Maagliato was three decades ago.
Maagliato was three decades ago.
Hi. New member here. I was just browsing and saw this exchange and thought I would add my 2 cents.
Not only was Magliato 3 decades ago, but Ayoob got it all wrong too. I became acquainted with this case back in 2003 while discussing this same topic on rec.guns. A poster said that Ayoob wrote of a man, who was justified in using deadly force, being convicted of murder because his cocked revolver fired accidentally. I bought a copy of Combat Handguns just to verify that Ayoob did write that, and found he did. He wrote that the judge would not allow any element of self-defense argument, ruling that the defense's theory was the shooting was accidental and, by definition, there was no such thing as a justifiable accident.
Ayoob went on to write "Ironically, Magliato had accidentally shot the deceased with a gun cocked to single action at a moment when he would have been perfectly and provably justified in deliberately shooting him with a double-action pull of the trigger".
That seemed so illogical that I had to check it out, to the point of paying Westlaw for a copy of the appeals court decision. This is what I found.
As for justification, Magliato had been threatened earlier, during a fender-bender with the deceased. He then went home, got his gun and went looking for him. Then after the shooting, ran off.
Regarding his claim that the judge did not allow self defense argument, this is from the decision:
"At the charging conference, defense counsel stated that he 'definitely' did not want the court to charge on the defense of justification under Penal Law § 35.15. Nevertheless, defendant sought to argue that he was justified in drawing the weapon, but not in firing it. The court informed defense counsel that if he made such an argument, the justification defense would be charged.
Defendant argued, in his summation, that the shooting was a tragic accident, but he made no specific argument that the weapon was drawn in self-defense. Accordingly, the People, in their summation, did not argue duty to retreat, and the court did not give a charge on the statutory defense of justification".
It was also Magliato's defense that made the argument of "no such thing as a justified accident", not the court.
"On this appeal defendant argues that, because he claimed the discharge of his pistol was accidental, and did not claim that he fired it in self-defense, the justification defense is inapplicable. He maintains that justification does not apply to an unintentional crime, and that drawing his pistol did not constitute a "use of deadly physical force" within the meaning of Penal Law § 35.15. These arguments are without merit.
(2) Defendant's contention that the law of justification has no bearing on his conduct, solely because the discharge of his pistol was accidental, requires little comment. It is settled that the defense of justification applies fully to a defendant's risk-creating conduct, even though it had unintended consequences (see, People v McManus, 67 NY2d 541; *29 People v Huntley, 59 NY2d 868)".
So, according to the NY Court of Appeals, there IS such a thing as a "justified accident".
