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Originally posted by BYTEMITE:
I understand what's at stake here. I understand how important it is for self-defense laws to stand.

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But this guy. THIS GUY.

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Originally posted by BYTEMITE:
What I find intolerable is how unapologetic Zimmerman is about a situation that ended in someone dying that by all accounts appears to have been a tragic misunderstanding.

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Originally posted by MAL4PREZ:

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Originally posted by BYTEMITE:
What I find intolerable is how unapologetic Zimmerman is about a situation that ended in someone dying that by all accounts appears to have been a tragic misunderstanding.

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100% it is so.

I think someone else posted, but my mouse just started scrolling and I missed it. Darn.

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Originally posted by 1kiki:
"I think someone else posted, but my mouse just started scrolling and I missed it. Darn."

HA HA

good one

I'll have to remember that.

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Originally posted by AURaptor:

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Originally posted by MAL4PREZ:

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Originally posted by BYTEMITE:
What I find intolerable is how unapologetic Zimmerman is about a situation that ended in someone dying that by all accounts appears to have been a tragic misunderstanding.

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100% it is so.

I think someone else posted, but my mouse just started scrolling and I missed it. Darn.

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He's on trial for 2nd degree murder. I'm sure he was told NOT to apologize, as that may appear to be some sort of admission of guilt, at least in the court of public opinion.

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Originally posted by AURaptor:
TM was the aggressor. Not GZ.

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Originally posted by Magonsdaughter:
I despair of your laws in the US if this guy gets off with nothing. If you shot and killed an unarmed person, if even you were defending yourself, you'd get convicted of something - manslaughter most likely. Surely there has to be acknowledge of due force, not any force.

Anyway, trial will determine the outcome, right or wrong.

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Originally posted by 1kiki:
I read an interesting discussion about 'jury nullification'. According to the author, it was intended by the founding fathers to be used as the last resort against unjust laws. (I don't know if the argument is historically or legally accurate; I haven't looked it up.) But supposing it's a legally-available tactic, then it should be used here.

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Originally posted by SIGNYM:
GZ followed TM,

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======================

All I suggest is a man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest. ~Paul Simon

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Originally posted by MAL4PREZ:
An armed man invited himself into the personal space of an innocent doing nothing wrong. This was the first aggressive move that started the whole thing. TM had every right to stand his ground and defend himself against GZ.

Perhaps the self-defense isn't thought to apply to TM since he never prepared himself properly by pitching into the industry that loves Stand Your Ground? Or perhaps there's another reason... ?

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Originally posted by m52nickerson:

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Originally posted by MAL4PREZ:
An armed man invited himself into the personal space of an innocent doing nothing wrong. This was the first aggressive move that started the whole thing. TM had every right to stand his ground and defend himself against GZ.

Perhaps the self-defense isn't thought to apply to TM since he never prepared himself properly by pitching into the industry that loves Stand Your Ground? Or perhaps there's another reason... ?

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Thing is Zimmerman following Martin and asking him, even aggressively, is not against the law. It comes down to who started the physical confrontation. Zimmerman said Martin did. The prosecution will have to show that Zimmerman started the physical confrontation or shot Martin without any physical confrontation.

I do not fear God, I fear the ignorance of man.

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*shaking head*

You try to pull a gun on me, TRUST me, you'd wind up in far worse shape than Zimmerman did. How it is that even people who know better chug down a spoon fed narrative so obviously manufactured ?

I stand by my assessment, still. Zimmerman approached an already suspicious Martin, got in his personal space aggressively, and Martin reacted in a hostile fashion, a scuffle ensued and wound up with Martin getting shot - my OPINION of that unknowable moment is that Zimmerman laid hands on him, and Martin reacted by pounding the crap out of him, but backed off once Zimmerman was incapable of aggressing on him, THEN Zimmerman shot him as he was backing away, out of a combination of fear, humiliation and ego involvement.

Which is in fact second degree murder, acceptable on plea to manslaughter.

But the spin on this, the blatancy of what appears to be something between institutional racism, and general ass-covering, also shows up the immense imbalance of power which makes our court systems something of a joke when the prosecutor, police, and court collude on something, whether it be railroading someone innocent, protecting someone guilty, or bending the hell out of the rules to shield their own incompetence - if a public defender started strategically leaking information he'd damn near be lynched for it and WOULD be disbarred, not to mention the various procedural and other violations prosecutors get a free pass for, not the least of which is violation of discovery, which is ALSO a factor here, since the leaked information being held back WAS in fact a violation of the discovery process, you understand.

The thing that's grinding my gears right now is the complicity of the media shovelling a narrative in such a way as to intentionally try to influence a trial, that's obstruction of a sort, but let that go, what REALLY annoys me about it, is this... "On noes, the person being chased by a suspicious, aggressive creep physically beat him when that suspicious, aggressive creep tried to pull a gun on him, oh how horrible..." And I say to that, Fuck You.

When an ARMED, suspicious and threatening individual approaches and confronts you, maybe lays hands on you, you really think it's beyond the pale to respond violently in an effort to prevent them from deploying that armament against you ? Mind you, we do not know whether Martin was aware that Zimmerman was armed, but I highly suspect that reaching for that armament is what set the conflict from push and shove to serious violence - one of my own well known tactics is preventing someone from deploying a weapon in much the same storm-rush fashion, but I don't stop till said weapon is in my possession.

Oh and FYI, tactical/procedural screwup I maybe didn't mention before, in addition to all the other ones... Zimmerman also screwed the pooch by getting in arms reach during that confrontation, probably in an effort to intimidate - there's a REASON I talk to people out there in the darkness from fifteen feet away, folks.

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Originally posted by BYTEMITE:

But... him saying this actually makes him seem like a really terrible person. And he can't go to jail for that. But I can dislike him a lot.

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Originally posted by AURaptor:

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Originally posted by BYTEMITE:

But... him saying this actually makes him seem like a really terrible person. And he can't go to jail for that. But I can dislike him a lot.

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Maybe he and Casey Anthony can start a club of some kind. A support group for really rotten folks who escaped jail time ?

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Originally posted by MAL4PREZ:

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Originally posted by BYTEMITE:
I understand what's at stake here. I understand how important it is for self-defense laws to stand.

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This is what I don't get. Why is Zimmerman's right to self-defense a big deal and Martin's right to self-defense not at issue? Zimmerman was the instigator. The kid was walking home when some nut with a gun confronted him for no reason. Martin had a right to defend HIMself.

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But this guy. THIS GUY.

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I'm right there with you on that.

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Originally posted by BYTEMITE:
You can't send people to jail just for being evil self-righteous bastards. And ultimately, while I question defining cement as a lethal weapon justifying escalation to lethal force, I'm not really sure what the outcome here will be. I don't think Zimmerman is "innocent" in the strictest sense of the term, but I'm also not sure he can be convicted.

Trevon Martin was probably defending himself. And probably Zimmerman was, though under the circumstances I think Zimmerman was in the wrong. We'll never really know exactly what happened that night. What I find intolerable is how unapologetic Zimmerman is about a situation that ended in someone dying that by all accounts appears to have been a tragic misunderstanding.

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Originally posted by SIGNYM:
I tend to settle the question about who's at fault by asking myself: Who approached who? There was, as I recall, a similar incident where some asshole watching a parade came off the curb to approach one of the paraders, and then claimed that he (curbman) was only "defending" himself in the ensuing scuffle.

Seriously???


GZ followed TM, even tho the police told him not to. Imagine- you're walking home at night, and some creep starts following you. You have no idea what's in his mind: Rape? Robbery? Harrassment? Handing you your wallet back, because you dropped it? Now, in my book, following (literally stalking) someone is an act of aggression. If you're following someone with an innocent purpose, especially at night and in a non-public situation (everyone else is indoors) you'll announce yourself, from a distance: Hello? Excuse me? I think you dropped your wallet!

What GZ did and failed to do is the initial crime. It's GZ's fault. Common sense should prevail.

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Originally posted by m52nickerson:

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Originally posted by MAL4PREZ:
An armed man invited himself into the personal space of an innocent doing nothing wrong. This was the first aggressive move that started the whole thing. TM had every right to stand his ground and defend himself against GZ.

Perhaps the self-defense isn't thought to apply to TM since he never prepared himself properly by pitching into the industry that loves Stand Your Ground? Or perhaps there's another reason... ?

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Thing is Zimmerman following Martin and asking him, even aggressively, is not against the law. It comes down to who started the physical confrontation. Zimmerman said Martin did. The prosecution will have to show that Zimmerman started the physical confrontation or shot Martin without any physical confrontation.

I do not fear God, I fear the ignorance of man.

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Originally posted by Niki2:
Everyone's entitled to their opinion...

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Originally posted by Geezer:

Mine is that a lot of folks are jumping to conclusions based on stereotypes and prejudices

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Originally posted by SIGNYM:
MAL4- again, thank you for that cogent post.

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Originally posted by m52nickerson:

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Originally posted by Magonsdaughter:
I despair of your laws in the US if this guy gets off with nothing. If you shot and killed an unarmed person, if even you were defending yourself, you'd get convicted of something - manslaughter most likely. Surely there has to be acknowledge of due force, not any force.

Anyway, trial will determine the outcome, right or wrong.

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In Florida as soon as you fear for your life you are allowed to use lethal force. It does not matter if the other person is armed or not.

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Originally posted by Oonjerah:
If I recall your posts last year, Frem ... didn't you say that

Zimmerman wouldn't be able to keep his mouth shut, and he'd

convict himself by blab?

By now, I guess, there's no way his attorney would let him take

the stand.

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See, from a prosecution angle, all you have to do is get this guy on the stand and start poking his fragile ego, and he'll ruin himself, lickety split - and worse, he will WANT to do it, just as his pride and ego forced that confrontation, demanded that he shoot, it will push him to tell his side of the story and "dress it up" in some logically inconsistent way that will allow a prosecutor with even a peanut for a brain (which is most of em) to completely excoriate his ass. So even if he gets a decent attorney, chances are he will no more listen to them about shutting the fuck up and staying off the stand, than he did the police dispatcher telling him not to pursue.

Really, guys like this, all you have to do is hand them a shovel, you understand ?

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Originally posted by Magonsdaughter:
I've had discussions around this. I do not agree with this law.

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