Or Zimmerman asks Martin not very politely what are you doing here and tries to restrain him. (These assholes always get away) Then Martin defends himself and gets the upper hand. That’s when Zimmerman decides if I can pull out my piece it’s over for this dude.
Not after someone pulls a gun on you but 4 out of 5 ain’t bad. The bolded ain’t human nature at all.
Martin is being followed by a strange man. If Martin was a girl and maced the shit out of Zimmerman, no one would have a problem. But Martin, the boy, somehow brought about his own death.
Remember the 13 yr old witness said they were separated at one point which makes it easier to pull a gun than if you’re still scuffling.
No shit, it occurs to me that in Florida as long as no witnesses are present you could walk up to a random person on the street and tell them their child is a real slut who just loves taking it in the ass, wait for them to punch you and then shoot them. Hell sounds like you could have a hitman for hire business, funny how this one guy keeps getting attacked huh?
That may have happened, but the problem is there’s no evidence that Zimmerman did this, and there is evidence, albeit fairly weak, that Martin attacked Zimmerman.
True, perhaps he attempted to grab the gun, which could be considered as continuing the fight - remember if Martin was the aggressor he has no claim to self-defense.
If Martin were a girl who maced the shit out of someone who did nothing more than speak to her, then yes, it would be a problem, it would be an unwarranted attack. It comes down to, as I believe has already been mentioned in this thread, whether it is reasonable for Martin to feel threatened.
If he was the aggressor, it is fair to say he brought about his own death. Not that he deserved it, but that it was an unfortunate consequence of his actions.
If Martin were coming towards Zimmerman when they were separated, after having already attacked him, he may well have been in reasonable fear of serious injury, and hence entitled to use deadly force to defend himself.
I’m not saying any of these things are what happened, but that they one of several possible interpretations of the relatively scant evidence we have, namely Zimmerman’s statement that it was self defence, and witness statements and tapes that either support or do not contradict it. I’ve not seen any evidence released that says whether Martin was threatened or attacked by Zimmerman, or to say where he was shot - front or back, and from what distance, being the important things. I’m sure this evidence exists, but until it’s seen it’s hard to say that Zimmerman is guilty of anything.
Martin ran. Zimmerman followed. That’s aggressive enough for a macing. We do not know if Martin even knew about the gun. That’s from your hypothetical. We do not know who attacked whom first. And I submit that Zimmerman was the aggressor and Martin displayed reasonable fear by running. Martin has just as much right to stand his ground as anyone.
If you believe that to be the case, do you have an explanation why there hasn’t been an epidemic in Florida of people committing murder, and getting off based on a spurious claim of self-defense?
You appear to think it is quite simple to get away with spousal murder in Florida. These laws are not new - why has hardly anyone taken advantage of this easy loophole before this?
And were his injuries even severe enough to warrant medical attention? If not, this further goes against the claim that he was at risk of losing his life.
People can get nose bleeds for reasons other than trauma. If Zimmerman smoked or was prone to dry sinuses, he could easily get a nosebleed after doing all that running and heavy breathing.
If his nose wasn’t broken, why should we even believe that Martin had even touched his face? Just cos the shooter says so?
As far as I’m aware, he was not required to be at risk of losing his life to be allowed to shoot in self defence, but at risk of serious injury. A broken, bleeding nose is serious injury, and can pretty easily be inflicted by someone - even someone significantly smaller - punching, especially if it’s unexpected.
If I’m wrong about any of this - I’m not certain about the law - please correct me with a cite.
I hope you’re wrong about it. A bloody nose warrants a death sentence? That’s ridiculous.
I don’t know the particulars of the law, but that just can’t be. “Serious injury”, serious enough to shoot someone, has to be more serious than what a thousand 7th graders suffer in the schoolyard every recess.
Nothing I’ve read about the case indicate he had a broken nose. Just a bloody one. And sorry, but anything can set off a nosebleed. If Martin had accidentally elbowed Zimmerman in the face while trying to get out of his grip, he could have caused it. Doesn’t exactly warrant a bullet in the chest in return.
The cops so far have described Zimmerman’s iinjuries, but not Martin’s (other than the bullet wound). For all any of us know, the kid could be blemish-free. Or he could have been beaten up worse than Zimmerman. I don’t see why either extreme wouldnt count against Zimmerman. If the kid doesn’t have any injuries, it suggests Zimmerman used the gun as a first resort. If the kid was badly beaten, it indicates Zimmerman had the upper hand in the fight and didn’t need the gun.
You are correct, at least as far as Virginia law goes. I don’t know what the specifics of Florida law are, but in Virginia, striking someone hard enough to bruise them, leave a mark on the body, and draw blood is “serious bodily injury.” See, e.g. Nolan v. Com., 673 SE 2d 920, 922 (Va App 2009).
Which makes sense. Does anyone imagine that the victim of an assault be incapacitated before sufficient injury has occurred allowing him to defend himself?
Why is that more probable that “The decedent had no injuries, meaning he hit Zimmerman and Zimmerman was unable to injure him in return?”
Your desire for a particular outcome does not magically create probable cause.
I started out on this story content to wait for the production of additional evidence by the police, and happy to take no position until then. The more I read your increasingly desperate prose, the more I find myself hoping that we get an answer soon.
I’d hate to see this type of justification used in a schoolyard brawl gone wrong.
“But officer! The reason why I lobbed a brick at his head was because he punched me in the head. How was I supposed to know he wasn’t going to kill me? I feared for my life, son!”
In the heat of a fight, doesn’t the survival instinct often take over common sense? If someone punches me in the face, I’m surely not going to think, “I’ll just tap him back real gentle-like, just so that he’ll see how he feels to be hurt.”
I’ve never been in a real fight before, but I would think if someone punched me and I was all het up (and had already identified the puncher as asshole scum) I’d be thinking, “I’m going to really hurt this motherfucker and make him pay right now!! Where the fuck is my gun!?”
And of course when I’m asked why I shot the guy, I’ll say that the way the fight was unraveling, anything seemed possible, that from jump-street it had felt much more intense than a “normal” fight. I thought the kid had a gun since he was holding his waistband funny, so I figured I’d better shoot him before he had a chance to shoot me. Of course I feared for my life! I wouldn’t have shot him unless I thought he was gonna kill me!
If these were two friends who had gotten into a fight about a girl in an vacant lot with no witnesses present and no 911 tape to establish the shooter’s prior state of mind, I would understand the futility in bringing the charges. But we have witnesses. We have a 911 recording. The only thing lacking is a telepathic recording of Zimmerman’s thoughts during the fight so that we can see if he really feared for his life and wasn’t just raged-up. We don’t demand this type of evidence for other suspicious killings, but for some reason this is what is needed here.
No, actually we never demand telepathic recordings.
I wonder if you’re just confused about what we require for other shootings, though. Nothing I’ve read here seems out of the ordinary, so I can’t understand why you believe it’s being handled so unusually.
Um, Bricker? you didn’t say anything was more “probable”. She was just saying that because the police haven’t commented on Martin’s injuries, we are unable to make any conclusion about how much of a fight Martin put up. We know that Zimmerman had a bloody nose. We also know that Martin had a gaping gun shot wound. Neither one of these tells us who had the upper hand in the actual fight (the termination of the fight is another matter).
I swear, some of youse guys are just looking for any excuse to argue with her.
I notice how you have written Martin lashing out at Zimmerman before he produces the gun.
This assumes, once again, that a kid in unfamiliar territory, on a dark street, would physically attack a man who has been stalking him for several minutes and who is 100 lbs bigger than him. Is this possible? Yes. But very implausible. Who here can imagine doing such a thing? To believe he’d do such a brazen act, I’d need to see evidence that he’s acted like this before. I don’t assume this kid is an idiot. He would know his best defense would be to run, not fight.
More likely, Zimmerman pulled out his gun after Martin told him to fuck off, which caused the kid to flee, yelling his head off for help. Zimmerman catches up with him and they fight, and the kid knocks him in the face. Maybe they roll around a little in the grass. I dunno. Kid is yelling his head off the entire time because he knows he’s fighting with an armed man who has targeted him for specious reasons. Zimmerman, already a basket case of paranoia and adrenaline, shoots the kid because he still has it in his mind that the kid is evil and his bleeding nose only confirms it in his mind.
If he pulled out his gun in the absence of any physical affront by the kid, that would make him guilty of felonious assault. You can just pull guns out on people just because they don’t do what you say.
I’ve asked this before and have not received a good answer.
What is required to bring charges against Zimmerman? What would be the tipping point of fishiness to his story that would make you think that the state would be irresponsible if they did not arrest Zimmerman?
Because beyond telepathic evidence showing that the shooter was more angry than afraid, I don’t know what more could be used to disprove Zimmerman’s claim.