When music at a neighbor's evening party got too loud for his liking, Raul Rodriguez showed up to complain, carrying a gun and a video camera.

As a verbal confrontation unfolded, the retired Houston-area firefighter told a police dispatcher by phone that he feared for his life and was "standing his ground," a reference that calls to mind the law at the center of the Trayvon Martin slaying in Florida in February.

The incident involving Rodriguez happened two years before Martin's death and will be decided under a different kind of self-defense doctrine. But it offers another example of how laws governing deadly force are tested in the nation's courtrooms and the many complex legal issues that swirl around each case.

Prosecutors call Rodriguez an aggressor who could have safely left his neighbor's driveway anytime. His defense attorneys insist Texas law still gave him the right to defend himself, even if it meant taking a life.