Supreme Judicial Court hears challenge to admission of witness statement and self-defense instruction in Renardo Williams appeal

An appeal by Renardo Williams Jr. asking the Supreme Judicial Court to overturn rulings in his trial over admission of an out‑of‑court statement and jury instructions on self defense was argued before the court. Defense attorney Jeffrey Baylor said a statement by a witness identified in the record as Mr. Francois — who was not available to testify at trial — should have been admitted, and that the trial judge improperly required Williams to testify before the gun‑related portion could be considered relevant.

Why it matters: The dispute turns on whether parts of Francois’s police statement were admissible as statements against penal interest and whether the trial judge’s instructions to the jury properly allowed the panel to consider a reasonable but mistaken belief or the defendant’s inability to safely retreat when deciding whether to convict of higher and lesser homicide‑related counts.

Baylor told the court that Francois “told police that at…