The trial against Mexican actor Pablo Lyle, who is under house arrest in Miami since April 2019 accused of the involuntary manslaughter of a man he punched in a traffic dispute, will be held on 2021.
Judge Marlene Fernández-Karavetsos determine don Thursday in a brief videoconference hearing due to COVID-19 that Lyle’s trial will take place next year, tentatively scheduled for mid-March.
The deadline can change due to the pandemic and in that sense, the judge agreed with the defense and the Prosecutor’s Office that there will be a “status conference” next October 14.
Pablo Lyle’s
defense, which lost an appeal that sought to save the actor from trial, said that two weeks would be enough for the jury selection and trials, to which the judge agreed.
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Lawyer Bruce Lehr said Wednesday that the Mexican’s appeal to a Third District Court “was denied several weeks ago.”
Lyle’s defense had appealed a first instance ruling issued by Judge Alan Fine, which prevented him from applying Florida’s self-defense law known as “Stand Your Ground” that would save him from trial .
That law, valid in Florida since 2005, allows a person who considers he is at risk of dying or suffering from serious physical harm to use “deadly force” simply by staying where he is, that is, not trying to flee from danger.
Nevertheless, the Court of Appeal considered there was not “any legal mistake from the first instance court in the application of the law,” according to the documents EFE had access to.
Lyle’s lawyers tried to adjust the closest date for the trial by reminding the judge he is in a difficult situation because he cannot work.
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On March 31, 2019, Lyle was on his way to the Miami airport with his son in a vehicle driven by his brother-in-law, Lucas Delfino, when they got across the car driven by Hernández.
In a traffic light, the Cuban went off his vehicle to reprimand Delfino for a maneuver he had made.
Amidst the fight, Lyle got out of the car and punched Hernández who, according to video recorded by surveillance cameras of a nearby gas station, immediately fell down.
The 63-years old died four days later in a hospital.
A forensic report of the Miami-Dade County revealed that Hernández died from “complications for blunt trauma in the head” and wrote down “homicide” as a possible cause of death.
The actor, married to Ana Araújo, with whom he has a son, was arrested on March 31 soon after the incident and was first under parole with a USD $5,000 bail.
After Hernández’s death, Lyle was accused of involuntary manslaughter and put under house arrest.
mp