The gunman who killed a 17-year-old boy and tried to kill 3 others in an argument over loud music compared himself to a rape victim in phone conversations he had with his girlfriend from jail. According to Think Progress, Michael Dunn called himself both the “victor” and the “victim” in a confrontation with a group of unarmed African-American teenagers outside of a Florida convenience store.

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“You know I was thinking about that today, I was like I’m the f*cking victim here,” Dunn told his fiancée Rhonda Rouer in December, a month after the shooting. “I was the one who was victimized.”

On November 23 of 2013, Dunn, 47, approached a group of four African-American teenagers in an SUV, demanding that they turn down their music. An argument followed in which Dunn claims his life was threatened. He opened fire on the teenagers as they attempted to leave the scene, killing Jordan Davis, 17.

“I mean I don’t know how else to cut it, like they attacked me,” he said. “I’m the victim. I’m the victor, but I was the victim too…I was the one that was being preyed upon and I fought back.”

“It’s not quite the same,” he said, “but it made me think of like the old TV shows and movies where like how the police used to think when a chick got raped going, ‘Oh, it’s her fault because of the way she dressed.’ I’m like, so it’s my fault (laughing) because I asked them to turn their music down. I got attacked and I fought back because I didn’t want to be a victim and now I’m in trouble. I refused to be a victim and now I’m incarcerated.”

Dunn told Rouer that being in jail had only reinforced his prejudices against African-Americans. He complained about being kept in isolation from the general population of the jail, but that “it would be better than being in a room with them animals.”

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The shooter was convicted on Saturday of three counts of attempted murder, but the jury remained deadlocked on whether Dunn is guilty of first-degree murder in Davis’ death, the most serious charge against him. On that charge, a mistrial was declared.

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