The recent case of State v. Gabriel Garcia, decided by a unanimous New Jersey Supreme Court on March 10, 2021, provides a textbook example of missteps by all participants in a criminal trial, with those by the prosecutor being unethical. Fortunately, Justice Albin’s decision corrected the errors, clearing the way for a just result on remand.

Defendant Garcia was arrested and charged with second-degree aggravated assault and third-degree unlawful possession of a knife for an unlawful purpose after he slashed the face and finger of an individual, Raymond Urbanski, with a knife after Urbanski asked him not to blow his car horn two doors from Urbanski’s house. Urbanski claimed that Garcia attacked him without provocation after he asked Garcia to “keep it down.” On the other hand, Garcia claimed that he acted in self defense. He testified that after he honked his horn three times outside his mother’s house where he had gone to pick up certain relatives, Urbanski approached his car, banged on its roof telling him, with an expletive, not to make any noise “around here.” When Garcia exited his car, Urbanski attempted to punch him and when Garcia then attempted to drive away, Urbanski, armed with a bottle, and two other men, one armed with a stick and another with a knife, chased him and stabbed his tires. Garcia eventually ran to his mother’s house. On his mother’s porch, as the men continued to threaten him and after Urbanski had punched him several times, and another man hit him in the head with the bottle, defendant flung out in fear, slashing Urbanski’s face with a box cutter that he carried on his belt and used as a mechanic. When Garcia’s family retreated inside the house, an enraged Urbanski kicked in the front door and threatened to kill the family. When the police arrived, they arrested Garcia and took him to a hospital where he was treated for a head injury, requiring stitches. Urbanski also required medical care, including 26 stitches for his facial wound.

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