Slaying sister's fiance; brings life prison term

After he was convicted Tuesday of first-degree murder, a 24-year-old man continued to maintain he acted in self-defense in shooting his sister's fiancé in St. Paul in April.

Still, Michael Joseph-Antwian Hall Jr. said he regretted that Shawn Moore's family was not there in court, so he could apologize. And he agreed with Ramsey County District Judge James Clark that gun violence and "black on black" crime must stop.

Clark, however, appeared unsatisfied.

He reminded Hall that he had gone to his sister's apartment building -- where the sister's two young children also lived -- with a loaded semi-automatic handgun in his waistband.

"It has to stop, Mr. Hall," the judge told him, "it has to stop."

Clark then sentenced Hall to life without parole.

Hall was accused of shooting Moore during an altercation near the back door of the apartment building on Randolph Avenue near Lexington Parkway.

"Mike" had shot him, he said, referring to Hall, with whom Moore had feuded during the previous weeks.

During closing arguments Monday, prosecutor Yasmin Mullings told jurors that Hall sat in his vehicle waiting for Moore to come out of the building. Moore had stepped out to smoke a cigarette, but ran back inside to escape and was shot in the back through the thin window in a security door, Mullings said.

Defense attorney David Paulzine said that Hall shot Moore in self-defense, and that it was Moore who had been the aggressor.

On Tuesday in the courtroom, Hall said that it was too bad that two men had now lost their lives.

"My family knows the truth," he said. "I know the truth."

Hall, as he left the courtroom, told his family: "There is always an appeal. You know what happened."