Which has what bearing on his case, exactly? The “risk” he claims he fired his gun in response to was quite reasonable, considering his injuries and witness accounts of Martin being atop him.
The cops did come, in this account: “and then it hit me, the police came and drove past me. And then is when it hit me that I gave them what I thought was my address instead of that address. So I called back and I said, you know, um, the correct address.”
This account indicates that when Zimmerman called to report a suspicious person, the police arrived shortly thereafter, and but for Zimmerman’s error in giving the address, the alleged thief would have been apprehended.
It doesn’t point to some need of Zimmerman’s to catch a criminal (and Martin wasn’t observed doing anything criminal) because the police are incompetent. It could shed light on why Zimmerman wanted the police to contact him on their arrival on the night of the Martin incident; in the NEN call he starts to give the dispatcher multi-part directions, realizes he doesn’t know the address where his truck is parked, then asks for them to call him. His bungling of directions before might have motivated this.
Apparently so, since Zimmerman mentions Martin’s behavior and that of the previous suspicious character, and does not mention race in either instance until he is prompted. And Zimmerman’s judgment seems to have been pretty good in the previous instance, if the previous guy was arrested.
If anything, this lends credence to Zimmerman’s account of waiting in his truck (as he did in the previous incident) and getting out in order to get the street sign or house number, so the police wouldn’t let this one get away because of his wrong directions.
Right, per the account, that person was arrested. I overlooked that bit.
So, a conclusion of “[Zimmerman waited for police] and that’s why the bad guy got a way!” makes little sense, as this person did not get away. Not the sort of thing that’d keep Zimmerman up at night, a la Spider-Man, haunted by the criminal whom he could have stopped but didn’t. And as already noted, the police did their jobs well in that case, giving no future motive for Zimmerman to take the law into his own hands and chase and tackle Martin. Which is unsupported by evidence anyway.
Why doesn’t it mean that Zimmerman’s prior experience allowed him to approach this current one with calm? After all, adrenaline is a result of the shockingly unfamiliar; repeated exposures to identical stimulus lessen adrenal reactions. Therefore, this automatically means that Zimmerman’s ability to assess risk was better than average.
Behavior that only looked suspicious because of his previous encounter with someone else. Which is why his mind supposedly flashbacked to 2 to 3 weeks prior.
It sounds like he has a pattern of not being prepared when he reports suspicious people, doesn’t it? Like, why was he the captain of the neighborhood watch if a little adrenaline was enough to wipe out his memory banks and cause him to send cops on wild goose chases? Do it once, okay, maybe that’s a mistake. But twice in less than a month by someone who patrols the neighborhood regularly? That sounds deliberate. To summon the cops so that they are close by, but not so close that they get there before he’s able to nab the quarry himself.
The guy he reported got away from him. We must ask ourselves how it is that Zimmerman missed the cops who drove right past him, if he stayed put in front of Taffe’s house like he said he did. The house was right beside the neighborhood entrance. It is implausible that he would’ve missed the cops, thus prompting him to call dispatch again to redirect. So what was he doing when he missed them? Probably rooting after the guy. He left his post to chase down the “suspect” who fled.
His emphasis on “waiting and waiting” gives this away.
It makes me think Taffe and Zimmerman were trying to entrap “suspects” by making Taffe’s house look like an easy target. Then an unsuspecting kid who matched the “bad guy” profile came along and this set off the alarm. Zimmerman, after possibly being summoned by someone, went into code red mode and pursued the kid, not because the kid had done anything wrong but because Zimmerman had it in his head that Taffe’s unsecured house + idle black youth + nightime = enemy action.
Remember we have yet to see Zimmerman’s phone data. The State has. I’d be interested in seeing if Taffe contacted Zimmerman before he decided to take his “trip” to Target.
Re walking in the rain: here’s a well known example of a middle-aged white guy (named Zimmerman, ironically) who was reported to and picked up by the police due to his walking the rain looking at houses.
Fortunately for him, he was very well mannered when in custody, and all ended well.
I would think the fact that the neighborhood association was succesfully sued by the Martin family would suggest that Zimmerman had some standing outside his own head.
<shrug> If Zimmerman had minded his own damned business, everyone would be alive, no houses would have been robbed, and there would have had their lip busted. MIND YOUR BUSINESS. Unless you see a crime in progress or someone being injured, do not interfere or interject yourself in that situation that you know nothing about.
You’re saying how you would be suspicious if someone was standing outside in the rain? There are a host of reasons that a person could be standing outside. Maybe they forgot their umbrella or didn’t know it was going to rain. Maybe they left their keys outside. Maybe their waiting for a family member to come and let them in. Maybe they are looking for an animal like a dog or a cat tat they want to herd inside the house. Maybe they had an argument with a family member and is outside in the rain to “cool off”. The reasons go on and on. I couldn’t imagine looking at a young man in the rain and coming to the conclusion “He looks suspicious tooo me!!111!1111oneone” because he didn’t have a damned umbrella.
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Why doesn’t it mean that Zimmerman’s prior experience allowed him to approach this current one with calm? After all, adrenaline is a result of the shockingly unfamiliar; repeated exposures to identical stimulus lessen adrenal reactions. Therefore, this automatically means that Zimmerman’s ability to assess risk was better than average.
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Possible but unlikely. He’s on a hodgepodge of medication including uppers, downers, and anti-psychotics. In fact, I suspect it’s the latter which is responsible for his robust, Chris Cristie-like weight gain. I hope he gets bigger.
This sounds like the association conceded that Zimmerman was acting in the capacity of the neighborhood watch when he killed the kid.
This actually hurts Zimmerman’s case. He wasn’t supposed to be armed while on patrol and he wasn’t supposed to follow anyone. That he did both things underscores how he knowingly acted recklessly.
Er, you don’t know that, at all. One suspicious person reminded Zimmerman of a different one exhibiting similar behavior who (evidently) turned out to be a thief. That doesn’t mean Martin’s behavior wasn’t, in fact, suspicious.
What pattern? The directions he gives in the NEN call are accurate when compared to a map of the neighborhood. He stumbles a bit over the dispatcher’s misunderstanding of what Zimmerman’s describing with going left and past the clubhouse, but so what? The dispatcher asks him for an address, and he’s unable to give one (“I don’t know, it’s a cut-through so I don’t know the address”). Then, he asks for them to call him. Again, though, he gave accurate directions.
Or, he had his back the street because he was watching the house the intruder was in.
Ah, so we know he wasn’t waiting because he says he was. Perfectly logical.
This says much more about your thought processes than it does about this case. I kept waiting for the part where Zimmerman was in the Legion of Doom.
But hey, why wait on that data before promulgating an inane theory about Zimmerman entraping suspects with a bait house?
Actually, Zimmerman appears to have prevented at least one house from being robbed.
You aren’t clear on how a neighborhood watch works, are you, in this neighborhood with its history of house robberies and shootings?
Indeed they do. And if someone asks you what those reasons might be, you are under no obligation to answer, nor do you have any right to attack. So while there might be a number of reasons why Martin was loitering in the rain in a neighborhood where he was a relative stranger, there are no good reasons why he should attack Zimmerman, break his nose, blacken his eyes, and smash his head into the ground.
Could I get a cite for the anti-psychotic medications that Zimmerman was on? Thanks in advance.
You know that, and I know that. I was wondering if Honesty would come back with something amusing about how minorities can spot untrue statements better than white people.
You appear to be unfamiliar with the word suspicious. Suspicious behavior does not mean that there is definitive proof that that someone is engaged in nefarious activities. And what is suspicious behavior depends on context, and let’s be honest, it is subjective. Someone walking in the rain to get from point A to point B? Doesn’t arouse any suspicion to me in the least. An individual skulking around someone’s yard after dark in the rain? Suspicious. Someone walking down the street looking around while they do so? Not suspicious to me. Someone walking down the street and slowing down to look inside every automobile or under every car port? Suspicious.
I love your mantra of “Mind your business.” It reminds me of “Snitches get stitches.”
I find it “suspicious” that any reasonable person thinks the best way to jimmy open a window is while carrying skittles, a cell phone, and WATERMELON-FLAVORED NONFRUIT ARIZONA BRAND BEVERAGE DRINK in your hands, but then again, I’m not caught in the loop of “I believe everything George Zimmerman said because I believe in the evidence which is George Zimmerman’s statement” so maybe I’m not on the same wavelength as some people.
What on Earth are you talking about? Who said Martin was jimmying open windows?
Do you and Honesty not know what “suspicious” means? Hint: it isn’t “in the act of committing a crime”.
No, your loop seems to be “I don’t like the kind of person I think George Zimmerman is, so he’s a murderer”.
If you think the only evidence in this case is Zimmerman’s statement, you should probably step away and do a little reading before commenting further.
This is what they are reduced to, just “Zimmerman should have minded his own business!” and “Zimmerman’s an asshole!”. They can’t discuss the evidence, or the elements the state must prove, because none of it supports their position.
I’ll say this for you with the face: while I largely disagree with her interpretation of the evidence, at least she presents and argues evidence much of the time.
You should find it suspicious because nobody said that. I find it disturbing that someone would make up a scenario like that for the purposes of argument.
Why is it reasonable on Zimmerman’s part to think that Martin’s intent was burglary, if that is not the argument?
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What is unreasonable is the idea that Zimmerman believed Martin was going to jimmy windows with Skittles and his fruit drink in his hands. Zimmerman did not make such a statement, and there is no evidence that he (or anyone else) believed it.