The facts behind the killing of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin in Florida continue to slowly emerge. I have previously stated that I view critical facts as murky for a prosecution — even though I believe that there was sufficient evidence to arrest George Zimmerman at the scene. While we have still not seen some of the forensic evidence, a new report indicates that police may have based their initial decisions in part on the statement of a witness. We have been discussing the maddening gap in witness testimony at the critical moment of the confrontation. Now a new report suggests that there may have been a witness to the struggle and that witness reportedly told police that it was Martin who was on top of Zimmerman before the fatal shot was fired.
FOX 35 in Orlando says that it has spoken to the witness. The witness reportedly said that
“The guy on the bottom who had a red sweater on was yelling to me: ‘help, help…and I told him to stop and I was calling 911.” Martin was wearing a hoodie that night and Zimmerman was wearing a red shirt or sweater. A friend of Zimmerman has also come forward to say that Zimmerman looked like a mess after the fight and that he recognized Zimmerman as the voice on the 911 call asking people to help him.
An obvious defense case is emerging for a classic self-defense claim. Zimmerman on the 911 tape admits to have shadowed Martin but says it was Martin who was checking him out and moving toward him a threatening fashion. Zimmerman claims that he was attacked when he was returning to his SUV. Police and counsel reported that Zimmerman had cuts on his face and head and appeared to have been in a struggle. Zimmerman was lawfully carrying a handgun was allowed to use the weapon if he was in reasonable fear of serious bodily injury or death. This includes the possible use of the gun in a struggle of control of the weapon.
While the case has been treated as racially motivated, the Zimmerman family has strongly denied such a motivation — noting that he is a hispanic with many African-American friends. Frankly, Zimmerman does closely resemble an alternative profile — that of a defendant in “Castle Doctrine” or “Stand Your Ground” cases. In these controversies, we often see people who are obsessed with crime and in some cases inclined to use lethal force. That does not mean that race did not play a role here. However, it is possible that Zimmerman was motivated by his well-documented obsession with crime as opposed to race. While I understand the sensitivity to the race issue and have my own suspicions concerning the role of race, I believe it is premature to label this a racially motivated crime without more evidence of such a motive. None of this means that Zimmerman should not be charged, but rather than there remain murky elements to the case. We simply need to know more about such motivations. In terms of the state law, we also need more information (particularly forensic evidence) to better gauge the chances of a conviction in the case. I still find the fact that Zimmerman was armed and outweighed Martin to be the most significant. However, this case is still in its earliest stage in terms of development of the evidence and witnesses. Among other things, if a charge is brought, such evidence could push prosecutors toward a manslaughter claim with a lower likely sentence than second or first degree murder. Even with manslaughter, the prosecutors would have to establish the element beyond a reasonable doubt, including the claim of self-defense. Of course, the mere fact that Martin may have gotten the better of Zimmerman in dominating fight at one point does not mean that Zimmerman was not the original aggressor. It will depend on the full range of witness testimony and, again, the missing forensic evidence.
I was asked last week to sign an online petition demanding the prosecution of Zimmerman. As I have noted, I believe that there is sufficient evidence for an indictment. However, I have never support such public campaigns for indictments. I do not believe in prosecution by plebiscite. Whether there are 100 or 100,000 people demanding an indictment, a prosecutor should not be influenced by such popular outcries. We saw how distortive and corrupting such campaigns can be on prosecutors like Michael Nifong. Prosecutors must based their decisions on the weight of the evidence not the weight of public opinion. Regardless of my views about a possible indictment, I would not want a prosecutor influenced by any petition supporting those views. There is a line between the visceral and the legal and such petitions fall on the wrong side of that line.
Source: Daily Mail
Take the gun out of this scenario and we have a fistfight; add the gun and we have a national tragedy. It’s manslaughter.
Seriously, a national tragedy ? Only because the media made it that way.
What about Channon Gail Christian, and Hugh Christopher Newsom, Jr.
ever here of them ?
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murders_of_Channon_Christian_and_Christopher_Newsom
How bout Aliyah Shell gunned down on her front porch this past weekend by what appears to be a bunch of white Hispanics. She was six years old.
http://www.suntimes.com/news/crime/11392878-418/story.html
P.S. Aliyah is black.
My feeling is that the case might have just fallen by the wayside but for the campaign (and it was indeed a campaign). Now the case is getting enough attention, I intend to refrain from speculative comment on the facts–the special prosecutor is in a far better position to work out what likelyhappened. I’m reasonably confident that there will be a fair trial, and that’s the best we could wish for.
Mr. Turley wants to see the evidence but the evidence walked away with Zimmerman. If that murdering thug was so innocent why didn’t the police take pictures of his many scratches/scrapes? HIs shirt with all those grass stains on it? Those wounds to the back of his head? His supposedly bloody nose? Why didn’t they do drug tests? If Trayvon was on top of that thug how did he get shot in the chest? Why no description of Trayvon’s clothing, wounds, etc?
Is Zimmerman related to one of the cops? That seems to be grounds for dismissal in Sanford.
Sorry Mr. Turley…it comes back to this murderer stalked the kid, terrorized him, then shot him in cold blood. Alll your lawyerly reasoning is not going to change that?
One question: Are you planning to defend this murderer?
Trayvon Martin’s Last Phone Call Triggers Demand for Arrest ‘Right Now’
http://abcnews.go.com/US/trayvon-martin-death-friend-phone-teen-death-recounts/story?id=15959017#.T3Bo_RxVOjR
Excerpt:
ABC News was there exclusively as the 16-year-old girl told Crump about the last moments of the teenager’s life. Martin had been talking to his girlfriend all the way to the store where he bought Skittles and a tea. The phone was in his pocket and the earphone in his ear, Crump said.
“He said this man was watching him, so he put his hoodie on. He said he lost the man,” Martin’s friend said. “I asked Trayvon to run, and he said he was going to walk fast. I told him to run, but he said he was not going to run.”
Eventually, he would run, said the girl, thinking that he’d managed to escape. But suddenly the strange man was back, cornering Martin.
“Trayvon said, ‘What are you following me for,’ and the man said, ‘What are you doing here.’ Next thing I hear is somebody pushing, and somebody pushed Trayvon because the head set just fell. I called him again, and he didn’t answer the phone.”
The line went dead. Besides screams heard on 911 calls that night as Martin and Zimmerman scuffled, those were the last words he said.
Sanford police chief under fire amid Trayvon Martin case
Police bungled the investigation into Trayvon Martin’s case, attorneys and experts say.
http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/03/21/2706876_p2/sanford-commission-votes-no-confidence.html#storylink=cpy
Excerpt:
• One of the witnesses who heard the crying said she called a detective repeatedly, but said he was not interested because her account differed from Zimmerman’s.
• For nearly a month, police never noticed a profanity Zimmerman mumbled under his breath when he called police, which some people believe was accompanied by a muffled racial slur.
• Even though investigators have the dead boy’s cell phone, it was Trayvon’s father who combed through the phone records to discover that his son was talking to a girlfriend in the moments that led up to his death. Police never contacted the girl, who told lawyers that Trayvon was alarmed because he was being followed.
The department defends its investigation and says it welcomes outside oversight. In an interview last week, Lee said the query into Trayvon’s death was “color blind” and thorough.
Trayvon Martin Family Seeks FBI Investigation of Killing by Neighborhood Watchman
http://abcnews.go.com/US/neighborhood-watchman-allegedly-shot-trayvon-martin-wanted-cop/story?id=15949879#.T3BnPhxVOjR
Excerpt:
Zimmerman, 28, who is white, claimed self defense. He was never arrested and has been charged with no crime, sparking national outrage.
ABC News has learned police seemed to accept Zimmerman’s account at face value that night and that he was not tested for drugs or alcohol on the night of the shooting, even though it is standard procedure in most homicide investigations.
Witnesses in Trayvon Martin death heard cries before shot
Witnesses say they believe Trayvon Martin cried for help just before he was shot by a watch captain
http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/03/15/2696446/trayvon-martin-case.html
Excerpt:
SANFORD — They heard the desperate wail of a child, a gunshot, and then silence.
Trayvon Martin, 17, died Feb. 26 in a dark pathway some 20 minutes after a neighborhood watch volunteer called police saying he thought a young stranger looked suspicious. It was raining, and the volunteer thought the kid in the hoodie walked too slow and peeked in windows.
Three witnesses contacted by The Miami Herald say they saw or heard the moments before and after the Miami Gardens teenager’s killing. All three said they heard the last howl for help from a despondent boy, and believe the sequence of sounds shatters the notion that Trayvon was killed in self-defense.
Orlando Watch Shooting Probe Reveals Questionable Police Conduct
http://abcnews.go.com/US/neighborhood-watch-shooting-trayvon-martin-probe-reveals-questionable/story?id=15907136#.T3BknBxVOjR
Excerpt:
But after the shooting, a source inside the police department told ABC News that a narcotics detective and not a homicide detective first approached Zimmerman. The detective pepppered Zimmerman with questions, the source said, rather than allow Zimmerman to tell his story. Questions can lead a witness, the source said.
Another officer corrected a witness after she told him that she heard the teen cry for help.
The officer told the witness, a long-time teacher, it was Zimmerman who cried for help, said the witness. ABC News has spoken to the teacher and she confirmed that the officer corrected her when she said she heard the teenager shout for help.
*****
Should police be correcting a witness–or just taking her statement?
Mr.Ed said:
”
And that’s hoe I believe it will end up at trial, give a small amount of guts on the prosecutor’s part.”
Does it all hang on prosecutor initiative? What is the judges role in discovering facts?
I’m not an attorney, and don’t play one on TV, but it seems to me that if you stalk somebody with a weapon in your hand, you have made a premeditated move that makes what you do murder. When a police dispatcher tells you to back off (or down), and you continue, you are an aggressor, and can’t claim victimhood.
And that’s hoe I believe it will end up at trial, give a small amount of guts on the prosecutor’s part.
Malisha1, March 26, 2012 at 6:57 am
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clean up your fear before it becomes Malice….Malicia’
Mespo, thank you for your clear headed perspective!
Mespo…… I thought that was the established law….. But what else is in store remains to be seen…. Seems more like the gop campaign at the moment…..
Z still initiated the conflict. Given the murder was committed during a crime (Z’s assault) that would make it 1st degree under FLA law.
QUOTE “just because the aggressor is losing a fistfight he initiates” “It’s manslaughter.”
DITTO!
If the mystery witness is to be believed, just because the aggressor is losing a fistfight he initiates to someone he outweighs by 80 pounds does not warrant pulling a gun on the unarmed boy and blowing him away when the cops and help are on the way. Murky circumstances but not murky law.
Take the gun out of this scenario and we have a fistfight; add the gun and we have a national tragedy. It’s manslaughter.
“Now a new report suggests that there may have been a witness to the struggle and that witness reportedly told police that it was Martin who was on top of Zimmerman before the fatal shot was fired.”
Self defense is an affirmative defense. The defendant, in this case Zimmerman, has the burden of proof and persuasion. At trial.
Heretofore the police have rendered their verdict that the affirmative defense prevails, which is tantamount to an acquittal. They overstepped their authority.
And arrest and trial is appropriate, with Zimmerman given all his rights to a jury trial and an affirmative defense.
His witnesses will have to face cross exam and the police will too, especially about their manipulation of witnesses.
In my book, if a guy looks a bit like a violent wife-batterer, a lonely predatory pedophile, a mentally disturbed person, a hoodie-hater, or what some folks call an “angry white man NOS,” I’m scared of him when he approaches me for no good reason.
Check, check, check check, and check.
As for the second check, see Z’s pappa statement of Z’s “grooming” of black children. The others are obvious. Oh yeah, maybe he wasn’t married, but then there are other women to practice on in the meantime.
I have still not found Prof. Turley’s outrage at the brutal and senseless murder and attempted robbery of TWO British tourists, here in Sarasota, just last year…they ventured accidentally into the “wrong” neighborhood. Deal with that, comparatively speaking, would you please.
I would not want a prosecutor influences by any petition supporting those views.
Depends, you don’t make a controversy like this go away by just saying you not charging the guy. Like you point out there’s a lot of murky stuff here.
But one VERY clear part is that the 911 dispatcher TOLD HIM TO NOT DO ANYTHING until police had arrived.
Zimmerman decided to instigate this anyway. To then try to portray HIM as the ‘victim’ is ludicrous. Even if the kid was beating the crap out of him.
I don’t blame anyone with someone following them to believe that they could have been assaulted by someone following them. And Zimmerman had NO AUTHORITY to question ANYONE! (Or stalk them!) And was in fact was disobeying the police.
This is NOT standing your ground, this is LOOKING for trouble.
Mr. Turley, that wouldn’t have changed much in my opinion. After all, Martin had a right to respond with force, INCLUDING DEADLY FORCE, if he was frightened. Don’t YOU think he was frightened? I would have been. To me, Zimmerman looks like someone who was up to no good — maybe on drugs — and he definiately SAW Martin before he got out of the car and then he got OUT OF THE CAR so he was acting aggressively. In fact, I would say that Zimmerman should probably turn himself in to some police agency somewhere to protect himself because absolutely and without doubt, ANYBODY who sees him NOW has every right to feel terribly afraid of him (he still has his gun) and therefore, anybody might stand their ground and kill him in self defense, at least in any one of those states with the “stand your ground” law.
In my book, if a guy looks a bit like a violent wife-batterer, a lonely predatory pedophile, a mentally disturbed person, a hoodie-hater, or what some folks call an “angry white man NOS,” I’m scared of him when he approaches me for no good reason.
About Martin beating on Zimmerman, you know, I have to hand it to him if he did that. He wasn’t frozen with fear or slavish enough to say, for instance, “please don’t hurt me; I’m just going back to my father and I never did anything wrong and I’m sorry if I scared you.” He was a man that day; he defended himself; and for a minute there, if this is true, he had what would have been the upper hand in a fight that was not of his making. He was on top before Zimmerman shot him? More the cowardly of Zimmerman; he could have waited until the cops arrived and they would have arrested his nefarious abuser.
The way I see it, Zimmerman was a coward and a bully and if he stands trial and I’m proven wrong, then I’ll see it differently. But even then, the way I see it, Trayvon Martin was a man, and a hero, dealing with a dangerous situation in the most upright and admirable way he could possibly deal with it, and kudos kudos to him.