Posted on 04/14/2012 4:15:20 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
When a man shot and killed a boy on a rainy night on the streets of Sanford Florida, because he looked suspicious and the man took it upon himself to investigate this person wearing a hoodie, the State District Attorney filed second degree murder charges against the adult, but may have inadvertently have all the charges of murder dismissed or find him not guilty.
The State of Florida Special Prosecutor Angela Corey has charged George Zimmerman for second degree murder against Trayvon Martin, which according to Florida’s law may get Zimmerman life in prison. But there seems to be a catch. According to Florida’s law, to prove second degree murder, the State of Florida must prove the following three elements beyond a reasonable doubt:
1.The victim is dead; 2.The death was caused by the criminal act of the defendant; 3.There was an unlawful killing of the victim by an act imminently dangerous to another and demonstrating a depraved mind without regard for human life. 01) Travon Martin is dead. Zimmerman claimed he killed him in self defense.
02) When the 911 operator said to not get involved, Zimmerman disobeyed the operator and confronted Martin. By not obeying the order, this can be grounds for obstruction of justice, an arrestable offense, therefore, satisfying two of three within the laws of second degree murder.
03) There was an unlawful killing of the victim by an act imminently dangerous to another and demonstrating a depraved mind without regard for human life may be the issue here.
According to Merriam Webster Online Dictionary, the word depraved says: marked by corruption or evil; especially : perverted. The State has to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Zimmerman’s mind was corrupt or evil or even perverted. Also what is reasonable doubt?
Reasonable doubt: Prosecution must be proven to the extent that there could be no “reasonable doubt” in the mind of a “reasonable person” that the defendant is guilty.
So is there any doubt that Zimmerman’s mind was corrupt, evil or perverted? The defense may say that he was concerned about the safety and well being of the community and that his intentions were to protect property and Zimmerman who gave chase, was a victim of Martin, who pounced on him, started to smash his head against the concrete and Zimmerman had no choice but to shoot Zimmerman to defend himself. If Zimmerman sticks with that story, the jury would have no choice but to say not guilty. On the other hand, the D.A. can still file manslaughter charges.
According to Florida law: Manslaughter is the unlawful killing of a human being without malice aforethought. Manslaughter may be voluntary or involuntary. Essentially, the difference between manslaughter and murder is that manslaughter was the result of an accident, heat of passion, or some other act in which the person does not have the mental state to commit a murder.
Involuntary manslaughter: To establish involuntary manslaughter, the prosecutor must show that the defendant acted with “culpable negligence.” Florida statutes define culpable negligence as a disregard for human life while engaging in wanton or reckless behavior. The state may be able to prove involuntary manslaughter by showing the defendant’s recklessness or lack of care when handling a dangerous instrument or weapon, or while engaging in a range of other activities that could lead to death if performed recklessly. Example: If the defendant handles a loaded gun without any knowledge of whether the gun is loaded, and he later discharges the gun into a group of people, the defendant’s actions likely meet the recklessness requirement for a charge of involuntary manslaughter.
Florida state laws also establish involuntary manslaughter if the prosecutor shows that the defendant used excessive force during self-defense or the defense of another person. The prosecution and defense can look at the facts and circumstances of the killing to determine whether the defendant reasonably believed that self-defense was necessary; if not necessary, the state might proceed with an involuntary manslaughter charge.
If the D.A. cannot prove that the Zimmerman was depraved, then legally, Zimmerman is a free man and under the double jeopardy rules, he cannot be tried again for the same crime…but then there is federal court.
It was a miss-communication by the dispatcher. She had told him to keep an eye and he did.
When she said you don't need to do that. I thought she was saying, you don't need to get out in the rain and cold as a response to his comment about the weather. It didn't occur to me to be anything else until the media got involved.
A competent judge with any integrity would throw this case out at the pretrial hearing. Unfortunately, I doubt that happens.
I have an idea what witness this might be.
There was a woman who called 911 to report the altercation. This is the call on which you can hear the gunshot in the background. You can also hear her yelling at someone else in the house telling them NOT to go out and help the person who was screaming for help.
One of the networks had an interview with this woman with her appearance and voice disguised. She said she peeked out the window and talked about the larger man being on top and hearing the cries for help.
The news media reported this as a grown man killing a young boy.
So everyone who didn't personally examine the body was under the impression that the young boy was the smaller person and had the higher-pitched voice. This was compounded by the photos of 12-year-old Trayvon being used by the media.
In fact, Zimmerman is only 5'8" and was the smaller man by several inches. Zimmerman also has a high-pitched voice even when he is not screaming, as anyone can hear on the recording of the police dispatcher call.
So we may have here a situation in which witnesses have interpreted what they heard or saw by reference to the mis-reporting in the media, leading them to believe they know the opposite of what occurred.
While the Zimmerman/Martin ‘white’ on black killing is covered 24/7 on the MSM with an outpouring of rage and charges of a racial hate crime, where is the concern- where is the rage about the home invasion, torture, beating, rape and murder of the elderly white couple by a gang of feral blacks in Oklahoma just a few weeks ago?
The 90 year old war veteran husband was beaten and his jaw broken. He was shot in the face numerous times with a BB gun and sent to the hospital in critical condition.
The 85 year old partially blind wife was RAPED and then BEATEN TO DEATH.
Can you just imagine the pain, the humiliation, the horror that dear old lady experienced being gang raped by that pack of feral animals?
(the autopsy states she was raped. Don’t think all of these animals didn’t all participate)
And can you imagine the pain, the horror of that dear old husband having to witness this?
There’s a lot more involved here than a home invasion and robbery.
WHERE ARE THE CHARGES OF A RACIAL HATE CRIME??
90 year old husband’s jaw broken and shot in face with a BB gun numerous times?
85 wife year old semi blind wife RAPED and BEATEN to death??
Why does it take a foreign press to enlighten America as to this henious crime?
Where is the outrage?
Thank God you’re retired
Actually chuckled when heard “alot will depend on the quality of the witness” and then the explanation...Checked it out, it was AC,.... he’s moon walking too.
Couldn’t wait to tell you. Guess it’s been a good thing that they are only showing the “young innocent” pictures
That is also what Zimmerman told police within minutes of shooting Martin. Hard to see how he could have concocted a story that fits all the evidence in that short amount of time.
OTOH the so-called probable cause affidavit relies heavily on the girlfriend in Miami's account, which was not given until several weeks after the shooting and the police tapes and other evidence were made public.
You really need to quit trying to reason any of this out. The facts and the law DO NOT MATTER.
1. This is an election year
2. Race and class envy is involved
3. There are already threats of rioting SERIOUS THREATS. They mean it and they will do it.
The poor kid is already convicted. The fat lady already sung.
It was the woman who appeared twice on CNN. Cboldt and Maggie had her number the first time she appeared with AC.
She came back later because she had new evidence...
Sounded like a “valley girl” to me.
#3 especially will be negated by the fact that there are witnesses who have stated that Trayvon was beating up on Mr. Zimmerman. A reasonable jury might consider the shooting to have been while maybe not self-defense, but certainly NOT murder. The race-baiters won’t like it, but they want nothing short of life in prison, or the death penalty for Mr. Zimmerman, anyway.
From reading your analysis, it is clear that you really haven’t studied the reported facts.
So your analysis doesn’t carry much weight because you get so much of the facts wrong.
There is no evidence on which to claim probable cause that Zimmerman physically assaulted Martin. (Unless there is some sort of secret witness, but that is quite unlikely given the media attention.)
Shooting someone is not ipso facto a crime. It must be an unlawful shooting.
The affidavit does not even literally state that Zimmerman initiated the physical struggle. It just says that a struggle ensued, using the passive voice, which is laughable that they resorted to that language.
If the prosecution is not willing to allege that Zimmerman initiated the PHYSICAL aspect of the altercation, then they have no legal basis to charge him.
Because if Martin physically assaulted Zimmerman (rather than the reverse) as Zimmerman has stated, then Zimmerman has the right to defend himself, and the only question is the reasonableness of his belief as to death or bodily harm.
But you are right in one sense; there is no way the charges will be dismissed by reason of technical deficiencies in the information and supporting documents.
This will go to the preliminary trial before the judge on the self-defense claim and after a lengthy public hearing with all of the witnesses and physical evidence, the charges will be dismissed by the judge (which preliminary trial will be after the election.)
This is Cutcher. She came on as herself, then 10 days later came on as "anonymous" with new information. I think she was flat out lying in her second interview, as being a person who called 911 and held the phone to the window. Cutcher has the same 911 tapes we do, and as "anonymous," she can pretend to be any one of those callers.
Wonder if they will look into jury tampering in her situation. If she tells a different story on the stand she could be looking at perjury.
My disagreement is with your apparent assumption that there was a “chase.” Of all the things that may have happened in the 2 1/2 minutes between Zimmerman’s call and the fight, a “chase” is the least likely. The known timeline and locations - neither of which are dependent upon Zimmerman’s account - show that Martin was out of Zimmerman’s sight, and maybe 100 yards from his house two minutes before Zimmerman even hung up with police. If he had wanted to go home, he had more than enough time to do so, without even running.
If Zimmerman was “chasing” him for 2 1/2 minutes, I think the prosecutor will need to explain why they ended up no more than 250 feet from Zimmerman’s car.
It seems to me that Martin circling back to confront Zimmerman fits this timeline - at least within the parameters of reasonable doubt - far better than the chase you are suggesting.
And to be honest, having listened to the recording of Zimmerman’s call, I just didn’t get anger or vigilantism in his tone at all, and I’ll be interested to see whether it’s the prosecution or defense that seems most eager to play it in court.
“If the cities explode, then lock & load.”
He did more than say "okay." He remained on the phone for almost two more minutes, during which he made clear that he no longer knew where "this kid" was. It's quite clear that he was not pursuing Martin at that point.
Nobody denies that Zimmerman was out of his car looking for Martin sometime after his call with police. And it is also indisputable that he had every legal right to do this. To jump from that to "he was chasing Martin" just doesn't really match up with everything we know about that night.
If Zimmerman "chased" Martin for two and half minutes after hanging up the phone, how did they end up just 250 feet from Zimmerman's car? Were they crawling?
If Martin just wanted to hurry home, how was he unable to traverse that last 100 yards during the two minutes he was out of Zimmerman's sight while Zimmerman was still on the phone with police? Or the additional two and a half minutes between the end of Zimmerman's call and the start of the fight?
On the "facts," about half. The legal mumbo jumbo, who knows.
If it’s the lady I am thinking of, her statements to Anderson Cooper made it very clear she did not see anything at all. His first question: “What was the first thing you saw?” Answer: “I heard a shot and ran to the window.”
Then she goes on to explain that she’s convinced, as a witness, that it wasn’t self-defense. People like that can get a hearing on CNN - I can’t imagine why a prosecutor would call her to the stand.
Have you seen the judge?
Not Guilty!
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