mean please court my name is king partner present russell mims mr mims was convicted of attempted first degree murder however the evidence shows that he was acting in self defense evidence shows that mr mims who is fifty years old at the time had just witnessed the brutal beating of william fisher william fisher was beaten by a group of young men in their early twenty's and he was repeatedly hit kicked and punched for about fifteen to twenty minutes to the point where his left unconscious and what's important note is that this beating was in fact planned by the state's witness carmen jackson she had just got into a heated fight with fisher with her husband and what she had done is gathered family members including another state's witness charles coleman and basically they went and in carmen's words they did what they had to do they jumped him and did what they had to do and basically when mr mims was riding his bike going to happen to see th fight against fischer when he saw this after he saw this he said stop you're killing him and basically soon as he said that this group of young men who was in their early twenty's were as mr mims with fifty years old this group of young men immediately came and started hitting him and there's testimony to his head about ten times his clearly outnumbered and he did what he could to try to get away he pulled out a pocket knife as he was backing up and as he swung it he ended up stabbing tony coleman once and if you look at what the state's witnesses say they claim that mr mims was not acting in self defense whereas the defense witnesses say they work and the state's witnesses basically they were if you just look at it they were unbelievable their version of events is that once the beating of fischer happened basically for what seems like no reason at all mr mims just turned and stabbed tony that doesn't make sense and more more than that as i pointed out earlier carmen and charles were the ones who would be implicated in the beating of fisher they're the ones who gathered various family members and they went and they were the let him know as to what was happening basically though regardless you know as a point on the opening brief all of the state's witnesses were related to another they're all family members they had a motive to protect themselves and motive to lie and as i also point out in the opening brief in the first argument they were just overall inconsistent they contradicted themselves numerous times a country to each other they were just unbelievable and in a case like this where so much rests on the fa and so much rest on the credibility it is important that we look at the state's witnesses credibility because it's their burden to prove or disprove whether or not mr mims was acting in self defense so we are confident that's the only yes there is conflictin yet position yes well they did they just contradicted themselves with carmen it was in their handwritten testimony as well as in her interview and then again she said my different trial and this is an issue for the trier of fact to decide  what is your position on why we should reverse the well as i said earlier i believe that here you should reverse because we believe that the evidence overall when you look at it is just so unreasonable as to give a recent doubt mr mims killed and the trial judge himself actually said that self defense exists he said that he said to quote him he said the extent of it is at issue but not the fact that it existed so the trial judge himself acknowledged that self defense did exist however based on the trial judge's statements it seems as though he did miss understand how the law of self defense worked in that he asked defense counsel various questions such as you know should you remove yourself when someone is coming at you with a knife or are you obligated to stab someone unless deadly area such as the arm or leg and based on his comments it seems that he misunderstood the l self defense because illinois case was clear that you were not required to flee if you feel that your threatened with that the force in our car had to wait until you're hurt you're not required to stab unless that the area you know such as the arm or the leg you basically you can use deadly force to protect yourself if you recently believe that it was necessary to prevent your own imminent death or great bodily harm and you have required to make a precise decision or  judgment in terms of where you ended up on standing at a vigil to protect yourself and i believe that this court should reverse because while the trial court is given deference if you believe that is tempered when the trial judge and it's a high burden in terms of finding specific intent to kill and even if when you separate out all the facts and you look at just the undisputed facts just on this if you did that show that mr mims stabbed tony one time he did not make any verbal threats to kill he immediately left and when he left there's test making the state's witnesses that tony was still standing he was talking and he fell after mr involved we believe that that does not show the civic intent to kill and just in closing as i said earlier there's mr mims we believe was acting in self defense and the state failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he wasn't and even if this court found that he wasn't there wasn't the ok well i believe that he should be reversed because he himself acknowledged that self defense exists and then he went on and he seems to have misunderstood how the law of self defense work and based on that the history of you in court should reverse where there is a misunderstanding of laws on the trial judge is part and the facts are clear here and the defense witnesses were credible the defendant interceded the fight was already over and at that point he testified that he ran up to the victim tony and stabbed him plunge a knife into his heart now there was no testimony that tony had any sort of weapon all i saw him get hit in the face ten times after he tried to help the victim fischer off the ground the testimony of marcus prior is the only person who said anything about how people were try fight the defendant after the fight between fisher and the others had already added really fisher did not see anything he was forwarding unconscious at the time that the next fight ensued he that he got out he was dazed there was no one around that time and then he proceeded to walk home he was not brutally beaten up he did not see hospital treatment he said himself as to his wounds as well counsel says that he was brutally beaten he was able previous bodily injury at the time that he stabbed tony you guys can see it in the back of the defendant not testified to prove that there was an actual subjective belief on his part that he was in such danger is almost near impossible when he did not testify one testified that anyone came in mr mims with a weapon he was not cornered into any sort of area where he could not move the way he had a bite at the scene he was in the open alley he could have done something that was that carmen and charles and carville and bill that they're all related or family members or close friends and members on his bicycle if you see this gu tony and stabbed him in the chest and he is not interested party at all in the situation so the only witness that the defendant has that supports his claim of self defense is marcus prior and other than that that is it so i would character of the attack use of a deadly weapon and the nature and extent of the injuries in this case as i just stated the nature extent of these injuries are undisputed the victim was basically as complete josephs the attending surgeon who received him at the motions basically followed upon this the circuit court ruled that as a matter of due process and fundamental fairness the people were obligated before trial to tender some sort of information demonstrating the defendant at two prior class  missions now circuit court ruled that this although not required by section five thirty three b that that would be somehow required by due process in addition to is that short like circuit court then reconsider the matter on the next court date and said this issue is not right i have not yet to rule on the defendant's motion for a new trial circuit court said i am withdrawing my previous ruling i will now address defendant's motion for a new trial deny defense motion for  but your honor just to clarify he was given twenty two years and it was at eighty five percent and ok when mr minister released he will be almost seven years old from his background i can assure you if you live that long feeling really committed a crime is just ok he's never on the other hand as i stated earlier the state state's witnesses were unbelievable they were elated family members they had a motive to protect themselves and they are just overall inconsistent and the bottom line is that the evidence shows that mr mims was clearly outnumbered he had just witnessed this brutal beating and now this group of younger men were attacking him and based on that mr mims use a degree of force that he recently was necessary to protect himself and  the law is clear that you're not required to reason out your exact response or to know the exact amount of force to yours you're not required to flee either based on the circumstances mr mims used the degree of force that he believed was recently necessary and we believe was objective lee reasonable so he acted in self defense and when you look at the defense testimony and the state's testimony the defense witnesses were more credible and the state just failed to prove their burden