Trayvon Martin - Page 23

WildGunsTomcat · 2012-04-11, 05:17 PM

Yup...they charged him with second degree murder and he's in custody right now.

Just so everyone has the definition:

Second Degree Murder is a murder that is not premeditated or planned in advance.

Sgt Shultz · 2012-04-11, 05:20 PM

Originally Posted by Malorn

He has to be charged; we'd have immediate race riots if he didn't thanks to the hype the story has gotten.

Conviction is a whole nother matter. Convincing all 12 jurors... that'll be interesting.

Supposedly new evidence is going to be revealed. That would be a nice change.

Even if they brought in a jury from the deepest hole in the Amazon, I am not sure you could get 12 people who haven't heard about this case. I bet the selection process is going to be a real treat that the media work the race angle on as well.

Figment · 2012-04-11, 05:44 PM

Originally Posted by WildGunsTomcat

Yup...they charged him with second degree murder and he's in custody right now.

Just so everyone has the definition:

Second Degree Murder is a murder that is not premeditated or planned in advance.

That would have been my expectation. Note that this also indicates it is not considered a hate crime by the prosecution.

As I argued much earlier in the debate, any prejudice would be part of the state of mind (IMO stress and paranoia) that lead to the incident of the shooting (poor judgment and provoking an incident that would otherwise not have occured), but would not be part of the actual motive to pull the trigger.

Warborn · 2012-04-11, 05:52 PM

Originally Posted by Malorn

He has to be charged; we'd have immediate race riots if he didn't thanks to the hype the story has gotten.

Plus the whole fact that he's a violent offender who chased down and shot an unarmed kid to death. I guess it's probably a 50-50 between "justice" and "avoiding race riots" though.

Baneblade · 2012-04-11, 05:58 PM

Originally Posted by Warborn

Plus the whole fact that he's a violent offender who chased down and shot an unarmed kid to death. I guess it's probably a 50-50 between "justice" and "avoiding race riots" though.

You using the word 'fact' is a little funny.

Figment · 2012-04-11, 06:05 PM

Now Warborn, you do have to be careful in labeling and judging prior to court. I personally do not agree with a law that uses "good faith in people's words to the reason of a killing" to judge if someone should be put before a court or not. Why? Because it can easily be abused and exploited.

No trial, no proper investigation, no guarantee that justice has been served and basically sets up a situation where killing someone without witnesses around means walking away scot free as you can just claim self defense. Plus, as this case shows, it creates a situation where conspiracy theorists can thrive.

I do hope that's also considered by the others in this thread (Malorn and co). Imagine for a sec that the actual defender, who died, had a gun, fired it, missed (or after you killed them, made them "fire") and you would claim self-defense against a man with a gun, using a story that corresponds with the angles of the shooting.

So as long as your self-defense claim is seemingly okay, you could get away with murder.

What if you felt threatened by someone with a concealed weapon? Maybe if you spotted him and you didn't like his face or the clothes he was wearing, you figured he's a criminal intending to rob you. What if you staring at him made this guy uncomfortable and he confronted you about it? What if you got into an argument and irritated he shoved you on the ground? What if. There's a lot of what ifs that could end up in a shooting that by no way are intended to be covered by the stand your ground law.

I would like to know what - as I asked a few pages back - the definition of "reasonable believe" of a direct threat to health and life is by this law, as it seems to me reasonable is very subjective. Too subjective perhaps.

Would it be really bad to put this law under scrutiny to see if it has holes in it that can be exploited?

Warborn · 2012-04-11, 06:46 PM

Originally Posted by Sobekeus

You using the word 'fact' is a little funny.

Zimmerman has a history of resisting a police officer with force.

He acknowledged on the 911 call that he was following Martin.

Martin was subsequently shot by Zimmerman.

Martin was unarmed.

**Malorn** · 2012-04-11, 07:09 PM

Meh.

WildGunsTomcat · 2012-04-11, 07:16 PM

Eh....Warborn's not that bad.

He was my mortal enemy for a while there though.

It is what it is. He just has a very liberal viewpoint of things, not that he's wrong...just that's how he sees shit.

Like most of us.

Baneblade · 2012-04-11, 08:17 PM

Originally Posted by Warborn

Zimmerman has a history of resisting a police officer with force.

He acknowledged on the 911 call that he was following Martin.

Martin was subsequently shot by Zimmerman.

Martin was unarmed.

I never said that what you claim happened didn't happen. I merely like pointing out that you know as much as anyone else here, yet you are all over the jumping to conclusions mat.

Warborn · 2012-04-11, 08:41 PM

My conclusion is that Zimmerman is a violent offender who chased down and shot an unarmed kid to death.

The things Zimmerman has told police have been inconsistent compared to what some witnesses to the event have said, but as this is now going to trial we shall see what these people have to say when they're testifying under oath. If I seemed vehement in my disdain for Zimmerman previously, it's because I'm not a racist and don't think black people ought to be shot for being black, and because Zimmerman wasn't going to trial.

Figment · 2012-04-11, 09:00 PM

The problem though is that it's not clear why exactly he shot him. If he provoked an attack to which he defended or instigated an attack and claimed defense.

There is very weak evidence for a racism hate crime, much more for anti-gangsta sub-culture paranoia, where being black is not the central motive. Any fight he may have gotten into or a surge of fanatic vigilantism is much more likely the direct motive for firing a shot. One of the questions is, did he fire when he needed to, or would it have sufficed to threaten. Establishing whether there is justification is the first issue, the second is whether there was any alterior motive.

Jumping ahead to racism is overdoing it.

Warborn · 2012-04-11, 11:24 PM

Nobody would have been shot if Zimmerman listened to the dispatcher and didn't chase after this kid he thought was so dangerous he had to call the cops on him. I'm not saying Zimmerman is guilty or innocent of any particular crime. All I'm saying is that he's a fucking asshole, and people have every right to be outraged at his behaviour.

NivexQ · 2012-04-11, 11:32 PM

I feel bad for Zimmerman. This wasn't cold blooded murder. It WAS murder, and he deserves to be punished for it, but he obviously didn't intend to kill this kid. He also showed remorse immediately after shooting him. Eyewitnesses said he was sitting over his body crying. He was just way too gung-ho. He was looking to be a hero, and he ended up being a villain.

Bittermen · 2012-04-11, 11:40 PM

Originally Posted by Malorn

And how do you know he didn't stop when instructed?

He was on the phone with the 911 operator. The operator asks him if he is pursing the kid. He says yes. The operator then tells him "We don't need you to do that"

He did it anyway.

The full phone conversation is on youtube.