Billy Joe Shaver Cites Poultry in His Defense
Billy Joe Shaver must have breathed a huge sigh of relief Friday (April 9) when a jury in Waco, Texas, acquitted him of an aggravated assault charge in connection with a shooting outside a bar in 2007. Shaver never denied shooting Billy Bryant Coker following an argument, so the trial came down to whether or not he did it in self-defense. And the jury obviously believed Shaver's side of the story. I don't claim to be one of Shaver's close friends, although he's always seemed like a really good sumbitch every time I've been around him. But with Willie Nelson and Robert Duvall -- two of his genuine friends -- showing up at the trial to offer moral support, it must have been an interesting scene at the courthouse. I wish I could have been in the courtroom when Shaver took the witness stand, but the Waco Tribune-Herald's Erin Quinn provided some great minute-by-minute, on-the-fly reporting that was the next best thing to being there. My favorite line from Shaver's testimony was after the prosecuting attorney asked him why he didn't leave the bar without his wife after realizing his argument with Coker was escalating. Shaver replied, "Ma'am, I'm from Texas. If I were chickenshit, I would have left, but I'm not."
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Dameoftheworld says:
I was honored to be in the courtroom during his trial. Billie Joe & best friend Willie Nelson are the nicest, most genuinely warm men I’ve ever met, in or out of the music biz — & I’ve met many. It was a fair trial & 12 other people thought so too. Billie Joe said: “pray for me.” it must have worked.
folliclesandfreedom says:
Somehow what Billy Joe Shaver did doesn’t sound like something one of the “nicest, most genuinely warm men” would do.
The prosecutors couldn’t prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Shaver shot in self-defense, but I think there is a better than half chance that this was not in self-defense.
And even if it was, the “nicest, most genuinely warm men” do not frequent the kind of bar Shaver was at.
Shaver is not guilty legally (though perhaps there could be a civl trial which he might well lose) but Shaver still comes out looking like a class A jerk to me.
William says:
CONGRATULATIONS BILLY JOE!!! Write a song about it man!
Thomas says:
folliclesandfreedon: Don’t come to Texas