A decision on whether to retry a Pennsylvania man on the three most serious offenses he faces in the shooting of a Sampson County Sheriff’s deputy may come late this week.

That was the word Monday morning from District Attorney Ernie Lee, who said his plan was to discuss the particulars of the cases against Michael Walthall with those directly involved and make a determination, hopefully by week’s end.

“We haven’t made that decision yet,” Lee said in a telephone interview Monday morning. “My intention is to meet with our prosecutors (Robert Thigpen and Jennifer Barnes), and talk to the sheriff and the officer (Deputy Caitlin Emanuel). My goal is to have a decision by sometime Friday.”

The decision on whether or not to retry Walthall comes on the heels of a 7-woman, 5-man jury’s failure to acquit or convict Walthall on three charges — assault with intent to kill inflicting serious injury, assault on a law enforcement officer with intent to kill inflicting serious injury, and assault with a deadly weapon inflicting serious injury — during a five-day trail in late October.

The jury was locked 11-1 on those charges and told Superior Court Judge Greg Bell they would not be able to come to a unanimous decision. They did, however, convict Walthall on the two lesser offenses of assault by strangulation and larceny of a firearm. Bell continued sentencing on those two charges until a later date.

The case against Walthall stems from an incident that took place in the early morning hours of July 23, 2022 on Hayne Stretch Road, where Emanuel and Deputy Tyler Spell had gone to investigate the larceny of a motor vehicle.

In her October testimony to the jury, Emanuel recounted her 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. shift on July 22 to July 23, 2022, saying it started out routinely as she covered the zone areas of Roseboro, Salemburg and Autryville while Sepll was assigned to the Roseboro city limits in a contract arrangement with that town.

She detailed how things unfolded that night, offering that she discovered the vehicle, drove a little farther down the road to search for potential suspects and then came back to the area where the stolen vehicle had been located.

Emanuel, sometimes emotional, told the jury that a man, later identified as Walthall, waved her down. She explained that Walthall told her, and later Spell, that a suspect ran away from the vehicle, and he admonished Spell “if you go now, you can catch him,” which Spell did.

The deputy said Walthall told her he lived across the street and she asked him to go get a form of ID. He left, she said, but came back. That is when Emanuel said the attack occurred, followed by the shooting.

Detailing what defense attorney Amos G. Tyndall called a 12-second incident, Emanuel said when she asked to see the ID Walthall left the scene to retrieve, “that’s when he covered my whole face with his gi-normous hand and slammed me to the ground.”

A struggle ensued with Walthall, testimony showed, putting the deputy in a chokehold, holding her down with his leg. “I felt like I had an elephant on my chest,” she testified. “I tried to fight back but it was like fighting a bear.”

Audio evidence in the case, which was played for the jury, detailed the screams of a woman (Emanuel) followed by the unmistakable pops of gunfire, seven in total, and then more screams.

The prosecution contended that Walthall fired the shots that injured Emanuel, causing a broken leg and damage to her heel, damage that, she said, led her to decide to come off the road and work in administration at the Sampson County Sheriff’s Department.

The defense said evidence in the case did not show Walthall intended to harm Emanuel during the 12-second incident, which left her wounded and bleeding on a dark stretch of highway as he ran away, tossing her weapon in a field.

The jury deliberated less than an hour before asking questions of the judge, and came back before nightfall saying they could not reach a decision on three of the five charges against him.