Well it sounds like the guy was a bully with a gun. The type of guy that without a gun wouldn't have felt comfortable being a bully, but that with a gun felt empowered to bully.
That combines into a worse combination than your typical bully, because he will revert to a gun in most cases.
However that may all be inadmissible in court, and so only the facts of the specific incident may matter.
In that case it seems quite difficult to argue he felt in fear of his life yet chose to remain in the situation for a prolonged period of time. He pulled a gun, yet then chose to stay for quite awhile after, arguing.
rod5591 it is certainly understandable to be upset with people, document an issue like loud noise, or even confront them.
I have had loud neighbors, including ones that would party not just on the weekend, but a couple times in the middle of the week routinely. Playing loud music, music with heavy bass, and music with profanity.
I have heard drunks out picking fights with each other at such parties, including the host, and grown men sounding like high school juveniles challenging and intimidating one another in some juvenile pecking order.
Well another neighbor would often call the police, who would arrive hours later. They would just start up again later or at the next party, which they had at least a few times a week. So the issue doesn't get resolved.
But what do you do? Obviously hostility with such a crowd is just going to lead to violence, and responsible adults don't put themselves in situations that will result in violence or they get criminal records or worse. Justified or not, the court will eventually go against you even if you do everything legally right each time, it is not the movies where justice prevails. You need to avoid most situations that you legally can.
So yes I can certainly understand the situation.
(There are a few situations that legally you must confront, like a property owner has a duty to confront trespassers, otherwise they gain legal right to easements over time and can even adversely possess or take ownership of the land. Property owners are legally bound to confront them or deal with the legal repercussions. In certain professions you have a legal duty to confront people breaking certain rules or laws, or you can be legally liable if they or someone else is injured or worse. You become negligent in your duties which allowed such a thing to happen if you don't confront them.
However in most other situations you have a choice, and the more confrontations you put yourself in the more you stack the odds against yourself.)
In this specific case he clearly was not going to accomplish anything with his communication skills to get the music turned down. He seemed intent on a hostile scene and not just on documenting the situation. He was looking for an altercation, and when he got one immediately reverted to words that obviously he is using to bring a gun into the situation.
He is stating words to bring a gun into the situation, rather than really trying to diffuse the situation or leave.
Now it does sound like the neighbors are a little nicer because there is a camera involved, they even make note of it at some point in the video, and it appears to discourage some course of action they may have taken otherwise.
So this is a crowd that would probably be even worse without the camera there, and may have been nastier at previous times.
After pulling his gun, and having no attack and ample opportunity to leave what has clearly just been escalated by him or others (court can decide that) into a situation so severe it supposedly needed the threat of deadly force, he then chooses to remain. Not just remain briefly, but remain and argue as the situation continues to get worse.
He clearly does not want to leave, but wants to continue the hostile situation in defiance.
Eventually he gets attacked and ends up shooting several people.
He is certainly not entirely at fault, but he is partially at fault. Partially at fault when people get shot is a bad thing.
