Jury finds Grove not guilty of manslaughter

After four-and-a-half hours of deliberation and questions about legal definitions of "justifiable" and "reasonable use of force," the jury in the voluntary manslaughter case of Douglas Grove came back with a verdict of not guilty last night.

Grove was being tried for the June 20 shooting death of Kitu Sampson.

The defense opened the second day of the trial by calling witnesses who testified about the character of Grove. Witnesses included his cousin, brother and a friend.

Grove's cousin, Ben Grove, testified that Douglas Grove told him Sampson had threatened their lives for helping Laurie Sampson move out of the Sampson residence following a domestic dispute.

In an emotion-filled voice Daniel Grove, Grove's brother, a University junior, testified to the gentle character of his brother. When Grove called him after the incident occurred, he said, he was "bawling."

Grove then took the stand in his own defense. He described his relationship with Sampson as "good friends" prior to the shooting and said he was scared of Sampson when he broke into his trailer the morning of June 20.

Sampson had broken into Grove's trailer two times before to retrieve items his wife had taken there after moving into a women's resource center. Laurie Sampson moved to the center June 17 following an incident in which her husband had given her a black eye.

On the morning of June 20, Grove testified, Kitu Sampson broke into Grove's trailer for a third time. Grove said he told Sampson to stop approaching him three times while he pointed a shotgun at him, "but that he just kept staring into my eyes and coming at me."

During closing arguments, Joseph Amendola, Grove's attorney, stressed that Kitu Sampson was a violent person, citing the testimony of Laurie Sampson, who said she was struck by her husband on several occasions.

Amendola admitted Grove could have handled the situation better but said that Grove's actions fell within the legal boundaries of self defense and justifiable use of force.

To show this, Gricar had Ferguson Township Police Detective David Mulfinger stand in front of the jury with the shotgun Grove used to shoot Sampson in order to reenact the scene. Gricar refuted Grove's testimony by showing where he thought Grove would have needed to have been standing for the wound that Sampson received to have occurred. He said that this positioning did not coincide with Grove's self-defense testimony.

"Because there was a death, the jury had to think for a while. I think that since the jury took four and-a-half hours is an indication that they did," Amendola said.

Amendola said the decision was a happy moment for Grove and his family, but that Grove never wanted Sampson to die and he will have to live with that fact for the rest of his life.

"I lost a friend," Grove said.

Gricar said he was not surprised by the decision.

"He did not have to prove that he acted in self defense, I had to disprove that beyond a reasonable doubt. There were circumstances that seem to indicate that he did," Gricar said.

The Rev. Shellie Sampson, father of Kitu Sampson, said the decision was due to the fact that Gricar and the police department are racist.

"Because of the DA's racist orientation, he basically felt that a nigger had no business trespassing on a white man's property," the Rev. Sampson said.

The Rev. Sampson said he is planning civil action against certain parties involved in the case.

Gricar defended his prosecution of the case.

"I can't control how they feel, it doesn't really bother me, I wish that they understood more about the legal system," he said.

He said there were no racial issues at all involved in this case except for the fact that one man was white and one man was black.

"There was no impropriety in the way I tried the case," Gricar said.