Below is a slightly expanded version of today’s column in USA Today on the Zimmerman verdict. As I wrote before the case was sent to the jury, I saw no alternative to acquittal even on manslaughter and expected the jury to render a full acquittal. I respect the conflicting views of many on this blog on the case and how it was charged and handled. We will now have to wait to see if the Justice Department will re-try Zimmerman as a civil rights matter. I have serious reservations about such an effort, but that can be for a later discussion. For now, a few observations on the verdict can serve to as a foundation for our own discussion.
SEPARATING LAW AND LEGEND IN THE ZIMMERMAN VERDICT
The acquittal of George Zimmerman in the death of Trayvon Martin was not minutes old when an outcry was heard over racial injustice and demands for yet another prosecution by the Obama Administration. There was even a call for President Barack Obama to address the nation from the Oval Office to promise action to quell projected violence. With the verdict, the George Zimmerman case entered the realm of legal mythology – a tale told by different groups in radically different ways for different meanings. Fax machines were activated with solicitations and soundbites previously programmed for this moment. The legal standards long ago seemed to be lost to the social symbolism of the case.
Criminal cases make for perfect and often dangerous vehicles for social expression. They allow long-standing social and racial issues to be personified in villains and victims. We simplify facts and characters – discarding those facts that do not fit our narrative. We pile meanings on the outcome that soon make the actual murder secondary to the message. George Zimmerman and Trayvon Martin became proxies in a long-standing our unresolved national debate over race.
Before the case is lost forever to the artistic license of social commentary, a few legal observations should be considered, even if unpopular, before condemning this jury.
First, many of us from the first day of the indictment criticized State Attorney Angela Corey for overcharging the case as second-degree murder. While Corey publicly proclaimed that she was above public pressure, her prosecution decisions suggested otherwise. Investigators incorporated the family in key interviews. For example, one key witness was first interviewed by an attorney for Martin’s family and then talked to prosecutors in the home of Martin’s mother. The prosecutors were accused of withholding evidence from the defense until shortly before trial — a delay that the defense said denied them the ability to use text messages that portrayed Martin in a more violent image.
However, the widespread protests and anger over the shooting seemed to have its greatest impact on Corey’s decision to charge the case as murder in the second degree. This was clearly a challenging case even for manslaughter and the decision to push second-degree murder (while satisfying to many in the public) was legally and tactically unwise. The facts simply did not support a claim beyond a reasonable doubt that George Zimmerman acted with intent and a “depraved mind, hatred, malice, evil intent or ill will.” Had Corey charged manslaughter, the case might have been closer but would have still been a challenge.
Many people were highly critical of the prosecution for putting on what seemed like a case for Zimmerman. The prosecution clearly made its share of mistakes like leading its case with the testimony of Trayvon Martin’s friend, Rachel Jeantel. Jeantel was a disastrous witness who had to admit to lying previously under oath and produced conflicted testimony. She also stated that just as Zimmerman was accused of calling Martin a derogatory name, Martin called Zimmerman a “cracker.”
The prosecution consistently overplayed its hand in a desperate attempt to overcome its own witnesses, such as handling the damaging testimony from the detective that Martin’s father clearly denied that it was his son calling for help (He later changed his mind after listening to the tape 20 times). Even after being criticized by many experts for overcharging the case, the prosecution proceeded to make a demand at the end of the trial that the jury be able to convict Zimmerman on a different crime: third degree murder based on child abuse. The judge wisely rejected that demand but allowed the jury to consider manslaughter as a lesser charge.
However, in the end it was the case and not the prosecution that was demonstrably weak. The fact is that we had no better an idea of what happened that night at the end of this trial than we had at the end of that fateful night. Jurors don’t make social judgments or guesses on verdicts. While many have criticized Zimmerman for following Martin, citizens are allowed to follow people in their neighborhood. That is not unlawful. It was also lawful for Zimmerman to be armed. The question comes down to who started the fight and whether Zimmerman was acting in self-defense.
Various witnesses said that Martin was on top of Zimmerman and said that they believed that Zimmerman was the man calling for help. Zimmerman had injuries. Not serious injuries but injuries to his head from the struggle. Does that mean that he was clearly the victim. No. It does create added doubt on the question of the use of lethal force.
There is also no evidence as to who threw the first punch or committed the first physical act in the struggle. A juror could not simply assume Zimmerman was the aggressor. Zimmerman was largely consistent in his accounts and his account was consistent with some witnesses. After 38 prosecution witnesses, there was nothing more than a call for the jury to assume the worst facts against Zimmerman without any objective piece of evidence. That is the opposite of the standard of a presumption of innocence in a criminal trial. There was evidence to support both accounts but that evidence remained in equipoise, leaving the jury with no objective basis to reject one over the other.
Even for manslaughter, the jury had to find that George Zimmerman intentionally committed an act or acts that caused the death of Trayvon Martin. but was told that “a killing that is excusable or was committed by the use of justifiable deadly force is lawful.” The jury instruction on deadly force states in part: “A person is justified in using deadly force if he reasonably believes that such force is necessary to prevent imminent death or great bodily harm to himself.” That lesser charge still brings the jury back to the question of who started the fight and how the fight unfolded. The prosecutors never had evidence to answer that question in a reasonably definitive way. In the end, the jury had no serious alternative to acquittal. That does not mean that they liked Zimmerman or his actions. It does not even mean that they believed Zimmerman. It means that they could not convict a man based on a presumption of guilt.
Of course, little of this matters in the wake of a high-profile case. The case and its characters long ago took on the qualities of legend. A legend is defined as “a traditional story sometimes popularly regarded as historical but unauthenticated.” People will make what they will of the murder trial of George Zimmerman. However, this jury proved that the justice system remains a matter not of legend but law.
Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University and a member of USA TODAY’s board of contributors.
The Z trial is a travesty of justice. The State of Florida puts this Stand Your Ground Law on the books and then turns around and prosecutes this guy for doing so. Well, he stood his head on the ground, he was not “standing”. So, by law he could have shot the punk before getting knocked down on his back with his head being pounded into the curb. The City of Sanford needs to rehire the Chief that they fired. If you live in Florida, forget “gated community”. Move back north to Newark or where ever you fled. At least you might have some cops to protect the neighborhood– from the hoods.
The dogpac wants to know more about censorship of comments on this Blog. Turley? Respond.
HumpinDog here: Where is My post or comment? That last one was DogBiscuitGuy’s questions as to where His comment went on WordPress censorship.
DogBiscuitGuy here: Where is my Post? WordPress? Censors for political expression now on this blog?
The best person to speak on CNN last night was Zimmerman’s brother on the Piers Morgan segment. This guy is very articulate and he took the sanctimonious No Guns Piers down some notches.
It is bantered about that the Justice Department is being pressured to prosecute Zimmerman for some civil rights violation. If the Obama administration does this then I will vote RepubliCon in the next Presidential election unless the next Democrat denounces the prosecution.
I thought there would be an acquittal yesterday and was surprised that it took so long.
The Race Factor in this case was promoted by CNN and the other networks. They have the pro Trayvon the Skiddles victim and black like me side and then on another angle a fair trial side. There was not an NRA side or a protect your neighborhood from thugs side. The fair trial side was fairly good. That Sonny chic was a bit much. That guy that has never tried a jury case or a criminal case in his life named Jeffrey Toobin was a joke. Piers Morgan is a joke and needs to go back to Liverpool. Don Lemon was good last night.
My lesson from this is that Stand Your Ground laws have to be articulated in stronger fashion. Gated communities should be truly gated. The residents of that particular community should be truly grateful to Z. The medical examiner Bao needs to get a real job. The people of Sanford need to rehire their police chief. The CNN people need to show the world the news and not spend fourteen days showing a show trial. O’mara and West should have strenuously voiced objection to the show trial being televised and O’mara was a schmuck to put his client on Hannity. The judge did a fairly good job on the Instructions. The jury did justice despite the Show Time Trial pressures. The NAACP wont get a nickel out of me after they have called for a Justice Department prosecution. Trayvon’s parents ought to own up to the fact that they born and bred a punk.
@ Mac: Very realistic points that should also include fear, confusion and the fact that Zimmerman had no way of knowing the full extent of his dangers.
Also, it does not make sense that an armed man with intent to use his weapon would allow himself to be taken down in the first place.
@Robin H.
i am not sure that Zimmerman’s use of 911 was as frivolous as you want to make it out to be, or implications really exist in the descriptions he made to police since this was a gated community and these calls were precisely what he was supposed to do.
He called 911 so many times but no one was ever shot in all of those calls.
Professor Turley pointed out:
(emphasis added). Legal fiction is a healthy, ongoing enterprise in its own rite.
But the main legal myth going on is that the petite criminal jury, the grand jury, and the petite civil jury were all conceived of as a way of bringing Western Civilization’s best form of moral justice to the fore.
Not so at all.
Actually, it was designed to keep rogue government in its cage:
(Why Trial By Jury?). The main reason is public protection from the corrupting influences of power on those who govern the public:
(ibid). Some of the amendments apply only to the federal government, others apply to the states via the Fourteenth Amendment.
But the gist of it is that the purpose of the American jury system is to protect the public from tyranny in government.
The final decision is up to the jury.
That has been done in State v. Zimmerman.
But even if you think that ultimate justice was or was not forged from the trial, remember that the notion of a jury system has another main purpose — an ultimately important purpose for a free society.
Even when a jury make mistakes in a particular case that is in no way an argument to extinguish the jury system itself.
George Zimmerman: ‘It Was God’s Plan’
Distortions abound: a rational legal track is throwing pearls to swine and still brings out the worst in the mob rule / racially charged*** intuitive prejudices that want vengeance and venting more than truthful conviction or real truthful disclosure of transgressions all around.
***(racially charged despite the awkward fact that Zimmerman is not entirely white, and probably has experienced racism himself…).
Truly another version of public and media mania and one can not say that this is not in the same boat as the OJ trial when it comes to blind popular consensus and public manipulation…white or black it has been a travesty of social conduct more than a test of our legal system.
In the prison system the criminals all speak of injustice to themselves; and in the racial divide there has been more than too much of that banter from prejudiced people that could not have possibly known what truly went down. One has to wonder if they are being intellectually honest with themselves, or just opportunists looking to vent their own dispositions?
http://m.motherjones.com/politics/2012/06/nra-alec-stand-your-ground Years before Trayvon Martin was killed gun lobbyists conspired to give stand your ground shooters immunity everywhere.
Michael Beaton – “Stand Your Ground” was irrelevant in this case, and this statute was not even cited by the defense. Why do you refer to it in multiple posts? This was a straightforward self-defense case, in which SYG played no role. Seems to me, you have an axe to grind. Like it or not, we all have the right of self-defense (except against brutal cops, evidently.) Personally, I thought the 2nd degree murder charge was overreach on the part of the State, but that the lesser manslaughter charge might have resulted in a conviction. I am not sympathetic to wanna-be cops nor am I sympathetic to those who jump them from behind. Also, unlike many of those who post on this forum, I have no legal training, just a citizen’s interest in the law.
@RogerJ : Michael Beaton – “Stand Your Ground” was irrelevant in this case, and this statute was not even cited by the defense. Why do you refer to it in multiple posts? This was a straightforward self-defense case, in which SYG played no role. Seems to me, you have an axe to grind. …
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I refer to it as crucial to the case because a) it was the original justification for not even charging Z. in the first place. Thus it was this law that was the basis of the original handling of the case. b) If it wasn’t mentioned in the trial still it was the unspoken context for this case, and many other cases like it.
Others have done a detailed job of laying out the particulars of this point. It seems to me to be self evident that the law itself if flawed and creates a context where events like this can happened with impunity.
I have no axe to grind. I hate injustice. I hate the never ending and seemingly unendable racism in this country. In cases like this I am moved by the human consequences of this extraordinary racial bias and hatred.
I am also moved by the ongoing incremental dismantling of our so called justice system. This is just one more chapter in the story. This board details example of the violation of basic principles that often have no consequence for the perpetrators.
The end result of this is the “wanna be cops” you spoke of, and the militarization of the police, as others have pointed out. And the hopeless attempts of powerless citizens to actually expect, much less receive justice. And so much more.
Maybe I have this axe in the grinding in re this case:
That the overall split between the Points of View on this issue seem to be depending on how big the context of the case is seen. If you only start the case at the point of the “fight”, then J.Turley’s point about the only question being “who started the fight” is the relevant point. And if the “law” is so limited as to only start there then “The Law is an Ass”.
If you allow the larger context of the entire event, and the even larger context of the STG law in the even larger context of toxic racism, both systemic as well as G.Zimmerman’s in particular (as has been well documented even on this board), then it becomes apparent that a crime was committed and a boy died and the killer walks.
I hate that also. I hate it for the family, and the boy. And I hate it for the sake of the country.
http://gawker.com/the-zimmerman-jury-told-young-black-men-what-we-already-770650992 To stay alive and out of jail, brown and black kids learn to cope. They learn to say, “Sorry, sir,” for having sandwiches in the wrong parking lot. They learn, as LeVar Burton has, to remove their hats and sunglasses and put their hands up when police pull them over. They learn to tolerate the indignity of strange, drunken men approaching them and calling them and their loved ones a bunch of niggers. They learn that even if you’re willing to punch a harasser and face the consequences, there’s always a chance a police officer will come to arrest you, put you face down on the ground, and then shoot you execution style. Maybe the cop who shoots you will only get two years in jail, because it was all a big misunderstanding. You see, he meant to be shooting you in the back with his taser.
Trayvon Martin is dead—and so many young men like him are dead or in prison—because in America it was his responsibility to take it. It was his responsibility to let a stranger with a gun follow him at night in his own neighborhood and suspect him of wrongdoing. It was his responsibility to apologize for being a black kid who scared people. It was not George Zimmerman’s responsibility to let a boy get home to his family.
The only thing that’s clear to me today is that, in Florida and in other “stand your ground” states, it’s open season for bigots and racists, as long as they don’t leave any living witnesses.Historically, it’s been the killer’s state of mind that distinguishes between various degrees of murder and manslaughter. In this case, Trayvon Martin was presumed guilty by many in the right-wing echo chamber, because he conveniently wasn’t available to defend himself.
George Zimmerman will have to live with himself for the rest of his life. Maybe he will reach some epiphany. I doubt it. And there will be many more Trayvon Martins, in Florida and elsewhere.
“….during the post-trial press conference, Zimmerman’s defense attorney, Mark O’Mara, remarked that if his client were black, “he never would’ve been charged with a crime.”
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What a grossly stupid, grossly dismissive, grossly bizarre statement. To ‘suppose’ that the color of he shooters skin in this instance would change the public perception of transpired events does exacerbate and inflame the entire question of race and racial profiling in the overstepping of law enforcement. Why not just hand out guns with that moronic statement?
Mark O’Mara: If George Zimmerman Were Black ‘He Never Would’ve Been Charged With A Crime’
The Huffington Post
By Danielle Cadet
Posted: 07/14/2013
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/14/mark-omara-george-zimmerman-black_n_3593337.html
Excerpt:
In the hours after the George Zimmerman trial verdict was released, both the defense and prosecuting attorneys answered questions about the trial and their reactions to the jury’s decision.
The case consumed the country’s attention for more than a year, sparking heated racial debate. While some criticized Zimmerman for racially profiling 17-year-old Martin, others said the teen was, in fact, the aggressor.
Although counsel was advised to leave race out of the discussion during trial, during the post-trial press conference, Zimmerman’s defense attorney, Mark O’Mara, remarked that if his client were black, “he never would’ve been charged with a crime.”
Perhaps there was overcharging in this case but I am not sure about that. When an armed man who is told by the police not follow an unarmed man follows that unarmed man, on foot. There seems to be ill will and malicious intent. No one can read ZIMMERMANN’s mind but no one needs to, his intent can be inferred from his actions. I must respectfully disagree with the Professor on the outcome in this case. Many people said that he would be acquitted not because the law was on his side but because of the race of the victim. I would prefer not to think that that but it is hard not to do so. The prosecution seemed flat footed and confused. It did not appear to bring its A game. The defense was dismissive and at times offensive. In the end the lawyers looked bad and the law that allowed Zimmermann to kill an unarmed man he followed with a loaded gun looks bad.
We are all now at risk from the Zimmermans of this world who beleive they rule the night because they have a gun and they are so angry and “afraid”. Floridians stay in doors.
According to Zimmerman’s justification: If Zimmerman had a free hand to grab his gun why didn’t he use that free hand against Martin’s hands? Also Zimmerman could have shot a warning shot first to see if Martin would be scared by his gun? That would seem to fit someone trying to avoid a fatality.
If it were a white teenager being stalked and killed by an African-American it would be hard to imagine there would be the same result in Florida. Having said that, maybe educating the public to this reality would be the best deterrent to avoid similar bias in the future.
Zimmerman was not on his property and Martin did not trespass on his property so Stand Your Ground could apply to Martin but not Zimmerman. Martin also had a relative that resided in the gated community.
The prosecutor also over-charged and the jury selection was questionable which should be thoroughly scrutinized.
this trial worked out exactly as the Constitution provides. not a surprise to lawyers. sure zimmerman is a *ick, but they are on show for every ethnicity. bad behavior is not always punished.