I have no idea. Some of the things we know about his past that I’m aware of (apparent marijuana use, possession of stolen property and a “burglary tool”, vandalism, writing things like “HELL NAW FUK DA SKOOL, FUK DA LUNCH, ND MOST OF ALL FUK DA FACULTY”, etc) don’t exactly reflect well on his character, but they’re mostly crimes / mistakes of a fairly minor nature. Thug-like? Perhaps, but not, in and of themselves, what I would consider particularly “dangerous”. What does it matter if he was or was not dangerous prior to his encounter with Zimmerman? He was dangerous that night, and it got him killed.
I feel like you’re assuming facts not in evidence. How do we know that Trayvon’s primary motivation for the actions that led to his tragic death was active fear for his life?
That is, there was probably some key turning point where Trayvon could have acted in a way that did not lead to his death, vs the way things actually played out. (Putting aside the I-think-unlikely possibility that Zimmerman, in addition to being a jackass and a racist, was such a cold-hearted serial killer Terminator that he would have executed Trayvon absolutely no matter what with no possible escape.) At that key moment, what was Trayvon’s mindset? What was he thinking?
A lot of people in this thread want to believe that it was “this guy is literally about to kill me, he is absolutely an imminent threat, it is his life or mine, I will therefore resort to violence” or “oh shit, I thought I could get away from him, but he just keeps coming!!!” or something like that.
But far more likely, imho, just based on Occam’s Razor and on the fact that we have no reason to think that Trayvon was a saintly pacifistic teenage male; is that it was something like “wtf was that guy’s problem? He thinks he’s such a big man?” or “no, fuck YOU you racist fuck” or something along those lines.
(Note that this is a difficult type of post to write, because by saying that there are actions Trayvon could have taken that would have not resulted in his death, it sounds like I’m laying the blame for his death squarely on his own shoulders. That is certainly not my intent. As I’ve said, I hold Zimmerman overwhelmingly responsible for Trayvon’s death, and there were certainly plenty of ways that Zimmerman could (and should) have acted that would have prevented the tragedy. I’m discussing Trayvon’s actions and motivations because the thread of argument I disagree with concerns his actions.)
Florida’s laws have set up a rube goldberg machine where, if luck doesn’t go against you, you can chase someone down in the night and shoot them dead and get away with it because if there are no other witnesses alive then there is only your story that matters. That’s the real problem. We don’t know what really happened and that infuriates us because no one wants to trust the word of an obvious sleezeball like Zimmerman.
You think Zimmerman would have been acquitted even without the evidence that favored him (abrasions on Martin’s knuckles, wounds on his face and head, grass stains on his back and Martin’s knees, etc)? I don’t.
I believe a scuffle probably happened.
But that scuffle was pre-meditated and planned for by Zimmerman (i.e., he had the gun). In the event of a fight, he would use the gun. It was a bit like an ambush. That’s my opinion.
I think you’ve missed the point. Zimmerman only “got away with it” because of the evidence that Martin attacked him. Absent that, the jury would not have looked so favorably on Zimmerman’s account. One cannot realistically expect to be able to just “chase someone down in the night and shoot them dead and get away with it because if there are no other witnesses alive then there is only your story that matters.” You’d also need some strong corroborating evidence that you feared for your life. Zimmerman had that, courtesy of Martin.
I didn’t miss the point. The point is it all played out how Zimmerman had planned it. He was the instigator of the shooting, by having the gun, by not following police instructions, by being a vigilante. What is unknown is how much he racially baited Martin but you would be a fool to believe there was no racial element to the whole event. I understand you view it differently, and I can see that point of view. Legally you can carry a gun and ask questions and defend yourself. But I see it as Zimmerman being the instigator of a murder over nothing.
I am astounded at posters assuming things that are not in the evidence at all or are even contradicted by the evidence- Zimmerman ‘did not follow police instructions’, Martin was not by his father’s home, Martin somehow saw the concealed pistol but did not mention that fact over the phone.
I find it plausible that Martin was scoping out possible burglary targets, as he had been found with suspicious items in Miami. I also have not heard of other Black residents of the apartment complex say Zimmerman had been harassing or following them because of their race.
And insisting that another poster provide a motive for Martin attacking Zimmerman should realize there is no evidence or testimony that could answer that.
Zimmerman has shown since the tragedy that he is not particularly smart nor nice. This is not evidence of criminal actions in this case.
Opinions that Zimmerman committed murder or manslaughter are not based on the evidence.
Does who Zimmerman is have any bearing on how we feel about his actions that night? Because he sure seems like a detestable kind of guy.
My reaction to an armed person following me around on foot would likely be similar to someone exhibiting road rage towards me, which has happened a few times in my life: Get the hell away from them as quickly as possible using every evasion technique I can think of until I shook them. If that was impossible i would call the cops and inform them of the situation. The LAST thing I would do is stop, get out of my car, and see happens next. I might get shot, as that has been the documented end result of multiple road rage incidents.
You can’t complain about a lack of evidence and then bring up this crap. Not only is there no evidence that any of this was happening, but no one even tried to argue it. And we have the fucking phone call he was on, where he was talking, and we know that he was currently staying in the area.
Not even Zimmerman tried this excuse. What made Marten seem suspicious to him were 3 other black people who had been up to something bad previously, and possibly the fact he had his hoodie up. Nothing about any behaviors showing he was stalking anything. His claim was that he was suspicious because he hadn’t ever seen him in the area before.
For someone complaining about speculation, you sure seem to have no problem with it yourself.
That said, what I’m saying at least isn’t speculation. He clearly felt threatened because we could hear it in the phone call before he drops it. He clearly feels threatened by Zimmerman following him.
From there, we know the conflict escalated. We don’t know what precipitated Martin’s attempt to beat up Zimmerman, exactly. But we do know what started the entire confrontation: Zimmerman choosing to follow Martin.
And, I allege, following someone is threatening. Throw in that the guy carries a gun and has a hot temper (as shown by other encounters), and it become likely that Zimmerman escalated the encounter.
Because Trayvon Martin is dead, we can’t know if he was just standing his ground against Zimmerman. And we do know that Zimmerman should have never been following Martin in the first place.
So it is definitely bad gun news, not an example of a good guy with a gun.
Watch or read the trial footage, and the follow up questions to that.
He’d still have the benefit of the doubt if Martin was alive.
Let’s make something very clear here. The victim in this case is George Zimmerman, who was brutally assaulted and had to defend himself. What is happening when people try to deny his right to self defence, his right to the presumption of innocence, and so is victim blaming, nothing more.
That’s not a problem, it’s a necessary consequence of the presumption of innocence. Do you really not think victims of crime who are forced to defend themselves deserve that presumption?
It’s not a threat of imminent harm, so mot one you’re allowed to take violent action against. And, it’s worth noting here, that following someone is in almost all circumstances entirely legal. And I would allege, following an unknown person in a private place to find out what they’re up to is not only legal but moral.
And yet another piece of unsubstantiated character assassination.
Are you ever going to explain why you left out significant details from the phonecall in your original narrative of events?
Unless he was defending himself. Of course, if Martin had had a gun he could have just shot Zimmerman first and claimed he was standing his ground (which I’m sure Florida courts consider an entirely valid argument when the perpetrator is a young black male).
Right. So Martin’s motive for attacking Zimmerman doesn’t matter but Zimmerman’s motive for attacking Martin does. Got it.
Of course, if you don’t attack the aggressive and armed person who followed you home and then confronted you, you might still be dead.
My heart bleeds for him. As did Martin’s.
Zimmerman was “dangerous that night” too. And it got Martin killed.
Literally nobody thinks Martin was a “saintly pacifistic teenage male”. But your version ignores the phonecall evidence, in which he was described as scared and merely demands to know why Zimmerman is following him rather than engaging in the sort of puffery you describe. So Occam’s Razor - and the available evidence - supports the “oh shit, I thought I could get away from him, but he just keeps coming!!!” narratives more than the “wtf was that guy’s problem? He thinks he’s such a big man?” or “no, fuck YOU you racist fuck” ones.
Being a teenaged delinquent does not mean you also can’t be genuinely fearful for your life; indeed, it likely increases the probability.
Are you applying that to Martin as well?
We most certainly do not “have the fucking phone call he was on” and we can’t “hear” shit on it. We have Dee Dee’s barely-intelligible recounting of the phone call, with her own (not-unbiased) feelings, suppositions, and emotions layered on top.
I feel like you are assuming facts not in evidence - what evidence is there that Zimmerman was almost certainly racist?
There was. Martin could have stepped into his own living room, instead of going back and seeking out Zimmerman and attacking him.
If Martin was so scared, why did he go back and seek Zimmerman out?
There is no evidence of this.
This is a false statement. We have considerable evidence apart from Zimmerman’s word.
There is no evidence that Martin knew Zimmerman was armed, and there is circumstantial evidence that he did not.
If I were being followed, and I was right by a place of safety, and had lost sight of the person following me, I would step into my own living room. I see no reason why that should be any different if I were black, 17 years old, or did not have a job.
Someone is being followed. They are close to a place of safety. They have lost contact with their follower. If I am an old white guy, I step into my own living room; if I am a 17 year old black kid, I go back and start a fight. This makes sense to you?
Regards,
Shodan
I’m the one that provided the link to the transcript so people could read the whole testimony if they wanted. I quoted the bits that were relevant to the point I was making. I’m certainly not going to quote the whole thing, so yes, that necessitates leaving most of it out. This shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone, and I don’t understand why you’re having such a hard time grasping the concept.
If he had shot Zimmerman, or succeeded in bashing his head into the concrete until Zimmerman was dead / maimed, he would have had to explain why he felt he was threatened with an imminent use of unlawful force. What would he have said? “He followed me, and asked me what I was doing”? “He had a gun”? Neither of those is indicative of an imminent use of unlawful force.
As I said, if there was some evidence that Martin’s attack on Zimmerman was in response to an imminent use of unlawful force, that would be something, but there is not such evidence.
I suppose in the wide world of possibilities, it’s possible that Zimmerman intended to murder Martin regardless of what he did. That seems extremely unlikely to me, but we don’t yet have the technology to explore alternate timelines where Martin did not provide Zimmerman a convenient justification for his use of force. I guess we’ll never know for certain, but I trust that most people who think it over will conclude, as I have, that if Zimmerman intended to murder Martin even if he were running away / surrendering, he probably wouldn’t start that project by requesting the police be sent to his location. YMMV.
BTW, what are you talking about “unsubstantiated”? Here is a Miami Herald article titled “Weed, fights and guns: Trayvon Martin’s text messages released”. It starts with this: