Murder Trial of SF Filmmaker Kevin Epps Will Swing on Question of Self-Defense

Nine years after filmmaker and journalist Kevin Epps shot and killed a man in his San Francisco home, it is now up to a jury to decide whether the act was self-defense or murder.

Most of the events that took place before Epps fatally shot Marcus Polk, his sister-in-law’s ex-husband, on Oct. 24, 2016, aren’t in question. Polk, who was unhoused and frequently visited his ex-wife, Starr Gul, and her kids at the house, was turned away at the door the night before the shooting. He returned the next day, inebriated, and entered the home despite being told again to leave. Moments later, Epps shot him twice, and he died.

Instead, jurors will have to determine why Epps fired a gun at Polk that day. Over the monthlong trial, defense attorneys argued that Epps feared for his life and those of the four other people in the house, while the district attorney’s office has posited that Epps was motivated by growing tension over Polk’s frequent visits to the family’s Glen Park home.

During closing statements on Monday, Epps’ attorney, Darlene Comstedt, told jurors that he was legally justified to act in self-defense after Polk entered the house, threatening him and neighborhood maintenance workers he’d just gotten into a spat with outside.

“Marcus Polk came at Kevin Epps in Kevin Epps’ home, and he shot in self-defense. He’s not guilty,” she said.

That narrative was widely accepted in the years after the shooting. Epps’ supporters say he is being targeted because of his race and background.

Though Epps was briefly arrested after the shooting, then-District Attorney George Gascón did not charge him, citing a lack of evidence. He wasn’t charged until three years later, after controversial 3D-generated images that recreated the shooting raised questions about the validity of Epps’ self-defense claim.

Prosecutors now allege that Epps’ use of force wasn’t justifiable. Polk was unarmed, hadn’t been physically violent and was allegedly faced away from Epps when he was struck, Assistant District Attorney Jonathan Schmidt said in his closing argument.

“In a word, it just wasn’t necessary,” Schmidt said. He has posited that instead, Epps was motivated by malice. “Shooting over a verbal argument about when is a good time to visit is like amputating … for a paper cut.”

Self-defense or malice?

The night before the shooting, on Oct. 23, 2016, witnesses say that Polk came to the house late after recently being jailed on a parole violation. After banging on the door, he was turned away by Epps.

He came back the following day under the influence of methamphetamine and cannabis, according to a toxicology report conducted after his death. He was again told to leave and appeared to comply.

Shortly after, though, Maryam Jhan, Epps’ partner, was alerted that Polk had gotten into an argument with two housing authority maintenance workers outside the home. They accused him of putting trash in another resident’s bin and told him to leave.

The argument drew Epps, Jhan and Gul outside. Jhan told the workers that Polk wasn’t her guest, and Epps and Gul again told Polk to leave, according to court documents. Then, Polk barged into the home and became “erratic,” threatening to “air out” Epps.

The defense said Jhan went downstairs to call her neighbor for help while “the situation upstairs escalated, and Mr. Epps, believing his life and others’ lives to be in danger, fired two shots.”

Polk was shot from at least two feet away and struck in the left arm and left side of his torso, according to court filings. The prosecution said he was attempting to turn on the TV at the time.

Epps has maintained that he shot in self-defense, and a witness testified that he said Polk “came at” him. California law allows people to use force intended to cause death against a person who unlawfully or forcefully enters their residence if they fear imminent danger.

But in May 2019, San Francisco police arrested Epps based on new evidence that suggested Polk was facing away when he was shot, throwing into question whether his self-defense claim was justified. Epps was charged with murder and illegal possession of a firearm as a felon. He had had multiple run-ins with law enforcement in his younger years and a prior nonviolent felony conviction from 2001, 15 years before the shooting.

Prosecutors said three-dimensional computer-generated images revealed multiple scenarios that could have led up to the shooting, including one that showed Polk’s back to Epps.

Gul corroborated that narrative, the shooting’s sole witness, who said in a 2019 preliminary hearing and again on the stand last month that Polk was standing in the living room facing the television when Epps shot from behind.

The 3D image evidence was ultimately withdrawn over objections by the defense, and court records state that SFPD investigators determined that it wasn’t possible to trace the trajectory of the bullets, according to court records, but Gul’s testimony has been key to the prosecution’s case.

Competing narratives

Throughout the trial, Schmidt argued that the shooting was motivated by the “simmering dispute” between Epps and Polk over his frequent presence.

Texts between Epps and Jhan appeared to highlight his dislike for the arrangement, and Polk’s daughter Melina, who was 17 at the time of the shooting, testified last month that Epps often seemed frustrated with his presence and complained that he didn’t “have any responsibilities.”

“He was an irritant, but being an irritant doesn’t justify [deadly force],” Schmidt said during closing arguments.

Schmidt described Polk as a regular at the Glen Park residence, where he often came to shower and hang out, since Gul and their children were often over at her sister’s home. He said he was familiar with Jhan and Gul, and helped around the house, cleaning bathrooms and pitching in with housework.

In closing statements, Schmidt said in the months before the shooting, Polk was visiting even more regularly. He alleged that Epps, on the other hand, had moved out of the home.

In her closing statement, though, Comstedt insisted that Epps did live at the residence and highlighted more complicated family dynamics.

She said the description of Polk as a “family man who’s present at Christmas celebrations … or births of kids … might have been true at one time, but not in 2016.”

Polk was a methamphetamine user, and it wasn’t uncommon for him to be turned away from the house, Melina testified.

He has prior convictions for domestic abuse against Gul, as well as for lewd acts with a child, second-degree robbery and drug possession, according to court documents published by Mission Local. He is a registered sex offender. His criminal history was not permitted to be revealed to the jury.

Comstedt also said Gul was contradicted by evidence and by her own previous statements on the events that led to the shooting.

Throughout the course of her multi-day testimony, Gul changed her description of how Epps and Polk were standing when Epps fired the gun. She first indicated that the men were facing each other head-on after the first shot was fired, but after repeated questioning, she told prosecutors that Polk was angled slightly away, Mission Local reported.

Gul also offered a different description of how she acted when Polk came into the house. In prior interviews, she said she had told Polk to leave, but on the stand, she said she was silent when he came inside.

And, in one of the biggest revelations of her testimony, Gul alleged for the first time publicly that during the altercation the night before the shooting, Epps pulled a gun on Polk.

“That was new,” Comstedt said.

Comstedt closed by reiterating that Epps was reasonably afraid of death or bodily injury when he shot.

Community calls for justice

In the years since his arrest and throughout the trial, Epps has garnered strong community support.

Before the shooting, he’d risen to local fame for his series of documentaries about the experience of Black San Franciscans, including Straight Outta Hunters Point (2003), which highlighted the poverty, violence and struggles of the neighborhood where he grew up.

In 2020, more than 600 people signed a petition urging a judge to allow him bail, and dozens of letters, including from Supervisor Matt Haney and Jhan, requested the same. When Judge Christine Van Aken granted that request, which is highly unusual in a murder case, supporters helped raise $250,000 for his release.

Just last month, Epps received the Northern California Society of Professional Journalists’ Silver Heart award, and during his trial, supporters have rallied outside the courthouse on his behalf.

“ I know that Kevin is a very honorable man,” Carol McGruder, a longtime friend, said during a rally on Nov. 20. “I don’t think that he’s just shooting and killing people for no good reason at all. It’s a tragic event, but I’m here to support him. He is a valued community member, a father and we want to get this behind us, have justice and have him be exonerated.”

“ I think we really need to question when prosecutors decide to bring someone like Kevin Epps to trial, if they have a problem accepting that somebody with his background, with his color skin from the neighborhood that he’s from, acted in self-defense instead of malice,” said Julian Davis, a spokesperson for Epps.

During prosecutors’ final statements before the jury on Tuesday, more than a dozen supporters gathered in the courtroom. Throughout the proceedings, a few got up and left the courtroom while yelling out in protest, alleging “prosecutorial misconduct” and “lies.”

KQED’s Azul Dahlstrom-Eckman contributed to this report.