Jurors should have considered stand

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — A man convicted of killing his landlord’s adult son with a sawed-off shotgun is entitled to a new trial because the presiding judge failed to instruct jurors about a possible self-defense argument, the state Court of Appeals ruled Tuesday.

A three-judge panel vacated the first-degree murder conviction of Ronald Wayne Vaughn Jr. in the 2017 shooting death of Gary Somerset. Vaughn was on the porch of the Lincoln County trailer he was renting and had the weapon when Somerset yelled “Let’s end this” and rushed at him, according to Tuesday’s opinion. The two and Somerset’s mother had been in a heated argument. Vaughn was sentenced in part to life in prison without parole.

Possessing a gun like the one Vaughn used —a Winchester .410 caliber shotgun with a sawed-off barrel that makes it easier to conceal and potentially more destructive — is a felony, and Vaughn was also convicted on that count.