Everyone else wants to practice armchair law with this case.
My turn.
This was stupid from minute one.
Before I begin, I should note that my family has a saying. "Never attribute to malice what can be equally attributed to stupidity." And I think that was a case of stupid from the word go. Not from the filing of the prosecution. Not from the police investigation. But from the minute Mr. Zimmerman (GZ) closed with Martin. From there, it was a boatload of stupid.
1. Listening to the (unedited) 911 call, GZ at least gave a description of an unknown (to him) person in a gated community that has been the victim of break ins. When asked about race, he answered black. Okay, fine. His description of Trayvon was pretty standard and generic, an overall profile. He wasn't sure what ethnicity Trayvon was in the actual transcripts.
2. Trayvon Martin (TM) is approached by someone he considered a "crazy white cracker." He was confronted, and GZ apparently started to walk away.
3. We know that there was a fight. Witnesses and forensic evidence proves that TM was on top (GZ's back was wet, and TM's knees were, so GZ was flat on his back on the ground, with TM straddling him, bouncing his skull off of said ground).
3a. Who started the fight? Well, if GZ did, TM would have been dead without a fight. Gunshot to the head. Done. We know that the gun never came out during the initial confrontation. If TM did, as GZ said, attacked him from behind on the way back to the car. So that has a ring of truth. However, if that's the truth, then TM would have had to have been stupid to attack someone who he believed was crazy. However, I can actually believe that. Why? He's a teenage male, so I assume that aggressive and stupid is automatic. He was also on weed at the time, so who knows what was going through his brain. Trayvon was also a wannabe MMA fighter, with a history of violent outbursts. Bad things happen with that combination.
4. I'm going to exempt the police from blame here because they seemed to be rather thorough, and even sent the case to the DA's office to see whether or not they should prosecute.
5. The case was shaky from A-Z. Who prepped these witnesses? TM"s father was unemotional and unsure about who was screaming for help on the 911 call. The girlfriend had apparently signed a hand written affidavit that she couldn't read. The ME's office was contradictory and unclear about what results he drew. The ME’s office was never at the scene of the crime. The EMT’s, who WERE there, thought GZ should go to the hospital
5a. When the FBI investigation originally couldn't put together a case for civil rights violation against GZ (which is usually an easy thing to do. It is the DOJ; if you've ever made a racial joke ever, they will find out and use it against you). They couldn’t make the case.
So, while I think that GZ is an idiot, that is, sadly, not a crime. He didn’t know what he was getting into, and then he approached who he thought was a suspect, in the dead of night, and then turned his back on him. If TM had been armed, and the criminal GZ initially suspected, GZ would have been dead. Period. If disobeying a 911 officer’s suggestion was a crime, he should be in jail. It's not, so he's not. He had a damn gun (a long distance weapon), and he was told to not approach-- so why was GZ even within ROCK-THROWING distance of Martin? Why confront him at all? Why not just stay at a reasonable distance until the cops approached? If he were going to walk up to TM and kill him immediately, it would make sense to close, but he didn’t.
Like I said, stupid.
The prosecution didn't have a case beyond a reasonable doubt. Simple as that. No prosecution brings a case without having it rock solid, with nothing is uncertain. In this case, the evidence was inconclusive, at best, which is why it was initially rejected for prosecution. There is no sign that GZ is a racist, considering his friends, his volunteer time in community centers, and the fact that he is part Hispanic, Caucasian as well as black. Throw in political pressure, and you have what amounts to a show trial that was a crapshoot to start with.
