SAN DIEGO — A man is in jail, accused of murder. But there’s a twist. Authorities told CBS 8 he was helping a woman in trouble on a city bus.
Now, the district attorney is trying to decide if he should face charges.
CBS 8 thought Edward Hilbert would be arraigned in court this afternoon, however, that didn’t happen.
We spoke with a defense attorney who says the district attorney is being cautious because the details of this case are unusual.
Police say Hilbert held Anthony McGaffe down to stop him from attacking a woman on an MTS bus on Saturday night.
SDPD said in a statement:
“Hilbert physically intervened and restrained the victim for several minutes. While being restrained by Hilbert, the victim lost consciousness, went into medical distress and ultimately died.”
Defense attorney Gretchen von Helms is not an attorney on this case. But I did ask her what she thought Hilbert’s defense should be.
“They need to play up the fact that this guy was trouncing on the woman, beating her, the rest of the people were alarmed by it and waiting for someone to step in," said Helms. “To charge someone, all you need is a little bit of evidence, to convict someone you need a whole bunch of evidence,” said Von Helms.
She says prosecutors only want to charge cases they think they can prove to a jury.
In this case, the answer may not be so clear.
“Some jurors are going to be really on his side. He's protecting a woman. Any jury is going to say, why is this guy beating on the woman in the first place?” said Helms.
San Diego prosecutors are looking at all the evidence before they decided what to do with Hilbert.
“I have never seen in San Diego a good Samaritan charged with murder. That's very unusual,” said Helms.