A Louisiana judge has reduced the 25-year prison sentence of Cardell Hayes to 22 years and two months for the 2016 killing of former New Orleans Saints star Will Smith. The judge made this decision to give Hayes credit for the time he spent confined to his home before his latest trial.
Hayes, 36, was initially sentenced to 25 years for manslaughter after fatally shooting Smith during a confrontation following a traffic crash. However, Judge Camille Buras decided to grant Hayes credit for his home incarceration, despite objections from prosecutors who cited state law restrictions on such credit.
Reports from New Orleans news outlets indicate that Buras re-sentenced Hayes on Tuesday, reducing the original 25-year sentence by 34 months. Hayes had been first convicted in Smith's death in December 2016, but the conviction was later overturned due to the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling against non-unanimous verdicts. He was then convicted of manslaughter again in a January trial.
Throughout the legal proceedings, Hayes has maintained that he acted in self-defense. In his testimony during the first trial, he claimed to have heard a 'pop' before firing his weapon. However, there was no witness or forensic evidence supporting Hayes' assertion that Smith had brandished or discharged a firearm.
Smith's intoxication at the time of the confrontation was confirmed by evidence presented during the trials. Despite this, the lack of corroborating evidence for Hayes' self-defense claim led to his conviction for manslaughter in both trials.
