Law&Crime Sidebar - West Virginia Woman Shoots Brother in Head, Claims It Was an Accident: Cops

Episode Date: June 29, 2024

Seira Harmon, 25, is behind bars after she admitted to police that she shot her brother, 31-year-old William Harmon III, during some kind of confrontation. Harmon claims she thought the gun��s safety was on when she aimed for her brother. Law&Crime’s Jesse Weber discusses the case with criminal defense attorney Jack Rice.HOST:Jesse Weber: https://twitter.com/jessecordweberLAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokeVideo Editing - Michael DeiningerScript Writing & Producing - Savannah WilliamsonGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this Law and Crimes series ad-free right now. Join Wondry Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. Police in West Virginia are trying to figure out what led up to a woman, allegedly shooting her brother in the head. She says it was an accident, but police have charged her with murder. I'm discussing the case with criminal defense attorney Jack Rice. Welcome to Sidebar, presented by Law and Crime. I'm Jesse Weber.

Deputies in Cabell County, West Virginia, have arrested 25-year-old Sierra Harmon over the weekend, charging her with murder in the shooting death of her brother William Harmon. According to a criminal complaint, a situation unfolded at a home at around 1230 a.m. Sunday that left William and two other men, including William's father, with injuries. William, though, was pronounced dead at the scene. Now, Harmon told deputies that she had aimed the good. gun at her brother. She admitted that, but she claimed she thought the safety was on. So why would she allegedly do this? Why would she point a weapon? Well, according to Harmon, she did this because

she says William was pointing a gun at her significant other. Reporting indicates her fiancee. And she told deputies that the gun went off. It was an accident. Now, it should be noted that the county sheriff says there was alcohol involved in this incident as well. The gun that was allegedly used in the shooting was found in a bush where Harmon reportedly tossed it. And listen to this, four spent bullet casings were also found where Harmon was standing, this according to the criminal complaint as well, and deputies also found a gun and two spent casings in Williams' vehicle. Sierra Harmon was booked at around 5 a.m. Monday morning. She was arraigned later that day. She is being held on a first-degree murder charge. Cabell County Sheriff Chuck Zerner.

told local media outlets, quote, with West Virginia being an open carry state, it has increased the number of people who carry guns. I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but it's a fact. Sometimes when arguments break out, unfortunately, they settle it with guns. William Harmon was a father of several children. His Facebook page is full of photos of him,

spending time with his family, outdoors, doing things like fishing or writing ATVs. He was only just 31 years old. Right now, I want to talk a little bit more about this case with criminal defense attorney Jack Rice. Jack, good to see you. Always love having yawn. Initial thoughts on this.

It's going to get fascinating, right? Because what we're talking about from Ms. Harmon is she's claiming self-defense or defense of others. This is actually against her fiance. She was claiming that her brother was actually pointing his web at him. Now, what that means is it gives her the right to defend herself or defend her fiance as if it were her. Now, the problem is is when she picks up the phone,

She's actually the one who called 911. She's also the one who said, I shot my brother. Well, that sure sounds like a confession. So we've got a whole bunch of stuff to sort of tease out here. One of the problems, yeah, there's a lot. Yeah, she could admit it. She could say, yeah, I opened fire, but I did it, like you said, in self-defense. So, yes, she's put herself in a corner about she can't say she didn't open fire.

She can't say she didn't do it. But if there's a reasonable argument that she was acting in self-defense, self-defense, not surprised she admitted it. Is there a reasonable argument of self-defense or defense of others here? Potentially. Here's your problem, though, is that they apparently found her brother's weapon, yes, in that cab, but not necessarily in his hand, right? And so this question is, was this something that he had fired previously? Was this something that he was about to fire again? Was this an imminent threat? Did she have to respond? And remember, it sounds like it was his family who was around, including, I think, his father who was injured here, that could be

troubling because, let's face it, it's always about witnesses. How are witnesses going to describe this? What are they going to say happen, especially if it was the father of the dead son? So we think about that. Who knows exactly what he's going to do, whether it's going to be Ms. Harmon, Mr. Harmon or I guess senior Harmon that carries the day. And if her story about what happened doesn't match up to the physical evidence, like you said, they're not being a gun by William's body, that could be very problematic. Talk to me about the idea of an accident though.

So in other words, it's almost a little bit like we're talking about with a Russ situation, if she were to take out a weapon, right, and use it to stop somebody from committing a crime. And when I say using it, I mean, not actually firing it, actually firing it, but pointing it. So let's take her allegations as true. She was using it to defend her fiance, didn't fire it. And the gun went off. Could she still be charged criminally here, let alone with murder? Yes. Well, sort of. I think that's the complication. Right now she's charged with first degree. That may be an overstretch anyway. Because if we're

talking about sort of the ongoing domestic relation of this, both sides have weapons, both seem willing to fire those weapons and this idea of potentially self-defense, whether that's enough or not. The thing is, is that there may be stages here that may change that. And so what I mean by that is, depending upon those circumstances, even an accident could result in criminal charges, but those might be something closer to an involuntary manslaughter charge. It's about negligence, gross negligence, rather than a purposeful act. Let's explore that like rust, like rust. Right, and he's charged in that case with involuntary manslaughter, but I looked up West Virginia law and correct me if I'm wrong, if you saw different, but they define first degree murder as murder by poison, lying in weight, imprison and starving, none of that applies, or by any willful, deliberate, and premeditated killing.

Now, my understanding is second degree murder is anything else that doesn't fit into that category. And then we have manslaughter, right? Based on the current facts we know, does this exactly fit in? Could it be seen as willful, deliberate, or premeditated, or do you believe this is a placeholder? The reason I say that is, is it possible law enforcement is charging her with this, but then can turn around and downgrade the charge? Oh, yeah. I actually do. I mean, it's funny.

I'm a former prosecutor. I'm a former charging prosecutor, too. And this is from many, many years ago. And there are different philosophies on how you handle this. There are sometimes, as prosecutors, what you will do is you will downcharge. You basically say, we're going to fix a problem right here. And if we don't fix this problem, we're actually going to crank them up. We're actually going to actually charge you far more seriously.

On the other hand, what you may do is you may go the opposite way and say, look, we're going to come at you with everything we got. But we really do know that was this willful? I don't know if they're going to be able to prove that, but what they always have the ability to do before you actually seat that jury, meaning before you actually have them sworn in and actually seated as a jury, you can amend those charges from that first degree

to a second degree, to a voluntary manslaughter, to an involuntary manslaughter. All of those are potentials. We're very early on, and I think it's likely we're going to see additional charges they're going to come for Ms. Harmon,

specifically because there's a lot of facts here that seem a lot different than she was lying and wait waiting to kill her brother it seems much different than that at least at first blush and just to be clear premeditation we always talk about someone planning you know to murder somebody they they go they buy the materials they lie and wait you can form premeditation in an instance right yes absolutely I think that is the difference I mean we have that willful piece and the problem is is when I hear the term willful, it sounds like if I intended to kill my brother, for a whole series of reasons, somehow I might be guilty of that first degree. It's a bit more complicated than just simply

saying, I've decided to do this. But that concept of premeditation, some people think it could take days or weeks. I'm going to lay on a schematic on how I'm going to do it. You could literally say, I've decided I'm going to reach over and pick up that gun and I'm going to kill my brother. That technically could be enough. Jack, I want your opinion, though, on this statement from the sheriff. It was made to local media. It said, we're going into some deeper investigations and taken some statements. There was at least one other individual there that we are talking to.

We're trying to see how the whole thing unfolded. What does that tell you? No, it tells me that there's a lot more going on than what we first heard. Again, there was this reference to the brother actually pointing a weapon at her fiancé. really could change this because all of a sudden, if that were the case, defense of others is an absolute defense. That may change. That doesn't necessarily mean she walks, though she technically could. But if there is more to this, if it's more complicated to this, at minimum, I'm seeing this as a voluntary manslaughter charge because in that case, there may be more to it. Yes,

she killed them. What is voluntary man slaughter? We're talking heat of passion. Explain what that could Exactly. Exactly. Well, you know, sometimes the traditional one we've heard of is if somebody comes home and they find their spouse in bed with somebody else and they just lose it and pull out a gun and shoot somebody. Yes, is it willful? Yes, it is. But it's done so quickly, you don't even realize in that heat of passion. By the way, in West Virginia, that comes with a three-year floor on time, a 15-year cap on time. That's substantially different than a first-degree charge. I think this is a placeholder. There's a lot more to come, so we'll be watching this one. I say that, but then remember when I said that there were four spent shell casings that were found by the defendant? That seems like a lot, right? If we're talking now about the number of shots, how does that complicate the analysis? Oh, my gosh. If there was just one shot, first of all, it's difficult when she says, oh, this was a mistake.

I didn't know that it was going to fire. How do you fire four rounds? And by the way, I'm assuming that's what she's saying, you know, when we talk about what an accident could be, I don't know if she's technically saying the gun just went off or it's like this was an accident, this wasn't supposed to happen. Yeah, I fired, but it could be more of a nebulous term about accident. That's true. But if at least this idea that it just went off on its own, sort of the singular round a la rust, right, that that goes off, although there were more than one round there too. But this idea that if that were to happen, that you're not going to be able to make that argument, that does complicate things. But you know what it makes me think of?

Is think about the New York Police Department when they fired at somebody, and they've spent 35, 45 rounds. When you get somebody who is really hyped up and they have seen this, is they'll just pull and pull and pull and pull depending upon what kind of a weapon they've got. Right.

Right. And that doesn't necessarily negate their criminal liability, but it is something to consider. And when we talk about a self-defense, if you can clear this up, if she was in any way the aggressor here, right? Because we don't know what happened here. There's this allegation that alcohol had fueled this or was somehow involved. Walk us through if she was in any way at fault. If she had started the argument, hypothetically speaking, would that mean that self-defense doesn't work for her? Or does it mean She could have started that argument, but if someone else took out a weapon, then it goes back to them as the aggressor. Walk us through that. Well, what will happen is she could start as, first of all, let's pull back bigger. If she's not the aggressor at all, and she's the one literally defending herself or defending her fiance, that is an absolute defense. If, in fact, she is the aggressor itself, but then what happens is she walks away and her brother comes at her, now all of sudden it shifts back she has the right to defend herself or defend her brother and so it sort of depends upon if you imagine a ping pong match about who's hitting the ball who's coming at whom

with it and so therefore it depends i mean i can think about a case that was happening not that long ago in wisconsin where somebody stabbed a bunch a bunch of kids in the apple river and uh it was a big trial and what it happened they attacked him first that's the one they attacked he first he walked away and then he came back they were the initial aggressors he came back despite that he was found guilty because they that shifting burden he was the one who became the aggressor subsequently and he lost his ability to argue self-defense I always find these self-defense cases from a legal point of view quite fascinating because it kind of toes the line and a lot of the time

at a trial it depends upon the defendant taking the and explaining their state of mind and why they ultimately opened fire. I wanted to put a bow on this. What is a really, really sad case, as I mentioned, you know, William lost his life, family man, he was so young. But you hear this statement from the sheriff that talked about how West Virginia is an open carry state, and when there are the – he was basically saying he doesn't want to jump to conclusions, but a lot of times when there are arguments, sometimes guns are immediately

drawn out. What are your thoughts on that? You know, my thoughts on weapons is, let me put it this way. I'm a former prosecutor, yes, I've been a defense attorney for more than 25 years, but I'm also a former CIA case officer. I've shut damn near every weapon known to man. And I'm really, really, really well trained in terms of the ability to use them. And it's my experience that the vast majority of people have no business handling weapons because they don't know what to do with them. They don't know how to shoot them. They don't know how to protect them. They don't know how to control them. And I'm including most of the cops that I've come across in my career. I mean that. And so as a result, I'm sort of a big believer in

why so many people think they have them, why they need them in the first place. Because statistically, statistically, if you have a weapon, it's far more likely that it's going to be used against you than you using it to defend yourself or defend others. And that is a simple and absolute truth. Powerful words there from Jack Rice and some startling truth to think about. Jack, so good to see you. Thank you so much for coming on. Always appreciate your perspective. How great is this guy's energy, right? Do we get any better energy than Jack Rice? I don't think so. But Jack, great to see you. Thanks so much. Thank you, brother. All right, everybody. That's all we have for you right now here on Sidebar.

Thank you so much for joining us. As always, please subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, wherever you get your podcast. I'm Jesse Weber. I'll speak to you next time. or Spotify.