Trayvon Martin and Truth About America

[michaelintp]

For those interested in trying to understand the legal standard and the legal ambiguities in this case, our discussion on page 6 is a good place to start.

As Professor Dershowitz points out (see page 6 above), it is by no mean clear that Zimmerman would be treated as a provocateur under the "stand your ground" law.  ... And even if he were, there is still another uncertainty. As stated by the Professor:

"But to complicate matters further, even a provocateur has the legal right to defend himself under Florida law if he can't escape and if he is in imminent danger of death or great bodily harm, as Zimmerman claims he was."

It will be interesting to see how the judge in the actual case describes the law and its potential application to the facts.

[Redjack]

lol.

it's as simple as it actually is.

what a court will do with it is another matter.

[michaelintp]

Yeh. Courts. What a pain in the ass to be bound by law, the presumption of innocence, the burden of proof beyond a reasonable doubt, respect for the right of self-defense, the need for due process, and so forth. So damned inefficient. And at times, so emotionally ungratifying.

[Redjack]

lol.

No pain in the ass.

Except that the court system would have left Zimmerman alone and you wouldn't know Treyvon's name if not for people living in the actual world instead of pretending to some sort of arbitrary objectivity giving them false distance from how things actually work.

you have the luxury, as usual, of treating this as if it's an academic discussion about an event that happened in a vacuum. that luxury is provided by your skin.

in the real world of cops and kids who aren't white (one that every male on this forum except you lived in for about a decade, growing up) this thing is just as cut and dried as it was about to be swept under the rug as so many other cases, just like it, have been. the mental gymnastics you must have to undergo in order to adopt your pose of "balance" must be Olympic in their calibre.

man sees kid of the "wrong" ethnicity and dress code in "his" neighborhood.
man calls cops.
man is told to leave it alone.
man ignores that directive.
man stalks kid.
man confronts kid.
some version of an altercation happens.
man gets a few bruises.
man kills unarmed kid for being the wrong color in the wrong place at the wrong time.
man lies about events.
man hides from cops.
man lies in court.
man is forced back into custody to stand trial.

those are the facts. if this was two white people you wouldn't even be bleating about it. you certainly wouldn't be bleating about it here.

how many times have you been on the wrong end of a gun?

None, I expect. There are two options in such a case, famous ones. Fight or Flight. Treyvon fought under a circumstance that any rational human being would consider reasonable. He ended up dead for protecting himself. For, oh, what's the phrase- standing his ground. but it's supposed to be muddy now because he's black and his murderer isn't. And because you want to make it a fun academic discussion about the vagaries of the law, you pretend that isn't the case and you come here to do that pretending.

in the real world, this has a 50/50 shot, at best, of working out to anything like justice. no one here will be surprised if Zimmerman skates and everyone here except you will be disgusted as the media bends to pretend that justice was served. how do i know? because it's happened before. so many times it's a cliche. that's the real world.

in that same real world, whatever the outcome of this particular case, black kids, black adults, will still get murdered by people like Zimmerman, many of those behaving under the protection of their badges or stand-your-ground-esque laws. And, while people like you play intellectual ping pong with the next one or the next six or the next hundred, we will still be here, watching and knowing what actually happens in the real world. living and dying in it in a way you aren't bothered to admit.

spare me your condescension. You're in no position to look down on any of this. you only think you are.

[Battle]

Res ipsa loquitur, michaelintp, Res ipsa loquitur.


I'm sure you understand that, don't you?

[michaelintp]

spare me your condescension. You're in no position to look down on any of this. you only think you are.

So speaks the master of condescension.  No matter -- from you it is always:

))<>((

I agree that an investigation was warranted in this case. I've been very clear about that. What I am not sure of is, as a legal matter, whether George Zimmerman is guilty of second-degree murder beyond a reasonable doubt. Those who are absolutely sure, one way or the other (and there are cheerleaders in both camps), have another axe to grind.  

I do find the legal aspects of this case interesting. I'll admit that. The issues surrounding stand-your-ground, the right of self-defense, and so on, are interesting. That doesn't take away from the fact that, as I discussed earlier in this thread, the killing of Trayvon was tragic.

And yes I have been on the wrong side of a gun, held by a police officer, on other occassions have been subjected to ethnic slurs, and so forth. Not that it is relevant one way or another to a discussion of whether the state will be able to meet its burden of proof regarding Zimmerman's guilt.

[Redjack]

So speaks the master of condescension.  No matter -- from you it is always:

))<>((

I agree that an investigation was warranted in this case. I've been very clear about that. What I am not sure of is, as a legal matter, whether George Zimmerman is guilty of second-degree murder beyond a reasonable doubt. Those who are absolutely sure, one way or the other (and there are cheerleaders in both camps), have another axe to grind.  

I do find the legal aspects of this case interesting. I'll admit that. The issues surrounding stand-your-ground, the right of self-defense, and so on, are interesting. That doesn't take away from the fact that, as I discussed earlier in this thread, the killing of Trayvon was tragic.

you're confusing condescension and disgust.

[michaelintp]

))<>((

Hahahahaha!  

[michaelintp]

Oh Battle I do understand.  Haha. Just don't think the phrase applies here. Yet.

[Redjack]

You're a better man than I am, Reggie.

I need a bath now.

[KIP LEWIS]

So, Michael is what you are trying to say, in a round about way, is...he might be as guilty as sin but legally may get off because this country's legal system is based on an idea that it is better for ten guilty men to go free than for one innocent man to go to jail?  (Not that reality seems to match that; we let ten guilty men go free and convict of innocent men in the process.)

Because if your point is that the legal process sometimes let morally guilty men go free because of legal technicalities, then we all know that and you really don't need to press it.

I get you are trying to discuss this in an unemotional academic way, but this isn't law school.

[michaelintp]

Kip, what you are saying is in part true, about the effects of legal safeguards sometimes resulting in the acquittal of the guilty, but they also often protect the innocent from false conviction (not always, but often).  That is also why a legal scholar like Alan Dershowitz, a liberal civil libertarian and legal activist against prosecutorial abuse, has taken such an interest in this case.  He, like me (though he has far greater expertise in criminal law), has identified the applicable legal principles and has described how they might apply, in an impartial and dispassionate fashion.

Kip, if you've read what I've written on this thread, it will be clear to you (and any reasonable person) that I've certainly not said one word against Trayvon Martin, that I totally sympathize with the feelings of his family and contemplate with horror the fear that he must have gone through. My very first post on this thread and a few others were while wearing my emotional hat. As you sense, I then switched hats, putting on my unemotional lawyer's hat, to try to analyze where we are going from here. Because the case does raise a host of legal issues. Including the kinds of issues that would normally concern civil libertarians, in the arena of prosecutorial abuse (for example, the prosecutor only disclosing for the probable cause hearing evidence supportive of the prosecution, and none of the evidence supportive of the defense, even though known to and in the possession of the prosecutor -- suggesting that she possibly has done so in the past, in other cases, as well).  

Also, as I have looked into the case a bit further, it has troubled me that on this thread the articles that Reginald has posted have in many respects been inaccurate, because they are agenda-driven, rather than seeking to understand the law and apply the law to the facts of the case. As a result, only evidence against the defendant is mentioned, false statements are made, spurious "inconsistencies" in Zimmerman's story are identified that are not inconsistencies at all, and no evidence supportive of the defense is mentioned. For example, I had to learn by accident (when looking into the bail hearing thing quickly on Google) that two months ago it came out that in Zimmerman's original police interrogations the night of the killing he passed the lie-detector voice stress test (and that, together with the consistency of his statements and the corroborating injuries and grass stains, were presumably part of the reason why the police ultimately released him)(though I also believe there was an element of racial bias involved). I should not have had to go to other sources, given the number of articles posted on this thread regarding the case.  

The authors of those articles are being dishonest and they are misleading their readers, creating false expectations. I understand the authors' emotions, but that does not justify dishonesty or sloppy thinking. I understand authors wishing to identify weaknesses in Zimmerman's case, for example pointing out where Zimmerman's wife lied at the bail hearing with Zimmerman's knowledge, or other instances where they find weaknesses, but that can't be the end of the discussion. My primary source of information regarding this case has been this thread, supplemented with a very few Google searches when something specific came up. I've not perused "right-wing" websites, pro-Zimmerman sites, and the like, as I've no interest in doing so. Because I know I will never get an accurate picture of reality by only perusing biased sources of information.

Is Zimmerman "guilty as sin?"  Well, none of us were there, so we are forced to look at this through the lens of the evidence that is being dribbled out for purposes of trying to get a handle on whether he is guilty "beyond a reasonable doubt."  He may, for example, be guilty by a preponderance of the evidence, but not beyond a reasonable doubt (like O.J., for example). This all turns on his self-defense claim and how that interacts with Florida's stand-your-ground laws and concealed carry laws. It is in theory possible that the killing of Trayvon Martin was the result of a terrible series of misunderstandings and mistakes, in part fueled by Trayvon's understandable fear, in part fueled by the recent burglaries in which suspects got away because the police did not arrive promptly, in part fueled by broad racial profiling or by the fact that those prior actual perpetrators were of the same demographic as Trayvon or because Zimmerman really believed Trayvon was acting strangely, in part by Zimmerman's mistaken belief that Trayvon was casing homes for burglary, and a host of other things that led to Zimmerman feeling that he had to follow Trayvon, that lead to a struggle that resulted in Zimmerman shooting Trayvon in self-defense. There just has to be a possibility that something like this happened so as to create a reasonable doubt that Zimmerman might not be guilty of murder but did in fact believe he was in jeopardy of immediate death or great bodily harm. This case turns on Zimmerman's self-defense argument.

I don't think it likely that Trayvon Martin charged Zimmerman while Zimmerman was holding a gun at him pointblank. I don't know if Zimmerman had even pulled out his gun when he was following Trayvon. I don't know if Zimmerman first attempted to grab or more vigorously attack Trayvon, or whether Trayvon (in an attempt to defend himself from some seeming "crazy man") initiated the violence. I don't know if Trayvon was really on top of Zimmerman pounding his head against the concrete and Zimmerman shot him then, or whether Zimmerman, pushed by Trayvon, fell backwards, bumped his head on the concrete, got up pissed off and shot Trayvon execution style while Trayvon was begging for his life.  Even if Zimmerman did shoot Trayvon while Trayvon was on top of him, was Zimmerman's fear of death or great bodily harm subjectively reasonable?  I don't know the answer to any of these questions, and I will not form an opinion until the facts are actually presented in court, where both sides are allowed to present their evidence.

I can tell you that I will not cry bitter tears if Zimmerman is convicted. But at the same time, I would not view it as a miscarriage of justice if he were acquitted of second-degree murder. Given the high legal burden the state must meet.  

No reasonable person questions that Trayvon Martin was an innocent teenager. This does not answer, however, whether George Zimmerman is guilty of second-degree murder under the law.

Anyway, I hope with the above you get a better picture where I'm coming from. Honestly, I believe most Forum members who have read this thread do understand.  I also understand what a painful topic this is. I hope I have not offended anyone by donning my analytic "Mr. Spock" lawyer's hat. That's just what happens when I start analyzing something, anything.  

[Battle]

...rather than seeking to understand the law and apply the law to the facts of the case.

I stopped right here.  Didn't read any further.  This is where the  miscommunication lies...
You don't really need to understand the law, because it was already understood when it was created.

Shouldn't the process be, 'understanding the facts of the case, and then seeking how the law applies'?

[michaelintp]

...rather than seeking to understand the law and apply the law to the facts of the case.

I stopped right here.  Didn't read any further.  This is where the  miscommunication lies...
You don't really need to understand the law, because it was already understood when it was created.

Shouldn't the process be, 'understanding the facts of the case, and then seeking how the law applies'?

Battle, I think you may have nailed the source of the miscommunication on its head. Emotionally, people want to see George Zimmerman punished for killing Trayvon Martin. What I think some are doing is the following: They see what they believe to be the facts (all seen in a light most negative to Zimmerman while ignoring facts helpful to his case), and then reason backwards as to what the law should be to justify the result they want to reach (jail time for Zimmerman). Even if, as a result, their characterization "of law" does not comport with the actual law at all.

You need to understand both the law and the facts at play in a case. It is not mechanical, as there are often ambiguities in the law and in the facts. That is why there are legitimate legal disputes. But you really do need to understand the actual legal principles at play in a case, and reason from them. That is why the explanations of a legal scholar such as Professor Dershowitz are so helpful.

Once one understands the legal principles, one can apply them to the facts as they are disclosed (with the caveat that of course the result may change as the facts change). Understanding the legal principles also helps the prosecution and defense understand which facts are critical and which facts are unimportant, as they develop the prosecution and the defense. This also helps people generally think about the case, as it develops.

[Battle]

Battle, I think you may have nailed the source of the miscommunication on its head. Emotionally, people want to see George Zimmerman punished for killing Trayvon Martin. What I think some are doing is the following: They see what they believe to be the facts (all seen in a light most negative to Zimmerman while ignoring facts helpful to his case), reach a conclusion as to what the result should be (jail time for Zimmerman), and then reason backwards as to what the law should be to justify that result.  Even if, as a result, their characterization "of law" does not comport with the actual law at all.

You need to understand both the law and the facts at play in a case. It is not mechanical, as there are often ambiguities in the law and in the facts. That is why there are legitimate legal disputes. But you really do need to understand the actual legal principles at play in a case, and reason from them. That is why the explanations of a legal scholar such as Professor Dershowitz are so helpful.

Once one understands the legal principles, one can apply them to the facts as they are disclosed (with the caveat that of course the result may change as the facts change). Understanding the legal principles also helps the prosecution and defense understand which facts are critical and which facts are unimportant, as they develop the prosecution and the defense. This also helps people generally think about the case, as it develops.

Here's the core of the problem with 'understanding the law' because if it isn't as mechanical (as it should be) and if there are ambiguities (arbitrarily unpredictable on a case by case basis) in the law, then we logically assume that the 'stand your ground' law is subjective and can only be granted and applied to a certain segment of American citizens and not to other kinds of American citizens, no?