A: I see him open the door, get out of the car, and at the same time I start to get out of the car. By the time I step on my weapon and shoot in the air, he's already in the middle of the road, he's already standing on the road.
The Honorable Judge A. Hellman: So it's like it says in the indictment that you went out at the same time. At the same time, it means that at about the same time.
The witness, Mr. Mukin: Approximately. I went out after him, if he hadn't come out I wouldn't have had a reason to go out.
The Honorable Judge A. Hellman: Did you see him open the door and then you left before he even had time to leave?
The witness, Mr. Mukin: As soon as I saw that his intention was to come in my direction, then yes, so I also left."
- However, even this softened description of the defendant is inconsistent with the testimony of the eyewitness Asa Gyari, who witnessed the early stages of the incident, until the stage when the defendant fired in the air for the second time. In his testimony in court, Asa stated that the defendant was the one who got out of his car first and came in the direction of the deceased:
"There was the jeep, a white jeep that drove in the opposite lane, and the one that was chasing me, the car that drove in front of me in my lane and blocked the jeep – a darker, smaller vehicle, that's it. I don't know what kind it is... He blocked the car, the jeep drove like that, and the other car drove like that, blocking it and stopping it, but it stayed in the lane in front of me, and that's why I stopped, and immediately jumped, a guy in shorts jumped out of the blocking car, I think, and with a gun drawn... With a ponytail, fair hair - diabolical? Blonde? With Coco. Long hair gathered with a ponytail like this, jumping into, in my right hand he has it, I see a gun pulled out, it's a line. (Thus in the original - my note Y.S.)And that's in a second, and he's behind the car, jumps out of the car, gets out of his car, behind his car he gets into the jeep, the driver of the jeep has already come out - that's a second - and they meet, and I see that he's pointing the gun at the head of the guy who got out and suddenly releases a shot." (p. 387 of Prut, paras. 7-24).