It’s possible that they can do both. Do you have any evidence that TM did not say anything after he was shot?
“Aggravated assault” means what, exactly? Why should I assume that the phrase I posted describes the crime of aggravated assault? What are the elements of aggravated assault?
See, this is the step you always miss. A crime has elements. What I described might possibly have been aggravated assault, but since I deliberately left out enough information to conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that it was aggravated assault, you cannot convict in our hypothetical without adding a fact to what I said.
Can you list the elements of aggravated assault? Can you show where each of them is met in the line of text I provided?
There are many people who think that TM “obviously” double-backed towards the “T”. Towards the area where he last saw GZ . TM would then be approaching GZ. Will the jury believe DeeDee’s statement?
Couldn’t TM just as easily continued away from the “T” if he didn’t want to go near his (his father’s girlfriend’s) house?
Florida v. Zimmerman: Uncovering the Malicious Prosecution of my Son George
Ebook just came out. Written by his father. Just bought it and will read this weekend. I’m curious to get the dads perspective of the prosecution. Especially since he was a full-time magistrate in Virginia.
http://www.amazon.com/Florida-Zimmerman-Uncovering-Prosecution-ebook/dp/B00DE19P3K/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1371248845&sr=1-1&keywords=Florida+v.+Zimmerman%3A+Uncovering+the+Malicious+Prosecution+of+my+Son
Quick request from me: when there is actually more information, can someone start a new thread, so I don’t have to keep coming back every time this thread seems unusually active and get disappointed by the fact that it’s just the same arguments again and again?
I mean, seriously, guys. Aceplace seems to be the first person to introduce anything new since this thread was spawned… And, yes, Aceplace, my request would be that you please start a new thread about whatever you learn in that book.
Hey Big, how about you start, in GQ perhaps! or maybe just here… the
Martin/Zimmerman Actual News and Information Only thread?
Good idea, except for the forum. It probably belongs in MPSIMS, perhaps counterintuitively, but I suspect the mods there would be stricter about hijacks.
Such a thread would be appropriate for MPSIMS, should someone wish to start it. If it were to be put in GQ, it would have to be a very strict thread with regards to editorializing and commenting on the news and developments, since it’s such a polarizing topic.
ETA: I forgot to consider the multiple-threads-on-the-same-subject angle. If such a thread is made, it’s better the more specific it is. That way there’s less overlap with this thread and thus less redundancy.
A case updates thread would be helpful. We’ll soon have daily news updates from the trial. It would be useful to post them in a separate thread and then discuss here in the imho thread.
So is anyone going to create it? Has it been created? Can we have a link when it is…?
Some folks continue to struggle with discerning the nuances of “disproving” self-defense vs. “proving beyond a reasonable doubt”, and continue to insist that proving the case for guilt, beyond a reasonable doubt, is not enough. Let’s structure an example to see if there really is a separate and distinct requirement for “disproving” self-defense, the absence of which would lead to automatic acquittal:
Joe Accused is fucking Victor Victim’s wife and decides to kill Victor. He makes a note of this in his personal journal. Victor Victim and Joe Accused know each other. Victor Victim invites Joe Accused over for drinks. Joe brings his gun and shoots Victor in the face. He tells police that Victor had held up a knife and threatened to kill him, stating: “I thought he was gonna kill me and so I killed him defending myself”.
The prosecution proves to the jury beyond any reasonable doubt that Joe intended to kill Victor (particularly convincing is Joe’s journal.) The prosecution never even acknowledges that Joe is claiming that Victor threatened him and he was defending himself. They simply lay out a devastating and wholly convincing case for Joe setting out to commit first degree murder of Victor and rely upon it as being more than enough, by itself, to make any alternative theories ridiculous to consider to begin with.
The defense puts on their case with whatever it is they feel will be persuasive regarding Joe’s claim.
The jury looks at the evidence of the prosecution, which they all find incredibly powerful, and none of them has the tiniest doubt in their minds that Joe absolutely intended to bring about the death of Victor and must be convicted of first degree murder.
Then they look at the evidence presented by Victor. They find the evidence weak, silly, ridiculous and not a single juror for one split second finds any of it in any way believable as supporting Joe’s assertion that he was forced to kill Victor to defend himself from death or great bodily harm. The fact that the prosecution didn’t specifically address any of it at all, much less “disprove” it, means nothing to them - it doesn’t need to be disproved since they find it does not begin to “prove” what it has been put forward to “prove” to begin with.
They convict on the first round of voting.
The prosecution has not “disproved” anything. Instead, they proved their case and relied on the inherent unbelievabilty of the self-defense claim to spare them having to make any effort at all to “disprove” it or any evidence offered regarding it, and it worked.
Now does anyone still think there is a genuine distinction between effectively proving the case for guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, and specifically disproving the claim of self-defense beyond a reasonable doubt? If so, can you explain what it is, how it operates, and what you believe would/should have happened in this case differently? If any of you still believe that the prosecution’s failure to directly respond to and “disprove” the claims of self-defense in this instance should have led to an acquittal, what that would look like?
Cuz I sez again:
"There really is no meaningful distinction between “Proving criminal guilt so awesomely and thoroughly that claims of self-defense crumble like cookies in milk.” and “Disproving self-defense beyond a reasonable doubt.”
And I say anew that “…the burden of proving guilt beyond a reasonable doubt never shifts from the State, and this standard ***broadly ***includes the requirement that the State prove that the defendant did not act in self-defense beyond a reasonable doubt.” means the same thing, just differently expressed, and y’all have wasted a lot of time and effort insisting that six of one is vastly different than half a dozen of the other.
To prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt, they must disprove self defence to that standard. Your hypothetical, in Florida, would not reach the jury, as the prosecution have not even attempted to prove the case. And if the judge erred in allowing the jury to decide, and they falsely convicted, it would be overturned at appeal.
Do you understand yet? In your example, under Florida law, the prosecution have not only not proved murder, but they don’t even have a case for it, just as much as if they attempted to convict someone of murder but neglected to prove - or even address - who the victim was.
The second is a natural result of the first.
But lets try it one more time.
Victor is a quadraplegic, killed by a shot to the face. The cops walk in and find joe holding the smoking gun pointed at dead Victor, the medical examiner confirms time of death was a minute earlier.
Joe claims self defense. His story is that Victor could shoot flame from his mouth like a dragon and was doing so, forcing Joe to kill him with a shot to the face.
The prosecution’s evidence proving beyond a reasonable doubt that Joe murdered Victor in the first degree is joe’s journal, expressing his desire and plan to do so, plus all the physical evidence and joe’s admission that he did indeed pull the trigger that sent the bullet into Victors face.
The prosecution declines to in any respect address Joes claim.
Jury looks at the evidence, including Joes. They laugh and convict.
Joe appeals on the grounds that the prosecution failed to disprove his claim that he was terrified and had to defend himself from Victor’s quadraplegic fire-breathing.
Does joe win his appeal?
Under Florida law, yes. The prosecution failed to address one element of the crime.
Of course, in reality, all the prosecution would have had to do was get the coroner who examined the body to say he could not have breathed fire, then the jury could choose who to believe. It’s not like it’s an undue burden on them.
Any link we create will disappear off the front page in a day or two. Once the trial starts we may have enough posts to keep it alive.
Finished the Zimmerman book (posted Amazon link earlier). It definitely needed an Editor. Zimmerman’s dad had over twenty years in the military and nine years as a Virginia magistrate. His writing style reflects that. 
No surprise that theres no new info on the incident. Thats for the trial. The book covers the shooting using reported facts and Georges recreation that he gave the cops. Then it goes into the news frenzy whipped up by the Martin family’s seasoned civil rights lawyers/activists. It details some long standing political connections between them, the Florida Attorney General, and the special prosecutor. Covers the frightening death threats, and public demonstrations and how they were orchestrated by the lawyers/activists.
One interesting bit of analysis is from George’s dad. He was a magistrate employed by the Virgina Supreme court. One of his main duties was Probable Cause hearings. He presided over 20,000 in a nine year period. He feels strong this was one of the worst Affidavits (from special prosecutor Corey) he’s seen. A feeling also stated last year by numerous legal experts around the country. Alan Dershowitz labeled it almost criminal misconduct by the special prosecutor.
To sum up, the book contends personal agendas and political motives played a big part in this prosecution. Civil unrest had to be placated.
The book is worth the $4. Skip through the drier parts and theres some good information. Biased of course in Georges favor but the author makes a lot of valid points. Especially about the personal agenda of the lawyers/activists. They make their reputation by stirring up trouble and creating news.
Oh? Please clarify your answer for us: Which “element of the crime” did the prosecution fail to “address” and can you show us where Florida law specifies the precise element to which you refer? (Hint: self-defense isn’t an element of the crime, it’s an affirmative defense that has elements of its own)
Before you go there: The language the opinion writer used to express an idea in the Browne case doesn’t, did not, and cannot change Florida law, by the way. The courts don’t make laws, the legislature does, and those laws are found in statutes. The courts interpret the correct application of the laws and if their rulings shine a light on some ambiguity, the legislature will make the changes to the statutes reflecting their intention more precisely. So agai…care to point to the law you are thinking of?
In the Brown case and all the cases it cites, the problem isn’t that the prosecution “failed to disprove” self-defense in spite of proving the elements of the crime beyond doubt, its that the prosecution failed to prove their case beyond a reasonable doubt in the first place:
Furthermore, the browne case is merely following other cases, the most salient of which is Bolin v. State, which originates the language you are so fond of in the process of discussing precisely these issues in much greater depth, making it absolutely crystal clear that your conviction about how the law works in this situation (failure to disprove＝ acquit) is, shall we say, completely wrong:
So are you still going to insist that our quadraplegic-murdering journal-keeper is off the hook because the prosecution completely ignored his self-defense claim and instead relied exclusively on doing the only thing required by law, which was prove guilt beyond doubt?
Take your time.
From my understanding of what I’ve read, yes, since the prosecution never addressed self-defense, the defendant couldn’t be found guilty. I think it would be a simple matter to prove though:
The police report would show no signs of fire at the scene of the crime.
The autopsy would find no signs of any organ that could produce fire.
The autopsy would find that there was no sign that any fire had passed over the enamel of the victim’s teeth.
The assailant had no signs of burns on their person.
The prosecution has now proven that he wasn’t in danger, and that no reasonable person would’ve been in fear of their life, and we get the guilty verdict.
With this claim, though, I might be inclined to grant a motion for a competency hearing 
Not in Florida. If the defense claims self-defense, and puts forward a scintilla of evidence in favor of self-defense, the prosecution has to disprove self-defense beyond a reasonable doubt. That’s been explained many times.
Look, Stoid, you are wrong. Repeating nonsense does not establish it as fact.
Do you remember how confident you were when you went into appeals court when you were suing your boyfriend? Do you remember how you thought you had an air-tight case? Do you remember how you were arguing it on the SDMB with the same huge swathes of cut-and-paste with bolding and underlining and colors?
Do you remember how the judges ruled against you on every single point that you tried to raise?
It’s the same thing here.
You are wrong, as a matter of law. Bricker, who is an actual attorney, has pointed this out. Just like all the actual attorneys pointed out that you were wrong in the various threads about your appeal.
It did no good then, and I don’t expect it to do any good now. But being obstinately wrong cuts no ice in a court of law.
Regards,
Shodan
Wanted to add clarification to my response. I went with the assumption that the judge was allowing the defense to claim self-defense since we were talking about the prosecution and jury trial.
The judge could look at their evidence and say, “No you can’t argue self-defense because of this” before it even gets in front of a jury, which is what I think would really happen.
…and their verdict is set aside by the trial judge as a matter of law.
Stoid: elements of the crime.
The jury has a set of instructions from the judge. They don’t simply vote “guilty” or “not guilty” without referring to these instructions. (I suppose they might, but that’s the kind of thing that causes verdicts to be tossed out as a matter of law.)
The record must affirmatively reflect evidence for each and every element that the prosecution must prove.
When the defense’s case put self-defense on the table, at that moment, the list of elements that the prosecution had to prove changed. It grew. Added to the existing elements of murder, the state now also had to disprove the presence of self-defense.
Because, according to your hypothetical, the prosecution “…never even acknowledges that Joe is claiming that Victor threatened him and he was defending himself…” I know there’s nothing in the record disproving self-defense from their case.
So where did the jury get the evidence that allowed them to reject self-defense?
Here’s (possibly) the mistake you make: you think because they don’t believe a thing the defense said, that’s enough to allow them to affirmatively believe the converse. That’s not the way it works. That thinking allocates the burden to the defense to PROVE self-defense. (Admittedly, that’s exactly how it works in many states – in “classic” self-defense, the burden is on the one claiming self-defense to prove it by preponderance of the evidence.) But not in Florida. In Florida, once the defense asserts “self-defense,” then the prosecution must add that to the list of things IT must prove: that self-defense didn’t happen.