Florida’s licence to shoot
ANALYSIS: As Americans mourn the death of Trayvon Martin, one thing is clear: race and politics trumped gun control in the trial of George Zimmerman, writes.
The moment neighbourhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman, a 28-year-old white Latino, shot black teenager Trayvon Martin dead in February 2012 as he walked innocently to his father’s home in Sanford, Fla., race and politics took centre stage.
The killing reverberated throughout the nation’s black communities, whose members know only too well the harsh reality of racial profiling and that the justice system is rife with racial bias, as many studies have shown.
While these two ingredients were mixed into the judicial process, two other elements in the case retreated into the shadows.
Those ingredients, however, would prove pivotal: gun control and Florida’s socalled “Stand Your Ground” law, plus its related statutes on self-defence.
Essentially, Zimmerman was able to shoot Martin because Florida law — and the law in most states — permits him to carry a concealed weapon and gave him the right to use that weapon to defend himself against grave bodily harm.
The problem, however, is people can get it wrong. They can misinterpret the danger. Luckily for these shooters, the law also protects against that eventuality.
“The chaos of such defensive-force situations means that people commonly make mistakes,” Paul Robinson, a law professor at the University of Pennsylvania, recently wrote in the Wall Street Journal. “The law does not require that a person get it exactly right. It may be enough that the person honestly believed his force was necessary.”
Zimmerman said he followed Martin because he thought he was a robber. When an angry Martin turned on him and began beating him up, Zimmerman shot him in self-defence. That’s his story.
When police declared the shooting was indeed self-defence, civil rights activists organized mass protests. The dark hoodie Martin wore that fateful night became a civil rights emblem. Federal and state politicians met with prosecutors and urged Zimmerman’s arrest and prosecution.
The killing was hashed out in America’s newsrooms. Al Sharpton, a civil rights activist and MSNBC host, travelled to Florida where he led protest marches. CNN and MSNBC claimed the tape of a 911 call made by Zimmerman “clearly” recorded him calling Martin a “coon.” NBC host Joe O’Donnell said the tape “constitutes obvious evidence of hateful intent.”
CNN later retracted its statement, admitting that the tape did not contain any racial slur but rather the word “cold.” O’Donnell said nothing.
‘If I had a son, he’d look like Trayvon.’ U.S. PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA
Even U.S. President Barack Obama joined the fray. He announced to the nation, “If I had a son, he’d look like Trayvon.”
The U.S. Justice Department sent FBI investigators to gather evidence for possible prosecution of Zimmerman for federal civil rights violations. No case was filed.
Zimmerman was finally charged about two months after the shooting with second-degree murder.
The trial did not go well for the prosecution. A witness said he saw a person in dark clothing (Martin wore a dark hoodie) holding a man to the ground and beating him, which confirmed Zimmerman’s story. A policeman testified that he believed Zimmerman’s account that he shot Trayvon in self-defence. Photos of Zimmerman taken immediately after the killing showed him with a broken nose and wounds on the back of his head where he claimed Trayvon had slammed his head against the concrete sidewalk.
There was no evidence at trial that Zimmerman had voiced racial slurs.
After a jury of six women — five white and one Hispanic — found him not guilty of either charge, protests swept across the country.
Concerned about possible violence, akin to the riots that inflamed the streets of Los Angeles following the acquittal of the policemen who beat Rodney King in 1991, Obama issued a statement, saying: “I know this case has elicited strong passions. And in the wake of the verdict, I know those passions may be running even higher. But we are a nation of laws, and a jury has spoken.”
The NAACP produced a petition with 450,000 names urging the justice department to reopen a civil rights investigation against Zimmerman, claiming he killed Trayvon because he was black. The justice department agreed to reopen the file.
Meanwhile, Zimmerman has the right to get his gun back.