Jury selection begins Monday in the trial of a U.S. man accused of driving into a crowd of counterprotesters at a white supremacist rally and killing a woman.
Prosecutors charged 21-year-old James Fields with 10 counts, including first-degree murder, which could bring a lifetime prison sentence if he is convicted.
Fields was among a group of white nationalists who in August 2017 went to Charlottesville, Virginia, to protest the removal of a statue honoring a general from the pro-slavery Confederacy that lost the country’s 1860s Civil War.
Clashes broke out between neo-Nazi supporters and counterprotesters, and the car authorities allege Fields was driving slammed into a group on a street, killing 32-year-old Heather Heyer and injuring dozens of others.
The trial is expected to take about three weeks.
Fields also faces federal hate crimes charges in a separate trial. He pleaded not guilty to those charges during a July court appearance, and no date has been set for that trial.
…
залишити коментар: