Two Thoughts about the Trayvon Martin/George Zimmerman Case

George Zimmerman, a neighborhood watch volunteer in Sanford, Florida, recently shot and killed Trayvon Martin, an unarmed black 17-year-old who was walking through Zimmerman’s neighborhood. Martin was returning from a convenience store to the home of his father’s fiancee. The shooting has been in the news so much, and has stirred such strong emotions, that I am reluctant to wade into it, but the case raises at least two interesting legal issues. I’ll start by noting that there are two competing narratives about what happened. Those who believe that Zimmerman was a vigilante who approached, assaulted, and then shot Martin emphasize (1) that Zimmerman contacted police upon seeing Martin, then, even though the dispatcher told him that “we don’t need you to do that,” chose to follow Martin, (2) that Martin was talking on his cell phone to his girlfriend, and told her that he was being followed and that he was afraid, and (3) that Martin carried nothing more threatening than a bag of Skittles. ABC News has a story here that confirms most of those facts. However, the Sanford police did not charge Zimmerman with a crime, apparently accepting Zimmerman’s very different version of events. The New York Times reports here that Zimmerman told the police after the shooting that he had failed to locate Martin and was returning to his vehicle when Martin confronted him, punched him, and then repeatedly slammed his head into the sidewalk. There is at least some evidence corroborating Zimmerman’s claims. The Orlando Sentinel [...]