A long time brewing.

Two men in Sanford, North Carolina, had a minor fender bender on a city street; both got out of their vehicles and approached each other; then they began fighting. One man pulled a gun and shot the other unarmed man five times, killing him. The shooter, Horace Dawson, was found not guilty of murder, reported the Sanford Herald.

Though the circumstances of the shooting might seem to indicate that Dawson should have been found guilty, the jury decided that because of previous actions by Richard Raab, the dead man, Dawson was justified in believing that his life may be in danger.

Dawson and Raab were well acquainted: they were neighbors who'd had problems with each other for the previous six years. Originally, Raab accused Dawson of having an affair with Raab's then-wife. For years afterward, Raab tried to make Dawson's life as miserable as possible. Raab would trail Dawson in his truck to harass him whenever he went anywhere. Raab also screamed at Dawson regularly, used speakers to blare loud music at Dawson's house, shot holes in Dawson's outbuilding, and threw dead animals in his yard.

On the day of the fateful vehicular collision, Raab was once again trailing Dawson to annoy him. The prosecutor tried to prove that Dawson did not fear for his life; hence, he was guilty of murder. The jury disagreed.