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WARREN -- A jury is scheduled to return to court this morning and resume deliberations in the trial of a Liberty man charged in the shooting of his neighbor July 6, 2020, at an apartment complex on Hadley Avenue.
The jury of nine women and three men deliberated for about 90 minutes Wednesday afternoon in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court after getting the case following a full day of testimony. Taking the witness stand was the defendant, Daryl L. Casey, 27.
The jurors are considering whether Casey is not guilty because of a self-defense instruction read by Judge Ronald J. Rice prior to deliberations. Casey is facing two felony charges including two firearm specifications in the shooting of Kavin O. Moore, 33.
Casey, the only witness for the defense, admitted to jurors that he had lied to a Liberty police detective about many aspects of the case, including the fact that Moore had threatened him with a knife.
In earlier testimony Wednesday by Liberty detective Rob Altier, jurors watched a video interview between the detective and Casey that lasted more than an hour. In that video, Casey told Altier he had started firing because Moore had a knife in his hands and was threatening him at close range.
Earlier testimony revealed that Moore was shot four times in the upper leg.
Altier also showed, through forensic evidence using the location of spent shell casings and bullet holes, that Casey was about 24 and a half feet away from Moore when he fired a .40 caliber Taurus pistol.
When Casey took the stand, the defendant admitted to lying "about almost everything" during the video.
"I was scared and nervous," Casey said under direct questioning from his attorney Walter Madison.
At the time of the shooting, Moore and Casey lived in neighboring apartments in the 3000 block of Hadley Avenue. Casey testified he was coming home about 1 a.m. July 6 with food from Waffle House when he heard his neighbor yelling and screaming and banging on the walls.
"I asked him to be quiet, to chill out," Casey said. In response, the defendant said Moore threatened to beat him up.
"I didn't know if he carried a weapon or not, but I knew he was a very violent person," Casey told Madison.
Casey testified that his neighbor of more than two years had previously picked on him because of the defendant's small stature: Casey is 5-foot-4 inches tall and weighs 90 pounds.
"He often would crack on me, and make me feel less of a man," Casey said of his neighbor.
After the confrontation that morning outside their apartments, while Moore got on his shirt and shoes to go outside, Casey said he went to get his gun and put it in his pants pocket.
Evidence showed Casey shot Moore while the victim stood at the main doorway of the apartment complex. Assistant Prosecutor Michael Burnett, during his closing, said the forensic evidence showed the victim was turning to run away when he was shot.
"That clearly shows that self defense isn't the case," Burnett told jurors. "There also wasn't an immediate threat of death for the defendant."
Burnett told jurors that the defendant would say anything to try to get himself out of trouble.
In his closing statement, Madison told jurors to put themselves in the shoes of the defendant, who was outweighed by Moore by more than 100 pounds.
"For him (Casey), some threats are more dangerous or simple than anyone else's," Madison said.
During the first day of trial, jurors heard from Moore, who said that Casey had initiated the confrontation by coming into his apartment unannounced. Moore, who walked to the witness stand with a limp, said the two had the previous day gotten into some sort of disagreement over a political candidate.