Black man not guilty of manslaughter in the death of a white teenager thanks to self-defense laws

Not guilty: The verdict in the manslaughter trial of Roderick Scott. After more than 19 hours of deliberations over two days, a jury acquitted the Greece man in the shooting death of Christopher Cervini, 17, last April.

"I just want to say thank you to the people who believed in me, who stood by me,” Scott said following the verdict. “I still have my regrets for the Cervini family; it's still an unfortunate situation for them. I am happy that at least this chapter is over."

As deliberations dragged on over two days and the jury asked for testimony to be read back, Scott admits he didn't know how it would all turn out.

"I was nervous of course,” he said. “You never know what direction this whole thing is going to turn, so I have no idea. But it worked out and I feel that justice (was) served today."

Cervini's family members say justice wasn't served. They say Christopher was murdered in cold blood, that he'd never been in trouble and Scott acted as judge, jury and executioner.

"The message is that we can all go out and get guns and feel anybody that we feel is threatening us and lie about the fact,” said Jim Cervini, Christopher’s father. “My son never threatened anybody. He was a gentle child, his nature was gentle, he was a good person and he was never, ever arrested for anything, and has never been in trouble. He was 16 years and four months old, and he was slaughtered."

Scott says he acted in self defense when he confronted Cervini and two others saying they were stealing from neighbors cars. He told them he had a gun and ordered them to freeze and wait for police.

Scott says he shot Cervini twice when the victim charged toward him yelling he was going to get Scott.

The prosecution portrayed it as an act of vigilante behavior run amok; Scott and his defense team presented the incident as the unfortunate result of reasonable behavior by a concerned citizen paired with the foolishness of a teenager under the influence of alcohol, drugs and bad peers

Should this case have even gone to a jury?One question raised by this story is whether District Attorney Michael Green and his team made the correct decision to prosecute. Some experts insist that prosecutors should stick to airtight cases, ones where a conviction is all but certain. The Scott case was anything but certain: it occurred in the dead of night, under poorly lit conditions with no objective witnesses (Scott testified on his own behalf, the victim's cousin recounted events from his perspective -- he was one of the alleged thieves).

In this case, there was a legitimate issue to be resolved, one that can only be answered with finality through a formal legal process and a jury decision. That is, was Scott's confronting burglars with his firearm a legitimate action and was his discharge of that firearm done under a reasonable belief that his life was in danger?

These sorts of issues are not clearcut. They test the definitions of "common sense" and "reasonable person." These are precisely the types of cases that benefit from the jury deliberation process. DA Green might have been concerned about whether this case was winnable, but by letting a jury of Scott's peers judge his actions, Green made a wise decision: he returned the implementation of law to the people.