CLAY COUNTY, Fla. – Jury selection will start Tuesday in the trial of Othal Wallace, who is accused of shooting Daytona Beach police Officer Jason Raynor back in June of 2021.
Raynor died in the hospital from his injuries two months later. Now, Wallace is facing the death penalty.
The trial is kicking off Tuesday with jury selection in Clay County. It was moved from Volusia County at the request of the defense team, which argued it would not be able to find an impartial jury in Volusia due to the coverage this case has received.
One of the biggest pieces of evidence, according to News 6 Legal Analyst Steve Kramer, will be the body camera video from the night of the shooting.
“That video is the key piece of evidence in this case and everything is going to orbit and revolve around that video,” Kramer said.
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The body camera of Officer Raynor showed him approaching Wallace on June 23, 2021, while Wallace was in his car, parked behind a Daytona Beach apartment. The clip released to the media of the entire interaction is just 29 seconds long. It showed Raynor asking Wallace to sit down so he can question him, before a brief conflict, and then a gunshot can be heard. Police said Wallace shot Raynor in the head, then took off.
“They’re going to have to take that video and articulate how that fits into a narrative and explain how it’s a justifiable homicide, how self-defense is warranted,” Kramer said.
He said Wallace’s defense team will have to prove Wallace shot Raynor in self-defense.
Police said that night, Raynor was looking for a stolen car with a similar description to the one Wallace was driving. They later said it turned out not to be the stolen car.
Investigators said after the shooting, Wallace took off in the car and was found four days later at a property outside of Atlanta, Georgia, that has ties to a Black militia group.
“If the defense opens up state of mind then they probably open the door to taking a harder look at that, to looking at potential ties to militia groups, to looking at social media posts, to looking at commentary,” Kramer said.
He said the state will likely argue Raynor was acting lawfully in patrolling and investigating a stolen car.
However, what the jury may hear about some details in the case are still up in the air, with the defense filing a slew of motions about evidence in the past week that the judge will have to rule on before a trial can start.
“Jail house phone calls, those typically come in especially if they constituted admission, especially if they give color to the case, the evidence, that stuff typically comes in social media posts, they may be on the table as well,” Kramer said.
Several of those motions are in regard to Wallace’s social media posts, calls he made shortly after he was brought back to the Volusia County jail, and his political ties and affiliations.
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