This article was originally published on www.goerie.com by Tim Hahn on June 9th, 2020.

Lawyer argues evidence suggests fatal stabbing of daughter’s boyfriend was self-defense.

An Erie woman accused of fatally stabbing her daughter’s boyfriend during an altercation inside her home in April is asking an Erie County judge to set bond in her homicide case.

Erie lawyer Eric Hackwelder, who is representing 67-year-old Delores C. White, has filed a motion in Erie County Court seeking to have bail set for her as the case advances to trial.

A hearing on the motion had not been set as of Tuesday afternoon.

White has been in the Erie County Prison without bond since April 15, when she was arraigned on charges including criminal homicide and first-degree murder in the death of 35-year-old Khalil Reynolds the previous day.

Erie police accuse White of stabbing Reynolds at her East Lake Road residence during an altercation. City police detectives who filed the charges wrote in White’s criminal complaint that she told officers who responded to her residence that there was a domestic disturbance between her daughter and Reynolds and that she stabbed Reynolds.

White later stated to detectives that Reynolds was always coming over to the house and “talking (expletive), I’m done with him that’s why I did it” and “I only stabbed him one time,” investigators wrote in the complaint.

White was held for court on all charges in the case following her preliminary hearing on May 11.

Hackwelder wrote in his motion to set bail that the first-degree murder charge against White was withdrawn in the case, “which reinforces the notion that the killing in this matter was neither planned nor premeditated.” He also wrote that no evidence was introduced at the preliminary hearing of any aggravating factors that would bear the likelihood of a conviction.

“In fact, the evidence elicited at the preliminary hearing appears to be more mitigating in nature and would demonstrate that this was an act of defending her daughter from a brutal attack inside of her own home,” according to the motion.

One of the detectives testified at the hearing that White said Reynolds was physical with her daughter, and that the detective observed two abrasions on the daughter’s face when he interviewed her.

Hackwelder added in the motion that White does not have a prior criminal record and is not a flight risk.

He cited in the motion the setting of bail in February for Erie resident Derrick A. Feidler, 35, who faces homicide, first-degree murder and other charges in the fatal shooting of 38-year-old Jose Arenas Jr. on Nov. 8.

Feidler posted the 10 percent of $200,000 bail set by Erie County Judge Daniel Brabender and is free as he awaits trial. The Erie County District Attorney’s Office opposed the setting of bail in Feidler’s case.

Hackwelder also recently sought to have bail set for another Erie homicide suspect he is representing, 61-year-old Erie resident Joseph J. DiGello. He is accused of fatally shooting 36-year-old Daniel Galvin, the son of DiGello’s girlfriend, at a Tuttle Avenue residence on March 8.

DiGello faces criminal homicide and aggravated assault charges in Galvin’s death. Hackwelder has said that they believe the shooting was accidental.

Erie County Judge John J. Mead denied the motion to set bail for DiGello on May 18. Hackwelder filed a motion for reconsideration on June 3, which Mead denied the next day, according to court documents.