Posted on 03/18/2012 4:35:27 PM PDT by redreno
According to new details, Sanford police are being accused of altering the statements of witnesses to the incident when Trayvon Martin was shot by neighborhood crime watch captain George Zimmerman.
17 year old Trayvon Martin has been walking back from a local 7-11 with snacks for himself and his father in Sanford during the NBA All Star Game on Feb 26th, when he was following by a car being driven by George Zimmerman, who did call the police non-emergency number to report a suspicious person. According the the recordings, Zimmerman stated the person was suspicious because he was wearing a hoodie and walking too slow in his opinion in the rain.
During the phone call to police he was recorded as saying, "these a..holes always get away."
(Excerpt) Read more at thefloridanewsjournal.com ...
He doesn’t have to spin the thread. The compliant media and their cop hating allies on FR do that well enough on their own.
Zimmerman is getting railroaded. Many, many blacks in Sanford. It’s ridiculous to think the Sanford PD would cover for a neighborhood watch guy because he is white and the dead guy black, yet that sort of thinking is all the rage here.
Sharpton is due anyday so the circus will soon be a fiasco. I’m sure the DOJ will be with him, licking his ass the whole way. The “funny” part is that even Zimmerman’s father has pointed out that Zimmerman is not “white but Hispanic” who has close relatives that are of mixed race. He says it’s ludicrous that his son would be chasing after a black guy because he was black. And yet we’ll continue down the race road until George Zimmerman is thrown to the wolves. That should be any time now.
I do not have all the evidence. None of us does. The police say the physical evidence is consistent with George Zimmerman's story. It seems more likely to me that Zimmerman was attacked than that he attacked.
I see that he is being lynched in the press without any real evidence.
Do you honestly think this guy just shot Trayvon without being attacked?
What this comes down to, I think, is whose story do you believe?
Young men between 15 and 25 tend to be very aggressive.
Trayvon was suspended from school for a week. That is why he was in that development with his father. Maybe he was suspended for drawing a picture of a gun. I do not know. His father refuses to tell anyone why he was suspended.
I know that lots of people have been attacked by young men for "looking at them wrong" or "disrespecting them".
Again, the only story that we have is George Zimmerman's. The police say that it is consistent with the physical evidence. We may not torture Zimmerman to make him change his story.
Zimmerman could have been aggressive and provoked Martin. There is just no evidence to show it.
“Self defense? You honestly think this kid attacked this guy?”
It’s quite possible the kid might have thrown the first punch, which would be the prudent thing to do when a stranger dressed in street clothes who has 100 pounds on you follows you in his car and then gets out and approaches you. A lot of men, myself included, would probably perceive Zimmerman as a threat and hit him as he approached. THAT is self defense.
Initiating a conflict with an unarmed kid when specifically instructed not to do so by police, and then shooting the kid is NOT self defense, it’s murder.
Precisely what I was getting at.
“Again, the only story that we have is George Zimmerman’s.”
Yeah, and the reason for that is that Zimmerman killed Martin. This means that Zimmerman’s story should be regarded with more suspicion, not less just because his is the only story.
“Zimmerman could have been aggressive and provoked Martin. There is just no evidence to show it.”
What are you talking about? It is not disputed that Zimmerman followed Martin in his car and then got out and approached him. That in itself, when done by anyone other than a police officer, is aggressive and provocative behavior. We don’t know if the kid tried to run or stood his ground and fought, but either way, he did nothing wrong and Zimmerman is still a murderer. The facts speak for themselves. Maybe Zimmerman just wanted to “detain” him but he had no legal authority to do so and the kid would have been perfectly justified to see him as a threat.
What could he possibly have yelled to Martin as he got out of his car that would not have identified him as a threat? “Freeze, Neighborhood Watch”?
Also, Zimmerman is 28 while Martin was 17 and 100 pounds lighter. Is Zimmerman that much of a wimp that he wouldn’t have been able to handle a kid in a physical confrontation without shooting him?
He obviously is paranoid and wanted to justify his paranoia by "catching" the kid at something. When the kid leaves the road, Zimmerman has to get out of his car and takes off after the kid. Upon confronting the kid, he starts to get his fat butt kicked and then pulls his gun rather than take the beating.
I think everyone here needs to step back one step from the final confrontation scene and look back in time as to why Zimmerman got out of his car. There was no crime in progress that Zimmermna witnessed and Zimmerman was not confronting the youth to save an innocent bystander.
He's going to do a lot of time for this shooting and well he should.
You are simply wrong in your understanding of what is justifiable under the law, and what is not. Mere words alone are not justification for self defense.
In a public area, it is perfectly legal to follow someone and ask them questions. It is not provocation for a physical attack.
If you attack someone who then legitimately feels that their life is threatened, they may use deadly force to protect themselves.
A dispatcher is not "the police" and their advise is not legally binding. If anyone believes that I am incorrect in this, I will gladly look at evidence to the contrary. They are not on the scene and can only offer advise.
How do you know he tried to stop him. He called the cops and was following him. Is it against the law to follow someone? For the sake of argument, let’s say the kid saw the guy following him, got mad, and attacked the guy. During the struggle, the kid tried to grab the gun the guy was legally allowed to carry. Would Zimmerman have the right of self defense in this case?
They have to be really good these days with dash camera and POV cameras on the officers.
The hurdle Mr. Zimmerman is going to have to jump is pretty high. He is going to have to explain how he got from in his car talking to the police on the phone, to a physical confrontation where he shot a minor feet from the father's residence. If he told the kid to stop and the kid kept walking, Zimmerman doesn't have any legal authority to try to stop him. We will have to see what comes out from the 911 transcripts.
Not knowing all the facts (mea culpa); if this was a scenario in concealed carry class, one can pretty clearly delineate where Mr. Zimmerman started making some poor - albeit not illegal - choices.
I find your ideas intriguing, How may I subscribe to your newsletter?
that is why FL has a stand your ground law. It is tort reform to keep away the nutjob cause lawyers.
If there is a suit it should be tossed out as a matter of law providing it is a self defense action.
neighborhood watch means watch.
not watch then hide.
if he wanted to follow he could follow and do nothing other than be a witness.
The police say the evidence is consistent.
The AP has found new evidence.
Al sharpton is now involved with all his credibility.
At some point the feds will jump in because holder wants to protect the re-election of obama.
Has the actual police report been released or are we stuck with unreliable AP spin?
He was suspended for tardiness. Also, it has been reported that Zimmerman weighs 250 pounds. Martin weighed 140 pounds. That’s more than a 100 pound difference.
Zimmerman is 28. He very much falls into the “young man” category and should be in his physical prime. A 17 year old has yet to reach his physical prime.
Bears repeating. The commies tell us that to notice a pattern of hyper-aggression by young urban black males is racism at its most vile. On the other hand, commie dogma insists that presuming fear and hostility toward blacks by everyone else is the most noble predisposition of all. Those of us who are neither crazy nor retarded notice the contradiction here.
Two hundred and fifty pounds doesn’t sound all that “prime”.
These are the key words here. Lots of FReepers are talking about how Mr. Zimmerman's actions earned him a full-on Miami style ghetto-thug beat down. What they fail to understand is that unless Mr. Zimmerman broke the law then Trayvon had no legal right to get all up on him wit' a quickness. The commies tell us that violence by blacks is a reasonable and legitimate response to perceived slights by non-black others. Numerous FReepers have repeated this commie lie here on FR in discussing this incident.
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