PEOPLE OF MI V DERRICK A WILSON

Annotate this Case

Download PDF

STATE OF MICHIGAN COURT OF APPEALS PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF MICHIGAN, UNPUBLISHED Plaintiff-Appellee, v No. 188030 Oakland Circuit Court LC No. 95-137699-FC DERRICK A. WILSON, Defendant-Appellant. Before: Neff, P.J., and Wahls and Taylor, JJ. TAYLOR, J. (concurring in part and dissenting in part). I concur with all but section II C of the majority opinion. I dissent from the majority’s cautioning “the prosecutor from engaging in such rhetoric in the future.” The prosecutor argued that defense counsel had gone through inconsistencies in the testimony to mask what had happened. The prosecutor then reminded the jury that, in the animal kingdom, a number of animals have defense mechanisms, the skunk has his smell, the porcupine his quills, and squids release ink to mask an escape. Only after giving this argument did the prosecutor liken defendant to a squid. In my view there was nothing wrong with the prosecutor’s argument. See People v Marji, 180 Mich App 525, 537; 447 NW2d 835 (1989), remanded for resentencing 439 Mich 896 (1991) (defendant likened to the center of an octopus) and Snow v Reid, 619 F Supp 579, 584-585 (1985) (defense counsel said to be clouding the waters as squid an octopi are reputed to do). /s/ Clifford W. Taylor -1

Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.