George Zimmerman’s Real Crime Against Trayvon Martin

Chloe, you give a dog a bad name for long enough and logical or not, eventually he's gonna answer to it.

Say hi to your new hound Casper the Race-iss.



Remains to be seen if his bite is worse than his bark.

I understand what you are saying, and there certainly is a legal line between vigilantism and what a good citizen can do. A few points that are irrelevant (1) 911 cannot give you orders not to pursue someone (2) merely having a weapon does not imply intent to use it. It will be very important, I think, if there is evidence about *when* Zimmerman drew his weapon. If there are indeed grass stains on the *back* of his shirt, that is very persuasive physical evidence there was a struggle. If that struggle ensued in the course of an assault, it would not be self-defence. The entire case will come down to whether there was an assault in progress or not -- one hardly needs to prove 'intent' if so. If not, 'intent to kill' (the standard for any charge higher than manslaughter) will have to be proved at some point.

I think you are a victim of outcome based reasoning: Because you know (or think you know) that Martin is entirely innocent and Zimmerman a nutcase, you know how the trial *ought* to turn out, and reason backwards to invent laws that aren't there, and apply them to his instance.

What a trial requires, however, is that a *general* person in Zimmerman's position would be bound to not get out of his car and pursue a Black youth. If your reasoning is to hold, than no would be neighbourhood watchman may ever get out of his car and pursue a profiled Black youth, no matter what evidence they might have. I think this was the initial crux of the media interest, and race was initially a qualification for the attention (if a Black neighbourhood watchman had gotten out of a car and shot a White kid, it would not do for anti-gun political purposes.)

Poor Blacks, of course, don't want *anyone* getting out of *any* cars with weapons, for any reason. Not even White police -- or Black ones. They want to be left alone, and calculated self interest says that when the President of the United States is willing to to throw punches, you run with it. So Obama has poured gasoline on this racial fire, prejudicing justice and race baiting. He should be impeached for that alone.

In any event, if you are going to argue that facts A, B and C should always have legal result L, then you really have to argue in all generality, and the elements you cite are nowhere near universal enough to warrant your conclusion.

The difference between legitimate pursuit and not will come to specific elements of law that haven't been mentioned in the course of this conversation.

I see cloeblossoms dodges direct argumentation. ;)

So, let's make it simple: chloe, should Zimmerman be charged with Murder One or Murder Two? Or something else? You disagree with Manslaughter and affect to know how justice should be served here.

If Murder One, you have to prove intent -- when did he form the intent?

If Murder Two, you need to show an assault by Zimmerman was in progress -- what was the assault? And you have to show intent as well -- when did the intent form? A murder that isn't premeditated but consequential on another crime won't be Manslaughter.

The force of the Media is to confuse these two circumstances -- to make it seem as if merely exiting the car amounts to Murder One if someone ends up dead. But they won't charge him Murder One I predict (the media is wrong). If they charge him it will be Murder Two and an Assault -- but the hard part will be proving the Assault.

Arguing equivocally that 'if someone ends up dead of course it's an assault' is just silly -- if it wasn't an assault until he pulled the gun, it could be self-defence. So the assault for Murder Two must be named and proven. And if it was Murder One all along, then the intent must have formed *before* he got out of the car. [Logically, he could have decided on premeditated murder after leaving the car and before engagement, but that would be hard to prove, likely weaken the case, and in any event contradicts what you claimed, that it was impossible for him to exit the car innocent -- that is indeed the crux.]

The media ploy (and Obama's) is to inflame prejudice and try him in the press for Murder One, so that he can't get a fair trial for Murder Two. But they have to have a conviction, so they will go for Murder Two, which should be hard to prove, but more likely to win in court. The media outrage is just smoke, mirrors, and a miscarriage of justice.