If the guy were a cop, you might have a point. The guy was a fucking Neighborhood Watch Captain, a title that carries about as much weight as Hall Monitor.
Okay. So let’s try this again then.
Would it be assault, battery, or any other crime to *physically fend off * a complete stranger who is chasing you on the street for reasons unbeknowst to you?
“Physically fend off” could mean anything hitting, pushing away, or any other contact intended to create more distance between you and your pursuer.
No I believe you are correct that is what the statute defines assault as. You don’t strike me as a poster who would post something without verifying the definition. I called it a Dukakis moment (you recall his dispassionate explanation about the death penalty) for a reason as I was discussing a personal definition, not a legal defintion. My guess (based on how I know my wife would define it) is that your wife would view it differently and she would say she was assaulted.
I think where much of the angst in this thread is coming from is on one side there is anger over this and you (and others like Martin Hyde, Shodan, etc.) are bringing a disappassionate legal view to the situation. So it comes across as if you are agreeing that Zimmerman isn’t guilty. My sense is your (the collective yours) view on this isn’t as dispassionate as it appears here as you are only discussing the legal definitions whereas your opponents are giving there opinion (suprise in a forum called humble opinion) without that dispassionate viewpoint.
Now given all that, if “I” were in the situation here, I would want a dispassionate legal mind to find me every avenue they could. I personally wouldn’t want to live in a society dictated by mob decisions or public opinion. So I appreciate (even though emotionally I don’t agree with it) your viewpoint as it helps me understand why he hasn’t been charged.
I do think he will eventually be charged though, but it will need to be done in a legal way or it won’t stick. There isn’t a reason to arrest someone to only have them get off which only inflames the situation. Either way my sense is Mr. Zimmerman is not going to have an enjoyable future, either he will be sent to prison and suffer some prison justice, or some other vigilante will provoke him at some future point and street justice will be served.
Sad situation all around though. Thanks for your thoughts.
But this is a 17 year old. Granted, I live in Minnesota, but all of the teens (even in summer) around my suburban house wear hoodies or t-shirts and these awful saggy, skinny jeans. I didn’t know skinny jeans could be saggy, but oh yes, they can.
As a teen, I used to hide behind my hair all the damn time. So, yeah, if some* random guy* (not a police officer) is staring at me and following me, yeah, I can put myself in his shoes and ‘hide’ behind a hoodie and try to walk faster to get away from the creep…
It depends on how close your pursuer gets to you.
If it helps, think of how basketball works. A player on the court establishes position; once he has done so, an opposing player that runs into him is charging, an offensive foul.
You are entitled to walk down the street. Someone else is entitled to approach you and say, “Hey, I have some questions for you!” You can run away; they can run after you yelling, “I just wanna ask you something!”
None of that is assault.
As long as the stranger doesn’t impede your progress, block you, restrain you, or threaten to harm you by word or by act, you are not entitled to shove, hit, or push him away.
Of course, it could be assault if he runs up to you yelling, “I’m gonna kick your ass!”
The keys are: does he threaten? Does he have the apparent ability to carry out his threat? And does he take some action which creates in you a well-founded fear that he’s going to immediately attack?
Martin Hyde is upset over how a bunch of “angry blacks” care so much about a slain “nobody” to the extent that, solely through their 1st amendment rights, they have put pressure on the State to do something other than dismiss the incident out of hand. Oh the humanity, right?
My wife is a lawyer, although not admitted to practice in this country.
I suspect you’re right… even though I have repeatedly said I thought his actions were quite unwise and I wanted to see all the evidence before I reached any conclusion.
What it appears here from some posts is that some dudes want a society where the Police decide guilt or innocence, not a Judge & Jury.
And where your guilt is not decided based upon the facts but upon the age and criminal record of the other guy. “Yes, sure, you claim he stabbed you 6 times with a knife and stole your wallet, and sure there’s a camera there that recorded that whole thing, not to mention a dozen witnesses. But you see, he’s only 17, and you’re 42, and he has no criminal record, but you were convicted of writing bad checks 10 years ago. So, we’re hauling you off to prison for ten years.”
Look, Zimmerman’s story is rather shaky. So let us allow the Grand Jury to make it’s decision, then a Judge and jury to make theirs. It’s not up to the Police to decide guilt.
I agree that I’m showing my age, but it doesn’t mean 10 of millions of people don’t feel the same way. By the way I got some strong feelings about guys that walk around with their pants hanging down so their underwear showing. Of course, I treat that as an announcement that they never want to get job pays more than minimum wage. And don’t get me started on visible tattoos.
RE: Assault
I weaned myself off of lawyer crack (WestLaw and Lexis) a few years ago. Has anyone taken the time to look up Florida case law to see whether the courts have weighed in to determine where the line is? (Apologies if it was done already, but I missed it in an eight-page thread.)
The statute’s been noted, but here it is again to save re-reading: “An assault is defined as “an intentional, unlawful threat by word or act to do violence to the person of another, coupled with an apparent ability to do so, and doing some act which creates a well-founded fear in such other person that such violence is imminent.” § 784.011, Fla. Stat. (1993).”
I got that from Viveros v. State on Findlaw (lawyer methodone). I found recent citations to it, but I’m not Sheperdize it–so it may have been subsequently replaced/updated/overturned.
Bricker’s contention seems to be that mere chasing does not convey a threat to do violence to another person. There are ancillary elements that need not be considered for the moment (e.g. the apparent ability to do so).
Have the courts weighed in on whether chasing someone can suggest a physical confrontation will follow? Have they weighed in on whether the chasee’s belief that a physical confrontation will follow is well-founded?
Bricker seems to be suggesting that it’s a settled question–that it’s neither an open question yet to be resolved by the courts or that they’ve already ruled on it.
Also, he seems to suggest that the determination of a “well-founded fear” is a question of law to be decided by the judge relatively independent of the facts, not a question of fact to be decided by the jury.
Again, I have neither re-slogged through the entire thread to see if this post is moot (sorry, if so), nor spent significant time looking up case law.
Yes.
And how is that relevant to the instant discussion?
The mere act of chasing does not, in any Florida case I can find, come close to meeting the standard for a threat or an act which could give rise to a well-founded fear.
Ahh, that’s where you’re going.
Here’s the problem: this kind of inquiry is highly fact-dependent. It’s plausible to imagine Zimmerman chasing Martin yelling, “Hey, you! Stop! I’ve called the police and they’re on their way. You need to stop and talk to them!”
And it’s plausible to imagine him chasing Martin and yelling, “I’m gonna get you, you cheap hoodlum! Come back here!”
I would agree that the latter is assault, criminal and tortious. I would argue that the former is neither.
Which brings me back to my point: we don’t have enough information to reach any conclusion.
You do know that in this case the 17-year-old was smaller than the person who shot him, right? And in any particular case, person A can be a bigger threat than person B, but in general, we consider some persons fitting category A to be a lesser threat than other persons of category B, right?
To make it legal in Florida, you would have to show that you are in legitimate fear for your own life. I don’t know how old or tall you are, but personally, even though I’m out of shape, I feel pretty confident that I would be able to protect my life successfully, without needing to shoot my opponent, against 99% of the unarmed 8-year-olds out there.
Ignore this post. Argh, I really shouldn’t post when hungry. It’s mostly gibberish. 
What I meant to say:
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But a ski mask at 40 is only applicable to a hoodie in this situation if it is something many normal teens are doing. It isn’t. Many normal teens, as others have said, wear hoodies in warm weather.
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The police story is only applicable if Zimmerman was in any way in his right to follow and accost this boy. He’s not a cop. As I said in my first post, if I were a teen and some adult started staring at me/following me/harassing me: I would be afraid. I can put myself in his shoes and think about hiding behind a hoodie and walking faster to try to get away from the creep.
shrug
To the contrary, I argue it’s a highly fact-dependent inquiry, and we don’t have enough facts to reach a conclusion.
The bare fact of someone running up to (or after) someone else, doesn’t appear in any case I can find.
But apparently the stranger is entitled to chase and hound you on your way home, and can even shoot you dead if you try to fend him off and he’s not within the requisite number of milimeters needed to objectively prove he’s acting in a threatening manner.
Thanks for the lesson on the law.
It kinda is.
Look, the police are the initial criminal investigators. Typically, the police DO get to decide innocence, in that if they don’t believe you’re guilty, the case against you won’t proceed further.
Of course, even if they believe you’re guilty, other steps have to be taken before you’re tossed in a 6x9 cell for the next ten years. But they are the initial gatekeepers for the criminal justice process.
You can also say that the “dispassionate legal view” advocates seem to be saying “in the absence of eyewitness testimony, any scenario can be construed and it is impossible to determine what actually happened.” Notice the repeated phrase “Well you don’t know what really happened, do you?”
I think it is perfectly possible to draw inferences from what we know, and decide what is the most probably sequence of events. (i.e. that teenager Trayvon Martin chasing down neighborhood watch captain Zimmerman and attacking him, while Zimmerman flees for his life, is much less likely than Zimmerman chasing Trayvon Martin in the street and detaining him.) The position that any explanation is equally likely seems ridiculous to me, and if our courts of law operated that way, a lot more criminals would be able to avoid prosecution or conviction.
If you want to argue “I think the scenario went down this way, here are my reasons”, I don’t see why that’s any worse than throwing your hands up in the air and say “it’s impossible to arrive at any conclusion.”
What does “hound” mean?
What does “fend off” mean?
You’re using vague words. The answer is that it depends. If I walk next to you and explain to you that the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand, but only for the first 144,000 of the Elect, am I hounding you? Most people would, I believe, say ‘yes’ to that characterization.
If you turn around and punch me in the nose, drawing blood, it’s you that is guilty of a battery, and I am innocent.
Why would the police or SA claim someone would be charged before they had made that determination? Further, I’ve never said the police MUST have evidence that made his claim of self-defense believable. Only that they have evidence that allows them to fully assess how likely they will be able to contest that claim in court.
Any individual who I either don’t know personally or who is not of societal importance is a nobody. Societal importance meaning they are a local political official, business leader, or on up (higher ranking politicians, civic leaders, famous artists etc.)
In the context of our criminal justice system though, we shouldn’t institute mob rule over the death of anyone, let alone a nobody (but even a somebody.)
Some 17 year-olds look like fully grown men. Trayvon Martin was 6’3" and 140 pounds. Either he was on his way to a very skinny adulthood or more likely he was still in that awkward growth-spurt phase. Look at the pictures, he was still a kid.
IIRC, Zimmerman was suspicious because he was walking slowly and wearing a hoodie * in the rain.* So I’m not seeing what is odd about the hoodie.