk drawer, and she grabs her gun, and she shoots.

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One shot.

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You can hear Brandon scream.

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You shot me.

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Justin yells, "Mom, you just shot him."

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Carey's response?

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I did.

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Oh, man, I'm going out to you. I see a pretty little challenger down there.

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That's a little bit more.

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Absolutely, no orges.

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I have a freaking little orges.

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I like it.

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Oh, man.

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What's going on here?

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I'm going to sit and talk to your cup.

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I'm not going to help.

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Yeah, actually you are.

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For what?

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Open the door.

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Don't put your hands on.

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Don't put your hands on.

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Put your hands on.

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Don't put your hands on.

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Don't put your hands on.

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Why?

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What are you doing this to me for?

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Why are you doing this to me for?

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I'm going to get this to me for, man.

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Wow.

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Oh, you ****.

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Mom, you just shot me.

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I did.

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Talk to me.

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Mom, my door.

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I want one.

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I want one.

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I want one.

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Mom, you.

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I want one.

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Why?

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She called 911 right after that.

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The call is chilling to listen to.

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I just shot a man on top of the roof of the town center.

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She tells the dispatcher.

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She says she's a bondsman and that Williams was coming after her.

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She tells them to hurry.

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When still water police arrived, they found Brandon dead on the balcony outside the emergency

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exit.

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He'd been shot in the back.

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He was unarmed.

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He had no weapon on him at all.

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This Captain Kyle Gibbs said Kerry cooperated with investigators that day.

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She told them she'd called Brandon to the office to revoke his bond and taken back to

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Payne County Sheriff's office.

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She said a fight broke out.

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She said Brandon tried to grab her gun during the struggle and she shot him in self-defense.

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The police looked at the video footage.

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They talked to Justin Henderson, who was the only witness, and they came to the conclusion,

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according to Captain Gibbs, witness statements as well as evidence found at the scene, including

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video evidence, contradict Kerry's version of the event.

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The same evening, around 6.30 pm, police arrested Kerry at her home in Drumwright.

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She was charged with first degree murder.

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The case went to trial March 2018.

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The Payne County District Attorney's Office charged Kerry with first degree murder, which

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requires proof of deliberate intent and premeditation.

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If convicted, she faced life in prison.

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The trial lasted four days.

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On Thursday, the jury watched the GoPro video.

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They saw everything I just described.

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They saw Brandon walk in, unsuspecting.

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They saw him try to escape.

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They saw Kerry shoot him in the back.

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On Friday, they heard closing arguments and began deliberating.

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The defense strategy was focused entirely on fear and self-defense.

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Kerry testified that Brandon tried to grab her gun.

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She said she beat him to it, meaning she got control of the weapon first.

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The critical piece of her defense was her claim that she was afraid Brandon was going to

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shoot her son Justin.

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That fear, she argued, justified the shooting.

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Even though Brandon was shot in the back, even though he was trying to escape through a window.

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Even though he was unarmed, because in her mind, in that moment, he was still a deadly threat.

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The jury came back with a verdict pretty quickly.

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Not guilty.

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Cassidy Kerry walked out of that courtroom of free woman.

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According to her defense attorney, some jurors later said that if she'd been charged with

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manslaughter instead of first-degree murder, they would have convicted her.

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The problem was the prosecution's burden of proof on the murder charge.

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They had to prove deliberate intent and premeditation, and the jury apparently didn't believe

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that standard had been met.

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The district attorney, Laura Austin Thomas, released a statement after the verdict.

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She said she stood by her decision to file first-degree murder charges based on the evidence.

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She talked about respecting the jury's system and the burden every participant carries in a

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criminal trial.

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She was careful not to criticize the verdict.

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Brandon's ex-wife Ashley spoke out after the trial.

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She told reporters that she'd never been contacted by the DA's office.

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According to a prosecutor, they weren't aware Brandon had an ex-wife or a young son

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until the trial was over.

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Brandon had a two-year-old son named James, named after his father, and that little boy

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will never know his dad.

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Ashley watched the video of the shooting after it was released.

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Her reaction was simple.

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"Honestly, it seems very malicious."

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She had a message for Chasady Carey.

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"I hope your decision will haunt you forever.

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You've had one judgment day, but you'll have another.

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You had no right taking someone's life, no right."

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The family's attorney, Noble Mac and Tire, put it bluntly.

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The video is obviously shocking.

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To anybody who's seen the video, they're going to be asking themselves how in the world of

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this jury come to the conclusion that they came to.

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The family planned to file a civil lawsuit against Carey.

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Mac and Tire said, "There's a little two-year-old who doesn't have a father anymore, and he's

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never going to have a father.

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It doesn't matter if there's money or not.

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It's not bringing him back, but they want to do justice for him."

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And Chasady Carey?

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Through her attorney, she said she intended to go back to work as a bail-bondzman by the

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end of the week after her acquittal.

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She claimed she'd lost everything while she was incarcerated awaiting trial.

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Here's what keeps me up at night about this case.

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Under Oklahoma law, bail bondsmen are required to get training on the proper use of force.

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There's a specific statute that states, "Bail enforcers can't use force that's unnecessary,

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excessive, or unreasonable."

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Chasady Carey had that training.

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She knew those rules, and yet she lured Brandon Williams to her office under false pretence.

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She locked the door so he couldn't leave.

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When he tried to escape out of a window, she shot him in the back.

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And a jury said that was okay because she claimed she was scared.

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Think about what that means.

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Professional standards about using force become essentially meaningless when someone can

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successfully claim fear.

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Subjective feelings override objective evidence about whether someone was actually dangerous.

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The video shows what happened.

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Brandon was unarmed.

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He was trying to get away.

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He asked multiple times what was happening, why she was doing this.

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He didn't attack anyone.

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He didn't threaten anyone.

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He tried to get away, and she killed him for it.

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Compared this to police shootings, when officers shoot fleeing suspects, especially when they

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shoot them in the back, those cases often result in charges, trials, national scrutiny.

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There are investigations into whether the threat was real and immediate.

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There are questions about training and protocols and whether the use of force was justified.

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Chastity Kerry was a private citizen with a bail enforcement license.

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She had financial incentives tied to keeping Brandon in the system.

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She owed him nothing in terms of due process or constitutional protections.

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And she walked away from killing him completely cleared.

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Thanks for listening to 10 Minute Murder, bingeable true crime stories.

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I'm Joe, I'm the host.

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And let's get to a quick email, subject the unintentional nap.

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Hi Joe.

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Okay this sounds weird.

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I love your voice and sometimes I fall asleep listening to 10 Minute Murder.

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Which means I occasionally wake up to you calmly describing a homicide.

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It's unsettling and oddly relaxing at the same time.

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Do you get that a lot?

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People saying your voice is soothing even when the topic isn't.

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It's from Sarah in Knoxville.

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And Sarah, you have no idea.

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Yes.

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And I'd like to say I'm doing it on purpose.

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I'm talking that way on purpose so that I'm not sounding over dramatic or I'm not sensationalizing

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a story just to make you feel a certain way.

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I'm not, this is just how I talk.

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So yes I hear that a lot and I'm conscious of the fact that I do that.

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But I don't want to not do it because then that would seem fake to me.

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Someone else told me that I was like a Mr. Rogers that talks about murder.

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And I don't know if that's a compliment or I'm going to choose to take it as a compliment.

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But yeah.

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Hey, if you're a new listener to the podcast, welcome in.

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Make sure you hit subscribe wherever you're listening right now.

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You can go to 10minutemurder.com, which is no doubt where Sarah from Knoxville went to

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send me an email.

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Go to 10minutemurder.com.

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You can send me an email there.

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You can check out the blog there.

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Sign up for the newsletter that I send out weekly.

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You can do that there as well.

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And you can use it to share the podcast with your friends and family.

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If there's a particular episode you want someone to hear, you can go to the website, find

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that episode.

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Pretty simple.

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There's a search feature there.

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And then just boom, you can send it right to them right there.

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And by the way, that is so important, sharing the podcast with your friends and family.

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Imagine if none of you did that.

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Who would listen to it tomorrow?

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Just you same people, which is fine.

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But I don't know about you, but I like growing.

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Without you sharing the podcast with your friends and your family and anyone that you think

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could be into this type of thing, it's not going to do that.

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It's not going to grow.

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It's not going to reach more people.

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So that's happening.

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People are sharing this podcast because I see the numbers and I really super appreciate

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it.

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I'm going to do it.

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That's your episode for today.

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Thank you again for listening to 10 Minute Murder.

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See you next time.