Zimmerman tries to auction gun that killed Trayvon Martin
One website rejects ad, while another went down minutes after posting it
MIAMI, FLA.— A second gun-auction website has posted George Zimmerman’s ad to sell the pistol he used to kill unarmed black teenager Trayvon Martin, after the ad was yanked from GunBroker.com Thursday morning.
The listing was removed by GunBroker minutes after the auction began, as negative feedback about the sale exploded online. In a statement posted on its website, GunBroker said listings are user-generated and that the company reserved the right to reject listings at its discretion.
Zimmerman never contacted anyone at the site and no one there “has any relationship with Zimmerman,” the company wrote in its statement.
It added, “We want no part in the listing on our website or in any of the publicity it is receiving.”
Hours later, United Gun Group tweeted that it would post Zimmerman’s ad. The new link was posted, along with a statement from Zimmerman. However, the site apparently went down a few minutes later. The site calls itself a “social market place for the firearms community.”
Critics called the auction an insensitive move to profit from the slaying.
Zimmerman had told Orlando, Fla., TV station WOFL that the pistol was returned to him by the U.S. Justice Department, which took it after he was acquitted in Martin’s 2012 shooting death.
The auction for the 9-mm Kel-Tec PF-9 pistol was to begin at 11 a.m. Thursday and end 24 hours later.
Zimmerman’s listing said a portion of the proceeds would go toward fighting what he calls violence by the Black Lives Matter movement against law-enforcement officers, combating anti-gun rhetoric of Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and ending the career of state attorney Angela Corey, who led Zimmerman’s prosecution.
The listing ended with a Latin phrase that translates as “if you want peace, prepare for war.”