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The man charged with second-degree murder for the May 11 shooting death of Nathanial Jennings, 19, in downtown Melbourne will be held in jail without bond until trial.
STEPHAN DIEUJUSTE, 24, initially was arrested for manslaughter and then freed on $200,000 bail. But the State Attorney’s Office charged him with murder in June after reviewing security-camera video of a confrontation between Dieujuste and Jennings, which ended with Dieujuste pulling his gun and firing.
At a special evidentiary hearing Sept. 5, Circuit Judge Steve Henderson agreed with prosecutors that proof of the crime is evident and presumption of Dieujuste’s guilt is great – a standard the state had to meet for the judge to jail the defendant without bond. Second-degree murder is punishable by life in prison.
Dieujuste told police he shot Jennings in self-defense after Jennings pursued him menacingly down Vernon Place, just south of East New Haven Avenue, and threatened to attack him. After the shooting, Dieujuste remained at the scene and cooperated with investigators.
But at the Sept. 5 hearing, Assistant State Attorney Trevor Persenaire played zoomed-in security video from a nearby business that shows Dieujuste shooting Jennings while he was still two arms’ lengths away. Dieujuste continued to shoot Jennings as he fled toward a crowd on New Haven Avenue, stumbling and falling each time he was struck, the video shows.
