A woman on trial for second-degree murder said Monday that she feared that Ilan Nissim would harm her and her family, and that she shot him in self-defense.
“In my mind, he was chasing me,” Janepsy Mesa Carballo said of Nissim. “His people, as he called it, were chasing me.”
She testified in hopes of having her murder charge thrown out under Florida’s Stand Your Ground law.
Carballo, 35, told a Miami-Dade court that she lived in fear of Nissim, who was an acquaintance and business partner of her husband, Orlando Mesa.
Mesa and Carballo’s toddler son were shot outside their North Miami home in April 2008. Her husband was killed and their 2-year-old boy was injured but survived.
A month later, Carballo shot and killed Nissim inside her home, according to authorities.
Prosecutors say Carballo was out to avenge her husband's death, claiming that she lured Nissim to her home the night she fatally shot him six times in his back.
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But Carballo said that she wasn’t expecting Nissim that night, and said that his visit turned violent. She acted in self-defense, she said.
“He turns with his left hand towards his right, and at that moment, I just started shooting, and shooting,” she said.
More testimony is expected on Tuesday.
