Over 9,000 people are murdered in the United States every year. Therefore, it takes extraordinary circumstances – like a mother (Casey Anthony) killing her child – for any of them to become a cause celebre. The circumstances surrounding the killing of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin are extraordinary to say the least. (One can be forgiven for thinking he was only 11 based on pictures now popping up everywhere….)
Ironically, the facts are very straightforward and undisputed:
Trayvon was shot dead on February 26 just yards from his home in Sanford, Florida by George Zimmerman, a trigger-happy neighborhood watchdog. Zimmerman claims that he feared Trayvon was an armed burglar on the prowl. In fact Trayvon was just walking home from a neighborhood store armed with nothing but his mobile phone, some skittles candy, and an iced tea.
The reason these facts are undisputed is that a number of eyewitnesses called 911 when they heard Trayvon crying out in despair as cop-wannabe Zimmerman was attempting to detain/arrest him. Indeed, that Trayvon could be heard crying “help, help” on the 911 tapes is what gives this case its heart-rending pathos. It is also what belies Zimmerman’s claim that he shot Trayvon in self-defense.
Not to mention that Zimmerman’s own call to 911 indicts him. Because no matter the wild-west nature of Florida’s “stand-your-ground” self-defense law, that Zimmerman clearly stalked and then confronted Trayvon – after being told by the 911 operator not to – impeaches his claim. And this is so even if Trayvon managed to knock him on his ass and bust his nose before Zimmerman shot him dead.
Here is an excerpt from that damning 911 call:
Zimmerman: Hey we’ve had some break-ins in my neighborhood, and there’s a real suspicious guy… This guy looks like he’s up to no good, or he’s on drugs or something.
Dispatcher: OK, and this guy is he White, Black, or Hispanic?
Zimmerman: He looks Black… These assholes they always get away… Shit he’s running…
Dispatcher: Are you following him?
Zimmerman: Yeah
Dispatcher: Ok, we don’t need you to do that.
Zimmerman: Ok… Fucking coons [aka “niggers” barely audible under his breath]….
(Mother Jones, March 18, 2012)
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Of course, we now know that he lied. Because he continued following Trayvon in “hot pursuit” – as if he were in fact a police officer. Which makes this provision in his own Neighborhood Watch guide so relevant:
The manual from the Neighborhood Watch program states: ‘It should be emphasized to members that they do not possess police powers. And they shall not carry weapons or pursue vehicles.’
(ABC News, March 20, 2012)
What’s more, there was late-breaking news today that Trayvon was on the phone with his teenage girlfriend from the time Zimmerman began following him to when he physically confronted him. According to reports, she says they were merely engaging in puppy-love talk before he expressed concern about some man following him, and that it was she who told him to run home.
The point is that her account belies all of Zimmerman’s alleged suspicions about Trayvon casing places to burglarize. Not least because it includes her actually hearing Zimmerman commanding to know “what are you doing around here?” and Trayvon repeatedly pleading “why you following me?” … until a scuffle breaks out and Trayvon’s phone goes dead.
Given these facts and circumstances, it is hardly surprising that the failure of the Sanford police to arrest him has caused such national and international outrage. Never mind that, but for this story going viral on social media, the local Police Chief Bill Lee would probably have gotten away with declaring this shooting justified. As things stand, however, Zimmerman is now almost as much a wanted man as Joseph Kony … remember him?
No doubt this notoriety and calls for protesters to descend upon Sanford are what forced not just the Florida state attorney general but even the Department of Justice today to announce plans to launch separate investigations. And I am convinced beyond any reasonable doubt that the outcome will be Zimmerman’s arrest, trial, and conviction in due course.
Incidentally, his attorney is bound to assert an insanity defense given Zimmerman’s psychotic suspicion of Black males – evidenced by reports that he made over 40 false-alarm calls to 911 over the past year to report Blacks on the prowl. But there’s a legal chasm between being certifiably insane and being a vigilante bigot. His insanity defense will fail; not least because he not only knew the difference between right and wrong, the 911 operator made it clear to him that just following this kid was wrong.
In the meantime, his family members are laboring to disabuse the public of the reasonable suspicion that Zimmerman was racially motivated. They cite his Hispanic heritage, Black family members, and Black friends as evidence in this respect. Except that anyone who does not think Hispanics can be racist towards Blacks should speak with Blacks who experience this form of racism every day in certain areas of Miami.
I must confess though that much of the outrage fueling Blacks like me is the Jim-Crow realization that there but for the grace of God, go I … or my son.
All the same, I am concerned about firebrands like Reverend Al Sharpton making this more a case about Black civil rights than about the murder of an innocent Black kid – in a cold-blooded case of vigilante justice. After all, the last thing this country needs is to have Blacks and Hispanics becoming polarized along racial lines in this case the way Blacks and Whites were after O.J. Simpson murdered his wife and her best friend.
Not to mention that proving this was a civil rights violation instead of manslaughter is fraught with legal hurdles and factual uncertainties (i.e., his racial profiling and epithets do not necessarily amount to race-based malice in this case.)
Accordingly, I urge Sharpton to enlist Hispanic leaders to lock arms with him on his “no justice, no peace” march on Thursday to diffuse any sparks of racial conflict between these two minority groups before race-based emotions explode.
That said, perhaps the only good thing that will come out of this case is that the Florida legislature (with prodding from the Department of Justice) will be compelled to modify or even repeal its stand-your-ground law, which emboldens people to shoot to kill based merely on their subjective fears. Especially since the Sanford police seem to think that it’s okay to use deadly force even if that fear is not of personal bodily harm, but of Black kids just walking home in their own neighborhood.
In fact, given the way this police department botched (or covered up) this case, I’d be shocked if these state and federal investigations do not end with Chief Lee losing his job … or worse. Why, for example, did he order the dead boy to be tested for drugs and alcohol but not the shooter…?
* This commentary was originally published on Tuesday, March 20, at 8:26 pm