Corey D. Stoddard
Yesterday, January 1, 2014, Cory D. Stoddard, 35, of Washington, D.C., was arraigned in District of Columbia Superior Court on a charge of second-degree murder while armed, in the death of Kevin Lewis Crouch, 22, also of  Washington, the day before. On the official tally of murders in the District of Columbia, this was the 104th – the last homicide of 2013.
I sincerely hope Mr. Stoddard beats the charge and is found innocent.
Before you accuse me of going soft on crime in the new year, consider the facts of the case and decide for yourself.
On Tuesday, December 31, the victim, Mr. Crouch, walked into a tow lot near the Anacostia Freeway in Northeast Washington at around 12:45 p.m. and came upon Mr. Stoddard, a tow truck operator, who was assisting a customer in removing a license plate. Mistaking the customer for an employee, Crouch asked if he had a green car on the lot. Stoddard replied that the man did not work at the lot and there was no green car.
At that point Crouch cursed, pulled out a gun and demanded money from Stoddard while the customer ran and hid behind a car, then called the police on his cell phone.
Stoddard also tried to run, but slid and fell. Crouch ran after him and while Stoddard was on the ground, struck him twice in the head with his pistol.
Stoddard grabbed his wallet and flung it as far as he could toward the lot’s fence. As Crouch bolted to retrieve it, Stoddard got to his feet and ran to his tow truck, turned the ignition, and drove toward Crouch, whom he hit near the corner of the fence. Crouch was dragged along the sidewalk and died of his injuries several hours later at Prince George’s County Hospital.
Though the jury probably won’t get to hear it, Crouch had been convicted of carjacking when he was 17. Several gun and assault charges in connection with that crime were dropped as part of a plea agreement.
Now, I think the logic behind the second-degree murder charge against Mr. Stoddard is that the law does not allow you to use deadly force unless your life, or someone else’s, is in danger. This is the same logic by which you are not allowed to blow off the head of a burglar who breaks into your house if he doesn’t threaten any of the inhabitants directly.
But when someone pulls a gun on you, strikes you twice with it, and seems to have every intention of using it to kill you, how is your life not in danger? Do you have to wait for the assailant to actually start squeezing the trigger? Or if you strike him with your truck – the two truck is what made Stoddard armed in the indictment – are you supposed to run into him just enough to knock him down but not enough to really hurt him?
It is easy to say in retrospect how far someone should go to defend himself, but in the crisis of the moment, you don’t exactly get to follow a flow chart or decision tree to determine how you should react. You have fractions of a second, and your life is at stake. I’m guessing that if Crouch had already used force to hijack a car at age 17, he instantly would have conveyed the attitude to Stoddard and the customer that he meant business.
If I were on a jury trying a man for shooting a burglar who broke into his home in the middle of the night, the prosecution would have to go a long way to prove to me that man had no legitimate reason to fear for his life or the life of his loved ones. In the same vein, I can’t imagine that I would act much differently in Mr. Stoddard’s situation. I would only hope I had the presence of mind and quickness of reaction to be able to do something to defend myself and my customer from a hoodlum punk.
If the facts of the case turn out to be as reported thus far, I trust the D.C. Superior Court jury charged with deciding Mr. Stoddard’s case will apply a similar perspective. And let all the other hoodlum punks out there realize that more and more of us are willing to fight back.
Let me first state, that if the facts show that self defense applies then the tow truck driver should be acquitted.
However, self defense may have stopped applying if it turns out that the decedent was running away at the time, and the driver ran him down from behind with the tow truck.
According to the charging document, the mugging took place in the parking lot of the tow truck yard at 1329 Kenilworth Ave. The mugger’s body was found at 1421 Kenilworth Ave. That’s almost a block away.
Stoddard claims he threw his wallet, ran the opposite way, got in his truck and admits to running the mugger over. Based on witnesses, the prosecution alleges that the mugger was running away after picking up Stoddard’s wallet. In addition, the charging document states that the tire marks from the tow truck are on the sidewalk and the grassy area between the sidewalk and fence on Kenilworth Ave.
So let’s say that Crouch mugs Stoddard, pistol whipping him etc. Stoddard throws his wallet and runs in the opposite direction. Crouch picks up the wallet, and starts walking away on Kenilworth Ave. Stoddard runs to his truck in the back of the yard, starts it up, backs out of the parking space, pulls out of the lot onto Kenilworth Ave. a busy road at 1 PM in the afternoon, drives up onto the sidewalk and runs over Crouch. Between the instant Stoddard tossed his wallet and the instant he hit Crouch, took time and thought. It was not a heat of the moment. He had time to think about what he was doing.
IF those are the facts then it is no longer self defense, because Crouch would be leaving the scene of the mugging in the opposite direction as Stoddard, he was no longer a threat yet Stoddard makes a conscious decision to reverse his direction in pursuit of the mugger and use deadly force.
Something else to consider. Crouch’s gun was a BB gun. It was found under his body after being struck by the truck and dragged 100 feet. If he was holding the gun in his hand when he was struck, the gun would have dropped free at some point in that 100 feet. However, if the gun was tucked away in his belt or under a jacket, then it would still be with him after he was hit and dragged. If the gun is “holstered” then it would not be brandished in a threatening manner, again making the self defense claim dubious.
Laws vary by location on that. Where I live, a public announcement was made a few years ago that in most situations when an intruder enters your home, you wouldn’t be prosecuted for shooting them because the threat was implied. If I drove up in the middle of someone loading the contents of my home into their car, I’d be wanting to drive right into them and pin their car so they couldn’t get away. It would just be instinct. When everything happens so fast, I’m not sure how you’d stop yourself from instinct just taking over. People should be able to defend themselves BEFORE they’re hurt if someone has broken into their private space.
This is all logical to me, Cornerstone. Thanks.
I agree with you Mr. Olshaker.
The Man should not be charged with anything in this instance. I think in many areas the laws on self-defense are unrealistic, and designed by people who have never been personally involved in emotionally charged, dangerous situations involving exigent circumstances requiring immediate action.
It seems that Justice is now a Blindfolded Girl holding the scales which measure mans irony more than anything else; and honoring the rights of criminals takes precendence over protecting citizens.
You’re also probably right that the offenders previous record would not be allowed into court, which is absurd. (because it would illustrate for the court his violent tendencies and show recidivism.) Yet as far as trial by “a jury of ones peers” I have no faith in them.
I think that juries should consist of LEGAL PROFESSIONALS of various walks who are educated in investigative procedure, and other aspects of Law. They would be more capable of rendering adeqaute decisions than a group of 12 people who’s awareness of Forensics rarely extends beyond watching reruns of C.S.I. on t.v. (and while such shows are entertaining, they often paint an innaccurate portrait of Forensic Fields as a whole.) It’s overall a highly flawed system in that respect.