Public defender: Steele was drunk

DADE CITY -- Tom Hanlon finally laid out the defense's case for the jury:

Alfredie Steele Jr. was drunk.

Which means Hanlon's client could not have intended to kill Pasco sheriff's Lt. Charles "Bo" Harrison.

Steele himself admitted he had been drinking the night he is accused of aiming a semi-automatic rifle at Harrison's cruiser and pulling the trigger. Steele got intoxicated beforehand at the Trilacoochee nightclub Rumors. The defense said it would produce witnesses who would tell jurors just how drunk Steele was.

"You're probably looking at me and saying 'Hanlon, what does (being) drunk have anything to do with it?" the assistant public defender told the jury. "If somebody is so drunk they cannot form a certain intent."

Actually, Hanlon is wrong. Voluntary intoxication is not a defense against intent. And intent, or premeditation, is the issue here. If the defense can prove Steele did not intend to kill when he pulled the trigger, then the jury should not convict him of first-degree murder, which carries the death penalty.

Pinellas-Pasco State Attorney Bernie McCabe objected, interrupting Hanlon's opening. Both legal teams conferred with Senior Circuit Judge Robert Beach in a bench conference. But the judge let Hanlon continue, without any corrective action. if the state wants to make its point that being drunk is not a defense against an intent crime, then it will have to do so during its closing argument.

Hanlon continued his opening, telling jurors the prosecution will argue they should believe some of what Steele said --- not all of it.

"The state is going to have to tell you .. that you can believe Mr. Steele when he says 'I shot,' " Hanlon said. "But you can't believe him when he says 'I didn't mean to hurt anybody.' "

"All I ask you to do is do your best. I don't tell you what to do. That is your job. I just put on the facts. Y'all make that decision."

-- JAMAL THALJI