Billy Woodward: ABC ’20/20′ Profiles Fatal Shooting Of Neighbors In Titusville, Florida, ‘Stand Your Ground’ Case
Billy Woodward, the Titusville, Florida, man who gunned down three of his neighbors in a fatal shooting in 2012, will have his case featured tonight on ABC 20/20. Authorities say that during Labor Day 2012, Billy Woodward, aka William Woodward, shot Roger Picior, Gary Hembree, and Bruce Blake because they had been threatening him and his family. Picior and Hembree died in the ambush, while Bruce Blake survived. Billy Woodward tried to use the Florida’s controversial “stand your ground” law in order to escape prosecution.
My question about 20/20‘s coverage isn’t rhetorical. Although ABC is one of three networks my TV antennae picks up (sometimes), I couldn’t watch their segment about this Florida 18th Judicial Circuit Stand Your Ground case.
For one thing, I had to talk to the sister of one of this circuit’s framed innocents I advocate for about a confusing and potentially dangerous interaction her brother had this week with a corrections supervisor.
For another thing, I knew that 20/20 likely wouldn’t mention that this is the same circuit where the state attorneys’ office so egregiously mishandled Trayvon Martin’s murder, and the same circuit where Michael Dunn – who killed Jordan Davis – resided, and the same circuit where a community college shooting got very little attention, although it led to changing campus carry laws, and although Stand Your Ground was apparently involved.
Then there’s the matter of being unwilling to subject myself to the media’s self-misdirected attention: the Florida Self-Defense/Stand Your Ground case that likely deserves the most media attention – John Wesley Dobbs IV’s – gets the very least. There has been one (1) news item about John, in which four Orlando Sentinel reporters claimed that John had killed a black man in a racially motivated altercation. Wrong. John was the only black man involved in the altercation, which was at least four-on-one, and clearly instigated by the non-blacks, who approached John’s vehicle. Rather than interview John – which would have let reporters see that he’d just successfully defended his life (and his girlfriend’s) – the reporters interviewed the attorney of the night club where John and his girlfriend were attacked … who of course was not there at the time, and was only seeking to reduce the club’s liability in the event of lawsuits. The nightclub was situated roughly 20 as-the-crow-flies miles from where Trayvon Martin was murdered, but was in the 9th Judicial Circuit, the 18th Judicial Circuit’s favorite to-go circuit for predetermined outcomes in transferred cases. And vice-versa.
Apologies to 20/20 if they indeed covered the other three other Florida 18th Judicial Circuit Court Stand Your Ground cases will not be forthcoming – 20/20 had the greatest ability to resolve scores of intact 18th Judicial Circuit frame-ups just by doing a follow up on their own 1980’s story about phony “scent evidence” expert dog handler John Preston. I asked; 20/20 didn’t bother to answer … ABC’s concern for the availability of justice is so conflicted that it’s clear to me that John Quiñones ought set up his cameras inside ABC’s headquarter to film an entire season of “What Would You Do?” featuring ABC execs.
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