George Zimmerman…
…has been arrested and charged with 2nd degree murder.
You may have noticed that so far I have refrained from drawing any conclusions about Zimmerman’s guilt or innocence, because we just don’t know enough about the facts of the case. We still don’t. What we do know is that a prosecutor has considered the case against Zimmerman strong enough to arrest and charge him. And that this is going to continue to be a very divisive situation for a long time to come.
Special prosecutor Angela Corey announced the charges but would not discuss how she arrived at them or disclose other details of her investigation, saying: “That’s why we try cases in a courtroom.”
Second-degree murder is typically brought in cases when there is a fight or other confrontation that results in death but involves no premeditation to kill. It carries a mandatory minimum of 25 years behind bars when a gun is used…
Corey said the decision to bring charges was based on the facts and the law, declaring: “We do not prosecute by public pressure or by petition.”…
Corey repeatedly declined to answer questions about details in the case.
“So much information got released on this case that never should have been released. We have to protect this prosecution and this investigation for Trayvon, for George Zimmerman,” she said.
The following, however, is a ridiculous conclusion to come to, and typical of the sort of inflammatory comments that have been standard in this case right from the start:
“That indicates they have evidence (Zimmerman) was chasing Trayvon because he was black,” said Florida defense attorney Richard Hornsby.
Zimmerman could easily have been charged with second-degree murder without the issue of race coming into it at all. We just don’t know on what evidence the charges are based, and Corey is absolutely correct in trying to keep it that way at this point.
The Florida DA saw no evidence (several weeks ago) to bring charges against the “white hispanic”. Now, federal special prosecutor Angela Corey has a different take on the investigation conducted by local authorities and/or has undertaken her own independent investigation (?) and decides to bring homicide 2 charges against Zimmerman. Curiouser and curiouser, Zimmerman goes down the rabbit hole of racial justice.
Meanwhile:http://tinyurl.com/bl78kwn
Some people should be careful of what they wish for. Numbers mean nothing when the ‘others’ got the guns.
http://tinyurl.com/37vlqal
It’s pretty rare for someone to call the police just as he is about to commit a murder.
Eric Holder of the Department of JustUs will be bringing federal charges against the Black Panthers for their bounty poster any minute now, right?
“What we do know is that a prosecutor has considered the case against Zimmerman strong enough to arrest and charge him.”
No. What we know is that a “special prosecutor” has considered the racial and political riots rising around Zimmerman strong enough to bend to the winds and run out a charge against him that wasn’t in the cards a couple of weeks back. What we know is that this is starting to shape up like a legal lynching.
Taking this “special prosecutor” at her word beggars belief.
“It’s pretty rare for someone to call the police just as he is about to commit a murder.”
Crackers, white hispanic-jew or not, do this all the time right before they squeeze the trigger. Just ask Reverend Jackson, Al Sharpton, Reverend Wright, Maxine Waters, et al and they will set you on the path of racial justice.
And now that charges have been filed, only one verdict will prevent riots from happening.
It’s an old-fashioned low-tech lynching.
vanderleun: I chose my words carefully. I didn’t say the case was strong enough to convict, or even to make a strong case for conviction, although perhaps it is and perhaps it isn’t. It could be quite weak. But a prosecuter (this one, in fact) considered the case strong enough to arrest and charge Zimmerman. That’s all we know about it.
Of course it could be a response to public pressure. But there is some case there, whether strong or weak—but enough to arrest and charge him.
“We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we’ve set. We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded.” — BHO
Shades of Wilson, only far more sinister and into the shadows.
rickl: yes, the pressure to convict will be great in terms of public opinion and the threat of riots.
I think, however, it will extremely interesting to finally hear what the evidence is. I, for one, have almost no idea what it is at this point, despite all the discussion.
Or maybe because of all the discussion.
Cleanup on aisle 9:37.
Thanks for posting this! I’m glad i found your site!!
Steve
Common Cents
http://www.commoncts.blogspot.com
A prophecy:
Within 5 years Zimmerman will be dead, forgotten.
He will be convicted of something, sent to prison and murdered in retribution. There is nothing he can do about it, the mob has already decided he’s guilty. Everything from here on out is just a show trial, a kangaroo court – the evil white Mexican must die.
“Strong enough.” Nope.
“Political enough.” Yup.
Without knowing the guilt or innocence, and believing justice should, but cannot, be allowed to run its course – acknowledging all that – what I see is a man who stepped up to help others in his community stay safe.
Sometimes that meant following bad guys, at some point it must have become dangerous enough that he felt the need to be armed.
We have a neighborhood watch. And we have chased down car burglars. And we knew that at some point, they were going to graduate from unarmed to armed. Why do we care? How do you explain it to someone who does not get it. We take care of our own (and no, none of us, thus far, has gone armed.) We do it to protect ourselves AND OUR NEIGHBORS.
But I think, given this, that we will be disbanding the watch. The idea that this kind of firestorm could be unleashed on one man who was protecting his neighbors, and not have them stand with him is very disturbing.
The shooting was a tragedy. No question. But we are now entering some other kind of police state, where we are no longer permitted to protect ourselves, and the highest levels of government are encouraging mob rule, bounties, dead or alive posters and the worst kind of race-baiting.
It’s shocking. It may already be too late for this nation.
I note, in passing, that this did not go to a grand jury but is the move of one appointed functionary. Gotta keep those juries out of the picture if you want the railroad to roll.
vanderleun: take a look:
So the grand jury can cut either way; Zimmerman could have been facing a first-degree murder charge instead of second degree.
Also, in practice, grand juries usually just follow the prosecutors’ recommendations rather than acting as the check on prosecutors that they are supposed to be:
This incident happened back in February. The police who responded to the scene and the local DA saw no reason to prosecute Zimmerman. Only after the case became a national–even international–cause célé¨bre was a prosecution brought. That speaks volumes.
Law-abiding citizens who act in self-defense should not have to fear criminal prosecution. Nobody who shoots a burglar, mugger, or carjacker should have to defend themselves in court, with all the attending expense and negative publicity.
If there was any question that Zimmerman had acted improperly, he should have been arrested and prosecuted right away. But he wasn’t.
This is a political trial, plain and simple. We didn’t even need to wait for a second Obama term for them to start.
And as I just saw on another forum:
I think that is ultimately the point of this.
Here’s a little pondering by a Winter Park citizen, 15-minutes south of Sanford: Me. Unless the prosecutor has some very heavy duty evidence not yet revealed, a 2nd Degree Murder conviction isn’t gonna happen. Maybe Involuntary Manslaughter would have flown, but there is No Jury in Florida that’s going to buy this grift. They can try that white..errr…white-latino…errr…Latino repeatedly for 5-years on this charge and it’s going to be a hopelessly Hung Jury.
The Wee Devil in me rather hopes that the Race Hustlers & PC-Thought Police keep shrilling for the next 6-months. Yep, Your Infantile Majesty, Your Uniter-Hoper-Changer-Toner Guy, your sorrya** troops are looking to divide us worse than anything since the Freedom Rider days. Yikes…You mean that’s what you want, too, Oh Divinity? Okie Doaky, can you say 40+states in November Boy King?
This is an attempt by those in power to put fear into anyone who dares defend their lives. If Americans don’t soon put the democrat party into the dustbin of history, we won’t survive this as a recognisable country.
It’s time to fucking stand up.
Here are the choices: assume the Florida DA and the local police were intent on covering up a racially motivated murder (‘hate crime’) or were grossly negligent; or assume the federal special prosecutor is engaged in race baiting or is attempting to right an injustice. We don’t know all the evidence, nor the initial testimony of white hispanic-jew Zimmer. Still, something smells about the whole media-Sharpton-Holder-Obama reaction to this case weeks after the actual event.
I suspect BHO can now write off all of Florida’s 27 electoral votes. Bad move Holder, and perhaps happens game over before it begins.
I saw some comments at Ace of Spades earlier today that suggested that this could be part of Obama’s strategy. Stir up race hatred and even violence; then Obama calms the waters with some stirring speeches.
Maybe. Naturally, he’d have the media on his side extolling his virtues to anyone who doesn’t get the point.
What is interesting is that the evidence which is publicly known is in Zimmerman’s favor. So, this is a case in which we have no choice but to continue to be patient, for months, until we finally are allowed to see if the Special Prosecutor has important evidence which has not yet been made public. For observers, it is extended limbo. All of our accumulated life experiences and observations cause us to suspect this, or to suspect that, yet we simply will not know, for months, if our suspicions are accurate.
Rickl,
Obama has never used the Sister Soljah card. I think the card would help him. Even if he doesn’t play it, I agree that this case is an excellent opportunity for Obama to make himself appear noble, as in his so called “brilliant” speech on race. Media would be eager publicists of Obama’s nobility.
I must admit that I fully expect the Obama Campaign to orchestrate the use of race in the cause of re-election. I would be shocked if they do not do so in myriad ways, and in a big way. To not use race … would go against everything which I believe they are. In truth, they have already used race – including Trayvon, and they have already thrown out some feelers re race, in order to pre-judge national reaction to their eventual gambits.
Rose says, “But we are now entering some other kind of police state, where we are no longer permitted to protect ourselves, and the highest levels of government are encouraging mob rule, bounties, dead or alive posters and the worst kind of race-baiting.”
That is what the left wants but is not what they will get. This is America, not Russia. This is America, not the killing fields of Cambodia. They seek to sow the winds of discord. That is never a good strategy for they will find themselves lost in a whirlwind.
Angela Corey was appointed by Forida Governor Rick Scott. She isn’t a Fed.
Make that “Florida Governor Rick Scott.”
Preview is your friend.
Who cares whether she is a Fed or not? Even Republican governors and Prosecutors can shrink before the threat of a racial maelstrom. That is what has been threatened in loud and clear terms.
Parker suggests that if they stir it up, they will reap the whirlwind. I do not believe that. Wife and I were discussing it, and my comment then and now is that we will bitch and moan, and on 4/15 we will send in our tax returns and go on living like good little citizens.
Actually we have little choice. The fact is that we cannot organize any opposition to what is transpiring in our country. The power is in the hands of Obama and Holder. They can look the other way when the Black Panthers do their dirty stuff, but don’t you try it. The power of the government will fall on you like a ton of bricks.
Meanwhile, Conservatives around the country are bitching, moaning and doing anything they can to undercut Romney, when we should be uniting behind him to take the power away from Obama. But, oh gee, he is not Ronald Reagan. We are our own next to worst enemies. Our worst enemy sits in the catbird seat surrounded by his merry band of constitution hating trolls.
Unfortunately, this will be a politically charged case. It need not have been so. The politics of racial division as injected into this smack of a tactical diversion. Anything to stir up the black base and the social justice types. Another tragedy in which the participants are pawns in an ugly chess game.
What gets lost in all this is that a young man is dead. I identify with the parents. I can see the grief in their eyes. I have been there and know the despair they are feeling. Turning it into a racial cause celebre is a cruel act that does them no favors.
The trial, hopefully, will lay out the evidence and justice will be done. If Zimmerman is found not guilty, the entire weight of the justice system should be used to insure there are no acts of vigilantism by such as the New Black Panther Party. If he is found guilty, we must accept the verdict as justice being served. However, I hope he will not be put in a prison where he won’t be safe. Prison justice is an ugly thing that besmirches the system.
The Brief Period of Violent Upheaval comes ever closer. Does my forecast of inevitable collapse seem a wee bit less crazy now?
point Says:
Preview is your friend.
———-
Especially now that we have preview here. LOL!
foxmarks: I see nothing inevitable. Have some historical perspective: the Depression (when we teetered on the brink of socialism), the assassinations and riots in the 60s (teetering on the brink of race war), just for starters.
But even if a collapse were inevitable, that’s no excuse whatsoever for someone making that collapse even more inevitable, as you’re planning to do by facilitating the election of Obama.
This smells a lot like Mr. Nifong’s case to me. Kangaroo court.
Will it still be considered “justice” (should a trial ensue) and Zimmerman is found not guilty?
Neo,
I’ve been reading a lot of blog comments on the Zimmerman case that talk about the problems in the black community. One thing I haven’t seen discussed is the role of the white radical chic in selling out honorable, competent middle class blacks to the rabble rousers. Few seem to realize the enormous changes that occurred in the sixties and seventies. Many of these commenters seem thoughtful but also younger. Like you, I came of age in the sixties, and I value the perspective that gives me on today’s events.
I remember the panic I felt at the Kennedy assassination. Yet we survived. Perhaps that’s one reason my reaction to 9/11 was not so much panic as trying to learn and understand what was happening so we could cope.
NeoConScum:
White juries in Florida can be intimidated by New Black Panthers just as Zimmerman most certainly was. I’m not so sure that a jury wouldn’t find him guilty.
Also, re the NBP’s cute little bounty DOA posters, can anyone doubt that there would be arrests mucho pronto if a “New White Panther” party put up similar posters regarding any alleged black perpetrator? Or even a white-black or Black-Hispanic? Holder, et al., would be johnny on the spot with handcuffs.
The cops and prosecutors on the scene when this killing happened looked at the evidence and declined to prosecute Zimmerman. Then, a whole truckload of race hustlers, Black Panthers, MSM Editorialists, and Obama & Co. injected themselves into this case, to stir up Obama’s black base in an election year and, in effect, to a form an intimidating lynch mob.
So, I now see this as purely political persecution; the OJ trial in reverse. There the guilty OJ was acquitted because of his race and the race of the victim and as “payback,” here Zimmerman will be convicted because of his race (it’s a twofer, he’s both White and Hispanic) and the race of the victim and as “payback,” and because it is politically convenient. The Dreyfus trial also comes to mind.
The MSM has “poisoned the jury pool” in every way possible by releasing an avalanche of deliberately falsified information, all of which indicts Zimmerman. The New Black Panthers have posted wanted posters on Zimmerman, and the authorities just look the other way. This tells you which way the wind is blowing.
The prosecutor has bypassed the grand jury, which sometimes acts as a restraint on a prosecutor’s power. The prosecutor is black and, from reports, is known as a controversial and harsh prosecutor. AG holder has weighed in, too, promising a second line of attack if she doesn’t do the job. Does anyone think that the local authorities, facing possible “civil unrest” if Zimmerman is acquitted, will let him be acquitted?
So, do I expect Zimmerman to get anything like a fair trial? Absolutely not, especially since it does not look, so far, like Zimmerman will have anything like first class legal representation.
And I point out that, if they can jack up ”white Hispanic” Zimmerman like this, they can jack up anybody.
I’ve said this elsewhere: there’s a tendency for conservatives to assume this is all some deep game by Obama, some amazingly clever and subtle scheme.
It’s not. He’s just that stupid. When he was a “community organizer” back in Chicago, ginning up a situation like this was always a good idea. Get some publicity, scare the honkies into coughing up some cash, get some high-fives from the brothers, all good stuff.
Now he’s going to do the same on a national scale, apparently under the impression that black voters are enough to give him an electoral majority. He really is that stupid.
J.J. formerly Jimmy J. Says:
“Turning it into a racial cause celebre is a cruel act that does them no favors.”
OMG, yes, this happens so many times with so many cases in the past that I have often wondered how naive those being used must be.
Truly, their grief must be so great that they don’t even see how they are nothing but tools to the powers that be.
There may yet not be a trial. Based on various legal columns on Florida law it is my understanding that in a self defense case the judge must review the prosecution’s case prior to it moving to trial.
“Moreover, the Florida statute provides an additional layer of protection to a defendant claiming self-defense: A judge must decide whether the defendant is “immune from prosecution,” that is, if the judge believes his actions fall under the law of self-defense.”
http://www.cnn.com/2012/04/10/opinion/dershowitz-trayvon-prosecutor-nightmare/index.html
There is little doubt that this arrest was to quell the lynch mob attitude being fanned by the race-baiters and the media. There is some possibility that there is additional evidence that has not leaked to the public that would indicate that Zimmerman shot Martin with the intent to take his life. Murder 2 requires that the prosecution prove intent. A very high bar based on what we know so far.
It is hard to see how an investigation that has so far injected so much information and misinformation into the public debate would suddenly seal itself and with regard to evidence of a “smoking gun” with regard to Zimmerman.
We’ll see but, no matter how this goes, this has to hurt Obama with hispanics who’ve already cooled toward him since 2008. If he loses hispanics or wins them only narrowly he can kiss Fl goodbye in November. This trial will prevent the Obama campaign from changing focus with hispanics.
WE all know Zimmerman will get off. Like the history of this nation. They will move him to a place with an all white jury as they did the day an all-white Simi Valley jury, despite the videotape, concluded that the evidence was not sufficient to convict LAPD officers Laurence Powell , Timothy Wind, Theodore Briseno and Sergeant Stacey Koon . Or as when J. W. Milam and Roy Bryant were found not guilty by an all white jury in the killing of Emitt Till. Zimmerman is all that is wrong with America. No wonder The Tea Party reminds many of George Lincoln Rockwell Revisited.
The supreme soviet has spoken..
the grand jury was not needed, a feminist prosecutor who has been oppressed since before she was born, will step in and handle it, as we all know, like adobo, such will make it better, as she and other oppressed have a view which the oppressors just dont have…
not like i havent quoted this before:
Show me the man and I will show you the crime – Lavrentiy Pavlovich Beria was a Soviet politician, and chief of the Soviet security and secret police apparatus under Stalin
The rule of law has been dead since the election, but like an event horizon, you cant perceive it directly, only in outcomes.
and as ANY child who knows communism, the outcome is ALWAYS what the state says it should be…
Eh Tovarish?
.
rawdagbuffalo: happy trolling. It is very important to prepare the ground in case there’s an acquittal, isn’t it? The acquittal must be invalidated before the trial even begins or before you know what the evidence will be.
[note from neo-neocon: this is a comment by “T,” but for some reason it was being blocked by the spam filter. I’m posting it this way instead to see whether it works.]
I’m interested that no one here or anywhere else has yet posted on Angela Corey’s comment quoted above:
“We have to protect this prosecution and this investigation for Trayvon, for George Zimmerman.”
She is on a first-name basis with the decedent but uses the full name of the alleged beating victim. Note also that it’s not “. . . AND Geroge Zimmerman.” It seems that Zimmerman’s name is added almost as an afterthought. (Disclosure: I haven’t heard a taped comment, I’m writing only from the printed quote above.)
I’d don’t think that this presupposes a verdict, but it sure seems like a poker “tell” of the special prosecutor’s bias and intentions in this case.
“We do not prosecute by public pressure or by petition.”
Even if true, that’s exactly what someone who was prosecuting for public relations purposes would say.
rawdawgbuffalo, do you realize that you had to go back to 1955 for your examples?
the people who ran the highlander school, where Rosa Parks went, MLK and pete seeger, were found to have been blowing up black families they had moved into houses themselves! they were reconstructing the hstory of the democrats and knights of the white camelia so that what they did would be remembered and a black man would never vote for the Radicals again!!!!!!!
Lynching Statistics
(This page was developed by a Berea College student as part of a course on Chesnutt)
http://www.chesnuttarchive.org/classroom/lynchingstat.html
ever ask why the stats stop at the year they did? and why do they START at that date?
Lynchings, by Year and Race,
1882-1968*
http://www.chesnuttarchive.org/classroom/lynching_table_year.html
MOST of the lynchings happen leading up to the HAYES tilden… in which democrats and the knights of the white camelia ran trough the parishes and murdered blacks… (in numbers VASTLY larger than the lynchings!!!)
Knights of the White Camelia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knights_of_the_White_Camelia
The Knights of the White Camelia was a secret group of the American South from 1867 through about 1870, similar to and associated with the Ku Klux Klan, supporting white supremacy and opposed to Republican (party) government.
so who are you actually on the side of?
the people who wanted slavery to stop, or the people who wanted to keep it and were willing to murder blacks in large numbers to have it?
oh… should i also point out that democrats being socilaist and all, are also trying to create a slave state…
do you think blacks under socialism will fare better? the soviet union elected their first black last year… the democrats didnt until the 1930s… the republicans did before lincoln…
African Americans in the United States Congress
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_Americans_in_the_United_States_Congress
African Americans began serving in greater numbers in the United States Congress during the Reconstruction Era following the American Civil War after slaves were emancipated and granted citizenship rights.
GREATER numbers… ie. they started serving in congress BEFORE slaves were freed by the white race and by radical republicans…
[the white western civ is the only race that has abolished slavery in as many forms as possible… africa still has slaves, so does the arab states, as does china, and russia, and asia. and NONE of them are even a bit caring about stopping it… ]
the wiki is dishonest…
it does not start BEFORE reconstruction
so if you read it, your going to think that it was that that did it.. no.. it was befrore that.
read this
The Thirteenth Amendment (ratified December 6, 1865), abolished slavery.
1865.. and the lunching stats start at?
Lynchings, by Year and Race, 1882-1968*
why? because thats when the democrats and knights of the white camelia acted.
The first African American elected to the U.S. Senate was Hiram Rhodes Revels, who in 1869 filled the seat vacated by Confederate President Jefferson Davis.
Also in 1869, fellow Republican Joseph H. Rainey became the first black member of the U.S. House of Representatives.
Blanche K. Bruce,Born into slavery in 1841, Elected to the Senate in 1874…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_African-American_firsts
first african american DEMOCRAT..
First African American elected to the U.S. House of Representatives as a Democrat: Arthur W. Mitchell (Illinois)
see… after the democrats had murdered them for 40-60 years, they got smart and switched to the democrats…
even THAT Wiki is doctored
here i will show you..
search for republican on that page, you get this..
1928 – First post-Reconstruction African American elected to U.S. House of Representatives: Oscar Stanton De Priest (Republican; Illinois)
but IF you know REVEL above…
1870 January: First African American elected to either chamber of the U.S. Congress: Senator Hiram Rhodes Revels (R-Miss.)
see? search for first republican, and you get 1928… search for the ACTUAL First republican revel, and get 1870
but most blacks dont know their own histories. heck, they dont know the man who INVENTED kwanza stuck a soldering iron down a black womans throat, and crushed anothers foot in a vice… merry xmas.
but in a way… some nasty white racists woudl say… they deserve what they get if they are so stupid…
hard to argue with that if you know the history, the facts, and even know what SANGER the inventor of the NEGRO PROJECT said to do IF the blacks started to wake up..
IF you have read a copy of her AUTOBIOGRAPHY you would know the quotes they say are not hers ARE hers.
http://womenshistory.about.com/od/quotes/a/margaret_sanger_2.htm
says this
A quote taken out of context: “We do not want word to get out that we want to exterminate the Negro population.” (In the context, it’s apparent that she didn’t want such word to get out because such a characterization of her work was common — and untrue. Then as now.)
this is an outright lie…
the whole quote is..
This is one of the dangers of carrying a gun – if you use it, you will be in uncomfortably close contact with the criminal justice system. While the old saw is ‘better to be judged by 12 than carried by 6’ is as true as ever, the judging seems to be pretty painful.
My sympathies extend to everyone in this tragedy, with an exception for the race hustlers.
I have the impression that Zimmerman is a modern day Socrates, drinking the hemlock because that is what society and its laws require of him.
We have so much heat here, so little light.
Trayvon was “just walking home” through a GATED community where he did not reside, and not in its streets, but via backyards? At what time did the T-Z encounter occur? Day or night?
Don Carlos- From what I have read, it was around 7:30 P.M., it was dark, and it was raining. One would wonder what Treyvon–who one account says had a girlfriend in one of these townhouses, and was on the cell phone with her part of the time as this incident played out– was doing there, according to Zimmerman, looking around, and walking through the wet grass behind the fenced off yards of townhouses in this gated community.
P.S.–Apparently Zimmerman told the 911 operator he was “sick and tired of these “a-holes” getting away,” so I presume that there was a history of intruders coming into this community and getting chased out.
I’d like to see what kind of history there has been of this kind of thing, are we talking vandalism, robberies, or loitering, and just cutting through.
P.S.S.–I’d also like to know just how “gated” this community really was. Are we talking an attended entrance with barriers and then a continuous fence surrounding the entire community, or are we talking about a symbolic gate–not attended at night, or perhaps, even attended at all, and haphazard, gap-filled fencing that is more decorative than effective? Because the one description/drawing I saw makes it look like the route Treyvon took going back to his house-according to some sources some 1,000 feet from the 7-11 where he bought the Skittles, cut through this “gated” community.
I thought he was temporarily visiting and staying with a relative or family friend who lived in the gated community. And that the community is not a luxury community, but a middle class one that’s had a lot of trouble with crime.
Don’t remember where I read that, but it was towards the time the story first came out.