{"id":266179,"date":"2025-09-30T09:44:12","date_gmt":"2025-09-30T09:44:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/266179\/"},"modified":"2025-09-30T09:44:12","modified_gmt":"2025-09-30T09:44:12","slug":"legal-experts-weigh-in-on-self-defense-claim-in-deadly-phoenix-road-rage-shooting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/266179\/","title":{"rendered":"Legal experts weigh in on self-defense claim in deadly Phoenix road rage shooting"},"content":{"rendered":"

PHOENIX (AZFamily)<\/b> \u2014 Phoenix police are investigating what led up to a deadly shooting near Seventh Avenue and Missouri Avenue on Saturday. Witnesses say it appeared to be a case of road rage<\/a>. Detectives say the woman who opened fire is claiming self-defense.<\/p>\n

A criminal defense attorney told Arizona\u2019s Family that self-defense may be hard to prove. Right now, the woman who pulled the trigger has not been charged.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a real borderline case,\u201d said criminal defense attorney Dwane Cates. \u201cShe didn\u2019t know what he had in his hands or what he had going on.\u201d<\/p>\n

Witnesses say the people in the SUVs were driving erratically for multiple blocks. Then a man, now identified as 54-year-old Stephen Guardino, got out of his car and approached a woman still in her car and spat on her. That woman then fired a single shot, hitting Guardino in his neck, critically injuring him.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe thing that bothers me about the case is what\u2019s called \u2018proportionality\u2019. You\u2019re only allowed to use deadly force when faced with deadly force,\u201d Cates said. People on the scene performed CPR. Guardino died at the hospital the next day.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe jury instruction in this case is, would a reasonable person in that situation feel it was necessary to use deadly force, OK? And there would be a lot of people who would say no,\u201d Cates said.<\/p>\n

But he also sees a world in which a grand jury could see the woman fearing for her life, meaning she acted reasonably in this case. \u201cWhen he ran over to her, I guarantee you that put her in fear. OK? And when he spat on her, then that could definitely be justification,\u201d Cates said.<\/p>\n

A new study from AAA found that 96% of drivers<\/a> admitted to engaging in some form of aggressive driving in the last year. <\/p>\n

Forensic psychologist Dr. John Delatorre said it often takes two to tango and more Americans need to recognize their emotions and de-escalate or disengage. <\/p>\n

\u201cRoad rage is actually something that we all go through, right?\u201d said Delatorre. \u201cLosing your life is not worth whatever it is that\u2019s going on.\u201d<\/p>\n

See a spelling or grammatical error in our story? Please click here to report it<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Do you have a photo or video of a breaking news story? Send it to us here<\/a> with a brief description.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2025 KTVK\/KPHO. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHOENIX (AZFamily) \u2014 Phoenix police are investigating what led up to a deadly shooting near Seventh Avenue and…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":266180,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5131],"tags":[5229,5643,1587,7182,51749,138831,4222,135507,1589,7183,51572,10178,113231,67,586,132,5230,68,2969,7308],"class_list":{"0":"post-266179","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-phoenix","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-arizona","10":"tag-az","11":"tag-azfamily","12":"tag-central-phoenix","13":"tag-criminal-attorney","14":"tag-gun-violence","15":"tag-neck","16":"tag-phoenix","17":"tag-phoenix-news","18":"tag-road-rage-shooting","19":"tag-self-defense","20":"tag-spit","21":"tag-united-states","22":"tag-united-states-of-america","23":"tag-unitedstates","24":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","25":"tag-us","26":"tag-usa","27":"tag-witnesses"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115292606789774982","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/266179","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=266179"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/266179\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/266180"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=266179"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=266179"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=266179"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}