Key defense requests were denied at a hearing Tuesday for the police officer charged with fatally shooting Philando Castile last year, but the door was left open for other contentious evidence that could come into play when the history-making case goes to trial later this month.
Ramsey County District Court Judge William H. Leary III ruled that Jeronimo Yanez cannot re-enact last year's fatal shooting in the presence of Castile's car while jurors watch.
One of Yanez's three attorneys, Earl Gray, said that although not all of their motions were granted, the defense still has a strong case.
"We got rulings that will help us defend the case," Gray said. "I'm not going to comment on the judge's rulings. We have enough there to easily win this case."
Several defense and prosecution motions were addressed at the pretrial hearing — the final one scheduled before the trial begins May 30. The judge reviewed requests by the defense to admit evidence of Castile's alleged past marijuana use, his arrest and driving records and an interview Castile's girlfriend, Diamond Reynolds, gave to police in an unrelated assault case.
Yanez, 29 was charged in November with second-degree manslaughter and two felony counts of dangerous discharge of a firearm after killing Castile, 32, during a traffic stop in Falcon Heights on July 6. Reynolds and her daughter, then 4, were also in the car.
Defense attorney Paul Engh made an impassioned plea that Leary allow jurors to view Castile's car in-person while Yanez re-enacts the traffic stop and testifies to what he saw and did.
"On a visceral level, the actual car and the seat and the blood … is visually arresting," Engh said.