[Nuke]

controversy != riot

[Mongoose]

There are demonstrations, sure, and the usual few people getting rowdy, but I haven't seen anything that would suggest full-fledged riots.

[MP-Ryan]

Spin, baby, SPIN!

I wondered if this topic would come up.  Here's the deal:

1.  Charges were absolutely appropriate.  To be able to use self-defense (or, as it's called in Florida, justifiable homicide) there must be a homicide.  That means that Zimmerman had to be accused of a homicide to present a defense of self-defense.  Now, I don't for a second think second-degree murder was the appropriate charge.  There's what the mob called it - murder - and what the evidence suggested - manslaughter at absolute worst.  Prosecutorial discretion should not extend to decline to charge when a homicide has occurred and when the circumstances surrounding a claim of self-defense are even slightly unclear, nevermind downright muddled like in this case.  That is why the original state prosecutor made the wrong call, and the special prosecutor made the right call.  It was in the interests of fundamental justice to put the evidence before a judge and/or jury to determine if Zimmerman's claim was reasonable.

2.  The pressure from the media, the constant stirring of racial tensions, the editing of the evidence, and the general witch hunt were all absolutely inappropriate.  More and more I'm starting to think that murder cases, particularly high-profile murder cases, should be subject to an automatic publication ban covering all the evidence and witnesses.  Zimmerman was convicted in the court of public opinion long before this went to trial.

3.  The verdict was the right call.  I don't for a second think Zimmerman is not morally culpable for Martin's death, but I do recognize that the United States is supposed to be a society governed by the rule of law, and the law says the prosecution must prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt to secure a conviction.  They didn't even come close to that.  There are too many unknowns and too many inferences that the prosecution team left with the jury.  Jurors are owed a fair bit of deference - they see all the evidence, engage in the trial, and are far better equipped to come to a fair legal decision than any observer.  That's why we use them.  The people saying the jury was wrong are missing the point.  Zimmerman may be guilty of criminal negligence causing death.  His actions might even meet some of the bar for manslaughter.  He wasn't charged with either - he was charged with second degree murder.  The Jury's question to the judge shows they also contemplated manslaughter as instructed by the judge and rejected it.  Obviously, there are too many unknowns to criminally sanction Zimmerman.  They returned a verdict of "not guilty" - that doesn't mean "innocent," it means that the state did not prove its case to remove Zimmerman's liberty.

4.  Much as I think Zimmerman is absolutely responsible for this event, chasing the man with a civil suit or a Justice case under the Civil Rights Act is wrong too - the man was acquitted.  Pursuing this further is an end-run around the principles of justice, legal though it may be (for those unaware, the US has a doctrine of dual sovereignty where the state and the federal government are both deemed to have a interest and therefore may both present charges resulting from the same incident without tripping on double jeopardy).

5.  The people saying Zimmerman has been exonerated and that the prosecution was an overstep have missed the point - Zimmerman is criminally not guilty, he is not found innocent.  Alternatively, the people claiming justice wasn't done are also missing the point - the justice system is supposed to be an impartial arbiter of the evidence, which is precisely what happened in this case.  You cannot pursue goals of liberty and equality and denounce a criminal case where those principles are actually applied at trial just because it is politically inconvenient for your narrative.  Then again, you can't support the Constitution and liberty and all the other platitudes that come from Zimmerman's defenders and not recognize this case is a troubling example of institutionalized racism and laws that favour the powerful over the powerless.

Is George Zimmerman to blame for the death of Trayvon Martin?  Absolutely.  Does he deserve to be punished for it by the state?  Not without additional evidence.  As it is, this man will have to live with this for the rest of his life and constantly look over his shoulder.  I wouldn't wish that on anyone.

[JCDNWarrior]

I could certainly try to write a few paragraphs around this case and everything that I find strange with how people appear to respond and the whole media circus surrounding the case, but I want to sum it up in what I feel is going on: Divide And Conquer. Cause some minor infighting, plaster the media full of the case and focus on race or class to get a rise out of people to keep them obsessing and busy with minor issues.

It's quite the distraction for many from events like the NSA/PRISM 'revelations' (Its not new information, actually, Echelon, leaked files, testimonies, etc. confirmed this a long time ago) continuing to come out as well as the events in and around Syria continuing to heat up towards a hot regional war that could spark world war and the plethora of other troubles and issues that need to be addressed, some more urgently than others.

At least it's all a treasure trove of behavioral information for psychologists or those in learning like myself.

[NGTM-1R]

5.  The people saying Zimmerman has been exonerated and that the prosecution was an overstep have missed the point

I'm not sure that's the argument being presented. Having watched the case, it seems the prosecution never had the ability to prove their case, and chose to prosecute anyways in the hopes the jury pool had been sufficiently tainted by the media.

That seems reckless, and disingenuous.

[MP-Ryan]

5.  The people saying Zimmerman has been exonerated and that the prosecution was an overstep have missed the point

I'm not sure that's the argument being presented. Having watched the case, it seems the prosecution never had the ability to prove their case, and chose to prosecute anyways in the hopes the jury pool had been sufficiently tainted by the media.

That seems reckless, and disingenuous.

Had they charged Zimmerman with the Florida equivalent of criminal negligence causing death or manslaughter from the start and focused on proving that, they actually had a reasonable shot at legitimate conviction.  The burden of mens rea is considerably less for those charges.

[Apollo]

How bad has these riots and such been anyway?

Important enough for CNN to not mention them on the front page of their website. (I've not seen any news outlet here mention actual riots.)

http://www.upi.com/blog/2013/07/15/Trayvon-Martin-protests-escalate-in-California/2541373889450/

http://www.bizpacreview.com/2013/07/14/kill-pigs-riot-erupts-in-oakland-in-response-to-zimmerman-verdict-79653

http://now.msn.com/george-zimmerman-verdict-protested-in-oakland

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/07/14/trayvon-martin-george-zimmerman-rallies/2516555/

There were riots in Oakland. Small-scale ones, but riots nonetheless.

As mentioned in these articles, most protests were fairly peaceful.

[Nakura]

The only good thing to come of this whole thing is how we now get to drink all of those delicious liberal tears.

For your entertainment: http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=forum&id=1002

[The E]

When this case was first reported on (or rather, once it got traction on newsfeeds I am reading), I was pretty much on the "Zimmerman needs to be convicted" side of the debate. It seemed to confirm all of the negative narratives that we europeans focus on when we discuss american domestic politics; We had a black kid being killed because of committing the crime of looking a bit shifty to someone who was on a neighbourhood watch power trip. It hit the right buttons, ya know, and confirmation bias did the rest.

But now that I've had some time to read some more informed commentary, I am very much with MP-Ryan on this issue. A trial needed to be conducted, because when a citizen kills another one, there needs to be an investigation, and there needs to be an official determination whether or not the act was justifiable under the applicable laws, or whether the person doing the killing overstepped and needs to be punished for it.

That this narrative had other sideshows playing out that impacted the reporting on it (All-white jury, a victim and a perpetrator who were both not exactly examples of exemplary behaviour) is unfortunate, and the media's tendency to distort the truth anyway in order to fit into a given narrative was particularly pronounced here.

There are, of course, discussions one can have on this topic. Such as the question why a white person is statistically more likely to be acquitted on a justifiable homicide defense, for example.

What I would like everyone in this thread to do though (and this is the part where I put on my moderator hat), is to try to keep it away from the tiresome "liberals vs conservativesREAL 'MURICANS" cockfight that at least some people want to get into. Yes, Nakura, that specifically (although not exclusively) means you.

[Luis Dias]

I overheard two of my co-workers talking about it on my lunch break.

Truly, this represents the American people!

So where is your data coming from? Your own coworkers?

lolno. You just wanted to get that out there though, didn't you? Pretty feisty, I see, always looking to start trouble. Are you George Zimmerman?

Wth Nakura that wasn't even directed to you. Or did you intend to reply to NG? Learn to use the quote function properly. And I agree with The_E on this. You are always jumping at the opportunity to finger point those daym libralss.

[karajorma]

The real irony is that if there are any smart people out there who want to shoot Zimmerman, they'll provoke him first and claim it was self defence.

That and the fact that due to deciding to act like a vigilante, he'll spend the rest of his life scared that someone will do the same to him.

[Flipside]

He wasn't guilty of the crimes he was accused of, but I don't think we'll ever find out what really happened. The real mistake here was phrasing of the law itself, though it doesn't change the fact that Martin got severely carried away.

What's more worrying is the level of Political spin being put on the whole matter; this was a tragic case that has got blown out of proportion to suit 2 different political agendas. The moment someone talks about 'liberal tears' or 'Republican racism' I sort of turn off to the entire topic anyway.

As MP says, the charges bought were probably more emotional in format than effective, nor was it racially motivated, though that doesn't mean racial stereotypes didn't play a role, but I even heard one comment that 'Republicans like Latinos now, because there's a Black man in charge', which is possibly one of the more stupid statements I've read on the matter.

The next productive step is to attack the wording of the law, not the person who abused/misinterpreted it, so that such a tragedy cannot repeat itself.

[Klaustrophobia]

except that won't prevent the incident, that will only change the outcome of the trial that follows.

[Luis Dias]

except that won't prevent the incident, that will only change the outcome of the trial that follows.

That's like saying that the law that forbids murders does not prevent murders, only what comes after.

[Flipside]

except that won't prevent the incident, that will only change the outcome of the trial that follows.

I didn't say it would, I just said it would prevent the tragedy that followed. It'll take a lot more than laws to stop these sort of things entirely.

One interesting thought experiment is to change races of the shooter/victim between Black, Latino, White etc, and ask yourself how various media would respond in those situations to the outcome, it quickly becomes apparent that this was a road to nowhere, no matter what happened, someone was going to be wronged, and that is why the law itself sits at the heart of the problem.

[Luis Dias]

Great statistical analysis of white and black killers / victims for the past decades:

http://wmbriggs.com/blog/?p=7168

[666maslo666]

The next productive step is to attack the wording of the law, not the person who abused/misinterpreted it, so that such a tragedy cannot repeat itself.

Whats wrong with the law as it is? I dont think there is anything that can be changed in law to prevent cases like this, not without risk of putting innocent people that really only defended themselves in prison.

[Flipside]

Because one person chose to pursue the other, this was not a random event, and it could be considered that the aggressive pursuit of the victim would have made him believe that he himself was in danger. That's the tragedy of this whole thing, the fact that both sides most likely genuinely believed they were acting in defense of their own lives.

As I said earlier, Martin most likely seriously over-reacted to the pursuit, but the law still needs to recognize that by pursuing someone in that manner, particularly after being told not to, Zimmerman was encouraging the situation that developed.

[TwentyPercentCooler]

The entire thing was a comedy of errors from the very beginning. Zimmerman shouldn't have been playing cop, Martin shouldn't have approached him (seriously, if someone's stalking you, don't ****ing confront them, it's a bad idea and won't end well), the media should NEVER be allowed to release the name of people involved in these kinds of situations until the court rules, and the DA shouldn't have caved to public pressure to throw a murder 2 charge at the wall.

Now we've got a dead teenager, a guy who was found innocent by the courts but is still guilty in the eyes of the public, and a bunch of bait for the "race war" morons on both sides, nevermind the fact that Zimmerman isn't white.

That being said, given the charges and the evidence, I think the jury came to the correct decision in that there wasn't enough evidence for murder 2 to stick. Manslaughter might have worked, but again, the DA was an idiot.

[666maslo666]

Because one person chose to pursue the other, this was not a random event, and it could be considered that the aggressive pursuit of the victim would have made him believe that he himself was in danger. That's the tragedy of this whole thing, the fact that both sides most likely genuinely believed they were acting in defense of their own lives.

As I said earlier, Martin most likely seriously over-reacted to the pursuit, but the law still needs to recognize that by pursuing someone in that manner, particularly after being told not to, Zimmerman was encouraging the situation that developed.

What exactly do you suggest, that if you follow someone you are liable to be convicted of manslaughter if he assaults you? I certainly cannot agree with that, nor with any double standards that would put people at legal disadvantage for merely following someone, a legal act in itself. Sure, if he did not follow him, then this all could have been avoided, but law cannot recognize such hypothetical speculations.