Zimmerman Trial for Trayvon Martin

[Borgholio]

Your statement embodies the reason why he was found not guilty. So many maybes and what ifs, but no actual proof. The jurors recognized this. They knew that "maybe" it could have gone either way, but "what if" Zimmerman lied isn't the same as being able to prove it. Nothing the prosecution said could be proven. Thus, not guilty.

[Ziggy Stardust]

I think the injuries are a bit of a non sequitir, because IIRC wasn't the defense's main argument that during the struggle Martin was trying to grab Zimmerman's gun, and thus he had reasonable cause to fear for his life? If that is the argument, I don't see how the apparent lack of serious injury sustained during the fight would, in and of itself, be damning.

(For the record, I DO think Zimmerman is guilty, but I realize that this is just my opinion, and that the facts as we know them show plenty of reasonable doubt, and I support the not guilty verdict as a result)

EDIT: Furthermore, I think Kamikaze Sith mentioned this earlier in the thread, but simply being on the ground with an opponent above you, even before punches are being thrown, would be considered by most law enforcement to be a situation in which you can reasonably fear for your life. So again, the apparent lack of serious injury is not damning.

[TheFeniX]

The severity of the injuries isn't always used to determine if deadly force is warranted or not. You don't have to allow yourself to be beaten half to death to finally resort to deadly force. Fights happen fast. You can't accurately judge how things are going, nor can you count on your attacker to not land one good punch or to tire out before you do:

Now, let’s say the suspect throws a roundhouse punch and tries to hit you in the face. Is this deadly force? I understand that some officer/subject factors come into play, but can’t a smaller person knockout or incapacitate a bigger person if they hit the person in the jaw? Even if the suspect does not knock you out or down, do you think he will stop attacking after one punch? One punch may not rise to the level of deadly force, but a barrage of punches at the head may rise to deadly force.

We have to realize that it is not very common for an officer to be attacked by a suspect intent on hurting or killing them. It is more likely the suspect is trying to escape, but we should not be any less prepared to defend ourselves.

In trying to understand how officers think, I have asked classes “When does a fight (without a weapon) become deadly force?” Most of the time, the answer involves the officer losing, being exhausted, or having no other option. Although this would justify the use of deadly force, it may be too late. By the time we are losing or exhausted it may be too late. We need to understand that when a suspect attacks, we need to be fighting not controlling. Most of what is taught in defensive tactics is control techniques or counter techniques to the suspect’s resistance. A suspect that is trying to hurt us is not resisting, he is attacking. Few systems deal effectively with this type of suspect.

[Andras]

In the old thread some people posted that the self-defense claim was an affirmative action that needed to be proven by the defendant. In 48 1/2 of the 50 states, a self defense claim has to be disproven beyond a reasonable doubt by the prosecution.

Only in Ohio and some of the lower apellate state courts in Louisiana must a defendant prove their self defense claim.
http://www.volokh.com/2013/07/14/burden ... f-defense/
This wasn’t always the rule. The English common law rule at the time of the Framing was that the defense must prove self-defense by a preponderance of the evidence, and Ohio still follows that rule; the Supreme Court has held (Martin v. Ohio (1987)) that placing this burden on the accused is constitutional. But to my knowledge, only Ohio still takes the view — all the other states do not. [See UPDATE below for one other state, Louisiana, in which some courts in some situations also take this view.]
...
UPDATE (July 30, 2013): It turns out that there’s one other state in which some courts follow the Ohio rule in some situations — Louisiana. The Louisiana Supreme Court made clear that it follows the majority rule in homicide cases, and some lower appellate courts do the same in non-homicide cases, but other appellate courts follow the Ohio rule in non-homicide cases, and the Louisiana Supreme Court has yet to resolve the conflict. See State v. Glover, 106 So. 3d 129, 137-38 (La. Ct. App. 2012) for more details.

[TheFeniX]

That switch has been happening over the past decade, at least in Texas, and even longer in other states. During my first CHL class, the prevailing wisdom was that if you ended up killing someone (or shooting them at all) in self-defense, you were going to jail and you were going to trial. Even if you managed to prove self-defense, the financial burden on you was likely going to break you and your family. On top of defending yourself in criminal court: someone was going to sue you in a wrongful death suit as well. Now it's up to the state to prove you were acting irresponsibly or with murderous intent and, at least in Texas, being found innocent in criminal court precludes you from being sued in civil court.

I can't say I disagree with this shift in the burden of innocence and guilt. If they have reason or evidence to suspect your self-defense claim is a lie, that's one thing. But prosecuting as a matter of course and leaving the defendant at the whim of the civil court system is stupid.

Unsubstantiated conspiracy theory time: I've always wondered if cases like this, where the prosecution does such a poor job picking holes in the defendants story is a combination of being forced to prosecute them "back in the day" for due process and being terrible at it presently because they've become so reliant on the defense to put up most of the evidence.

[Andras]

As far back as 1987, the USSC noted that in only 2 states did the defendant have to prove self defense.
http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/480/228/

Furthermore, the mere fact that all but two States have abandoned the common law rule that affirmative defenses, including self-defense, must be proved by the defendant does not render that rule unconstitutional.

[TheFeniX]

Fair enough. I left out that the distinction lies in that charges are no longer filed as a matter of course. There has to be actual evidence of wrong-doing before authorities can press charges. In the case of Zimmerman, the original decision to release him without charges was the correct one considering the law and lack of evidence disproving his story.

The vagueness of Duty to Retreat didn't help much as well. It was generally used as a "you should move X feet away, but we won't tell you what X is because even we don't know."

It's a similar situation to the traveling law before Texas pushed the burden of proof onto the state and defined it better. You would hear cases of a person being arrested and convicted of illegal weapon possession while crossing multiple counties because they make the trip once a week (or whatever), thus weren't traveling, but were performing "a routine." However, a "trip" to a new place, even in the same county would count as traveling. Basically, it gave authorities way too much latitude in if and when they could press charges.

Most district attorneys and police agencies around the state have construed the definition of traveling narrowly.

According to a study by Scott Henson, with the Texas Criminal Justice Coalition, 13 county or district attorneys—including those in Houston and Fort Worth—instructed officers to quiz motorists found in possession of weapons about their travel plans or simply arrest them, seize the weapon and let the prosecutors sort it out. The questioning could get ridiculous: Visiting Grandma in another county was OK; getting groceries was not OK.

Shit like that shouldn't fly (and it doesn't anymore). Suspecting the person of wrong-doing (such as being suspected of another crime) is one thing, but arresting people as a matter of course and passing the buck to the next guy is doing a shit job, especially considering the time and money lost for the private citizen. But authorities just pass their costs off on the taxpayer, so they really don't care.

[Simon_Jester]

The catch is that this can turn into "Bob is being let off for shooting Joe because we haven't got enough evidence to prove that killing Joe was wrong."

The concern I see coming from minorities (among others) is that this can turn into a two-tiered justice system for murder cases.

If the 'wrong' kind of person gets killed, the default assumption is that it's okay, you cannot prove that a crime was committed, you can't prove it wasn't self-defense, so Bob gets away with killings as long as he can kill people in the middle of the night with no witnesses, and avoid making the scene of the killing an obvious crime scene (i.e. not commit a home invasion or shoot someone at point blank range).

If the 'right' kind of person gets killed, people freak out, the act is investigated, any evidence of a crime is pulled up and used to justify a trial. Prosecutors have more of an incentive to win the high-profile case, are less likely to blatantly botch the case, et cetera. The odds of a conviction for murder are thus much higher, even if the evidence is identical. It's a matter of common sense: no one gets convicted for a murder if the state doesn't feel the need to prosecute, and all too often, the nature of the victim affects how much the state feels that need.

The complaint many have about the Martin case is that if Trayvon Martin were white, and/or Zimmerman were black, then Florida would have treated this like the 'right' kind of person had been killed. More competent prosecution would have done a lot to either prove Zimmerman guilty OR, at the very least, demonstrate by process of elimination that he could not be proven guilty, to the satisfaction of people who suspect Zimmerman. Instead of there being these lingering doubts and questions about how the trial would have gone if the prosecution hadn't been idiots.

[TheFeniX]

The catch is that this can turn into "Bob is being let off for shooting Joe because we haven't got enough evidence to prove that killing Joe was wrong."

That's the point though. If you don't have enough evidence to prove it was murder, then it wasn't murder. I get that there's the possibility of abuses, many of which, instead of vagueness screwing the defendant, it's screwing the prosecutors, but it's an issue with the laws not being well-enough defined.

The concern I see coming from minorities (among others) is that this can turn into a two-tiered justice system for murder cases.

A black man shot a white kid in equally suspicious circumstances and no one cared. I get that racism is still a pretty fucking huge issue, but Zimmerman is not white and I can't recall Florida having the most enlightened view on Hispanics. I've never understood all the race baiting this case has brought up.

No one in 2010 was talking about how now black guys were going to start murdering white guys with no repercussions.

[Terralthra]

Fair enough. I left out that the distinction lies in that charges are no longer filed as a matter of course. There has to be actual evidence of wrong-doing before authorities can press charges. In the case of Zimmerman, the original decision to release him without charges was the correct one considering the law and lack of evidence disproving his story.

The vagueness of Duty to Retreat didn't help much as well. It was generally used as a "you should move X feet away, but we won't tell you what X is because even we don't know."

Vague or not, at least it gives a fairly concrete verb. "Duty to retreat" may not be very clear about how far to retreat, or whatever, but it pretty obviously rules out pursuing, in order to confront.

[Grumman]

Vague or not, at least it gives a fairly concrete verb. "Duty to retreat" may not be very clear about how far to retreat, or whatever, but it pretty obviously rules out pursuing, in order to confront.

No, it does not. The duty to retreat does not exist until there is a credible threat of violence to retreat from. In Zimmerman's case, this threat did not exist until a few seconds before Martin assaulted him.

[Terralthra]

Vague or not, at least it gives a fairly concrete verb. "Duty to retreat" may not be very clear about how far to retreat, or whatever, but it pretty obviously rules out pursuing, in order to confront.

No, it does not. The duty to retreat does not exist until there is a credible threat of violence to retreat from. In Zimmerman's case, this threat did not exist until a few seconds before Martin assaulted him.

Please do not state facts not in evidence. He claims this did not exist until a few seconds before he claims Martin assaulted him.

[TheFeniX]

Fair enough. I left out that the distinction lies in that charges are no longer filed as a matter of course. There has to be actual evidence of wrong-doing before authorities can press charges. In the case of Zimmerman, the original decision to release him without charges was the correct one considering the law and lack of evidence disproving his story.

The vagueness of Duty to Retreat didn't help much as well. It was generally used as a "you should move X feet away, but we won't tell you what X is because even we don't know."

Vague or not, at least it gives a fairly concrete verb. "Duty to retreat" may not be very clear about how far to retreat, or whatever, but it pretty obviously rules out pursuing, in order to confront.

The problem is, based on the phone call to police, Zimmerman was merely interested in making sure to keep sight on Martin, rather than actually engage in a confrontation. He noted something else to this effect later on claiming he rolled up his window to avoid interacting with Martin at one point.

Either way, Zimmerman abandoned whatever initial encounter there was. Martin initiated the second one, so duty to retreat isn't applicable. But my original point was that, even when applicable, duty to retreat was used by prosecutors in whatever way they wanted, granting them too much leeway.

Anyways, after signing a petition against imprisoning an idiot for 10 years because he made a "terroristic threat," change.org has been spamming me. I found this e-mail while clearing out my personal account:

Last year, our son Trayvon Martin was stalked, chased down and killed by George Zimmerman, and Zimmerman received no punishment whatsoever. That's in large part because Florida is one of at least 21 states with some form of 'Stand Your Ground' law which enables people like George Zimmerman to claim self-defense.
'Stand Your Ground' was never meant to give aggressors the opportunity to get away with murder, but that is what happened when our son Trayvon was killed. After Trayvon's death, law enforcement used the law as an excuse to refuse to arrest George Zimmerman. Even worse, the jury in the case was instructed to think of what Zimmerman did as self-defense, even though Zimmerman ignored instructions from the police and instigated conflict with our son, who was just trying to get home to his father.
We are shocked and heartbroken by the jury’s decision to allow our son’s killer to go free. Despite our despair, we must honor Trayvon’s legacy by doing all that we can to protect other young people from being targeted, pursued, and senselessly murdered.
We started a petition on Change.org calling on 21 governors whose states have some form of 'Stand Your Ground' laws to review those laws and amend them so that people who instigate conflicts -- people like George Zimmerman -- won't be able to use these laws to get away with murder.
We are not the only ones calling for 'Stand Your Ground' laws to be reviewed. President Obama spoke out on the need for review, and prominent Republicans like Senator John McCain have joined him. This is not a Democrat or Republican issue, it’s not ‘black’ or ‘white’ issue, it’s a wrong and right issue.
This is a matter of making sure that no other family will ever have to go through what we have been through. No parents should ever have to know what it feels like to watch your child's killer walk free.
Our hearts broke on the night of February 26, 2012 when George Zimmerman killed our son -- and we were stunned and devastated when the police refused to arrest Zimmerman. We petitioned for Zimmerman's arrest on Change.org, and after more than 2 million people joined our call, Zimmerman was charged with our son's murder. We felt so much closer to justice for Trayvon, and so grateful for the support of those who signed our petition.
But on July 13, 2013, our hearts broke again when the jury set Zimmerman free. Our hearts broke because it is so hard to accept that we can't protect Trayvon anymore. But we can fight to make sure that this never happens again.
Please sign our petition calling for a thorough review of all 'Stand Your Ground' laws to prevent killers like George Zimmerman from going free.
We want to say thank you to all of you who have stood up for our son. Because of all your efforts, Trayvon’s life is celebrated all over the world. Please continue to stand with us as we fight to ensure that his legacy is to leave behind a safer and more peaceful world for all our sons and daughters.
Thank you,
Tracy Martin and Sybrina Fulton

Anyone concerned about their message can go here.