Zimmerman verdict, part 2: The “unarmed teen”

[gejoslin]

Massad Ayoob« Link Removed


Link Removed

Tuesday, July 16th, 2013 It seems that the verdict of a sworn jury in our criminal justice system means little to the haters, who are still screaming that George Zimmerman killed “an unarmed seventeen-year-old.” Given that seventeen is old enough to enlist in the Marine Corps and to be tried as an adult – the Gainesville Sun recently headlined that a “sixteen-year-old man” was to be charged with murder in the selfsame Florida criminal justice system – the age issue doesn’t hold a lot of water when seen through a clear glass.
“Unarmed?” Actually, NO. The history of adjudicating deadly force actions shows that Trayvon Martin was “armed” two or three times over.
First, the haters (like the prosecution) assiduously ignored George Zimmerman’s statement that while Martin was “ground-and-pounding” him, Martin saw Zimmerman’s gun in its now exposed holster, told Zimmerman that he was going to die tonight, and reached for his victim’s pistol.
If I’m your criminal attacker, you don’t have to wait for me to shoot you before you can shoot me to defend your life, and you don’t even need to wait until the gun is in my hand. If I announce my intent to murder you and reach for a gun, I’m bought and paid for right there. And it doesn't matter whether the gun I’m reaching for is in my holster, or yours.That’s why every year in America, when thugs try to grab a policeman’s gun and are shot, the shootings are ruled justifiable.
Page Link Removed

 

[BluesStringer]

It's an interesting point, but I personally think the defense made a brilliant move by not focusing on the "he saw my gun" meme. For one thing, the PERsecution did a fair job of making it a question how TM could have seen it given the darkness and the position GZ claimed they were in. If the defense had allowed themselves to get off in the weeds over that (mostly) irrelevant issue, the only way to argue it more vociferously than George himself stated his perception about it in the reenactment and interview videos would have been to put him on the stand. By not mentioning it, or only mentioning it in the same context as the PERsecution had with their own witnesses, they avoided opening the door to further, more in-depth discussion of the meme, and thus avoided having to call GZ to the stand to explain away whatever questions the PERsecution had planted in the juror's minds. It boiled down to a 50/50 question of whether or not it even could've happened the way Zimmerman thought it did, and the evidence of having his head beat against the concrete was incontrovertible due to visible injuries. They just didn't need that question to be answered in order to maintain the mountain of reasonable doubt that the PERsecution themselves introduced.

Blues

 

[Warrior1256]

People keep saying that they want justice for Trayvon Martin. Well, there WAS justice for Trayvon Martin. The jury, picked by the defense AND the prosecusion, made up entirely of women (probably more than one a mother), found Zimmerman not guilty. Simply because that Martin's supporters did not get the verdict that they wanted does not mean that justice was not done.