The Zimmerman Case

Note: A verdict may be announced by the time this entry is posted for all to read. This is my sincere opinion; feel free to fill in the comments section below with constructive banter - no trolling allowed!

I know I haven't paid as close attention to the George Zimmerman trial in Florida as I would've have liked to, but a lot of it has to do with moving. That being said, I'll step out on a limb and say he's guilty of killing Trayvon Martin. However, he walks because of Florida's Stand Your Ground law which is designed to protect a certain constituency. To me, it seems like the laws created to selectively protect people like Zimmerman are steeped in racism. How else can you justify 46 calls to the police every time a suspicious (read: black) male is in the neighborhood? One call to Sanford Police Department even concerned a seven-year-old child! When the dispatcher told him to hang back and not follow Martin, Zimmerman willfully violated that command and gave chase anyway as if he were already a fully certified police instead of a volunteer neighborhood watch man. If you're explicitly told not to pursue a possible suspect because it is unknown if he is armed and dangerous, then why disregard key instructions? It doesn't make any sense. What if he had gotten himself killed, if not banged up worse? Will it be worth playing hero? Didn't think so.

Another reason why I think Zimmerman goes free is the lack of admissible evidence. I know I'm not a law student - personally, I would've gone into educational law - but the state is doing itself no significant favors by allowing events that are irrelevant to what happened February 26, 2012 such as toxicology results showing Martin smoked marijuana and his text messages several weeks prior. What matters is what happened that night. We also know there was a fight and Martin just happened to kick a grown man's ass; it still doesn't justify shooting him in the heart. Surely the jury deserves the opportunity to decide whose cries were heard on the recording. As both mothers have relived those tragic moments and identified their sons as the one who yelled, the six women who serve as jury members must take into account that one son is no longer here while the other is in court attempting to fight for his life.

I discovered that Florida has a stiffer penalty for manslaughter than second-degree murder; if Zimmerman is found guilty, there is a greater possibility of his return to society. How? Easy: Manslaughter in the Sunshine State is an automatic thirty years in prison without the chance of parole, while second-degree murder is twenty years to life depending on the sentencing judge. Assuming he gets the minimum in this case, he could be out of prison in as little as fourteen years thanks to good behavior and other incentives toward an early release date. Thank the conservatives who control all facets of that state's government and those of us who harp for a black-and-white world that demands swift justice until it happens to one of a certain class. Stand Your Ground theoretically allows individuals to protect themselves in life-or-death situations; in practice, it covertly presents open season on young black males. We (including myself) are merely deer with nowhere to hide in an open field. The law protects the aggressor in the majority of cases, particularly when the shooter is white and the victim is black, just as this situation. Put this in reverse and I can personally guarantee that the black male goes away for many years if he is not sent to death row. I find it strange that such a small percentage of the American populace is culpable in so many crimes.

As always, language plays a role. We all know Martin was seventeen years old; he thought, spoke, dressed, and otherwise was a normal teenager. Having been seventeen once upon a time, I looked grown-up at 5'10", 160 pounds, and perhaps carried myself with a bit more poise than my contemporaries, but I was still a kid in the eyes of my parents, teachers, older co-workers at Taco Bell, fellow community members, etc. The world hadn't exposed its ugly side to me back in 1996 (I turned 18 in December of that year, hence the immaturity), so I did the silly stuff:  pass out free food to my friends and family, play a LOT of basketball, decry homework, pursue girls who could care less, spend disposable income on sneakers and music, and so forth. Of course, I could flip the proverbial switch and let the tears fall like torrential rain when the times required such. I'm not entirely defending Martin, but his brain was still developing at the time of his death. Maybe those strong words from his mouth were enough of a threat to provoke Zimmerman to fear for his life causing him to shoot him.

On the flip side, Zimmerman should have known better. Calling what amounts to any young black male "suspicious" and saying "these fucking assholes always get away" does not bode well for a man who claims not to be racist. Words are one thing, but actions tell the tale. In the black community, we know that anytime a white person mentions this line: I'm not racist. Some of my best friends are black, they are masking their true bigoted feelings with a tired cop-out line to justify thoughts and actions. We see right through it, and so does God. Be honest with yourselves; I'm okay with that. I'll at least respect your honesty even if I find myself at an extreme distance from you. Remember, Heaven is not a segregated place.

The final reason Zimmerman walks a free man is because our legal system is primed for white males to escape scot-free. As voters, we need to realize that certain people either benefit or suffer disproportionately from certain laws, and Stand Your Ground is one of them. For example, why do crack users get tougher prison sentences than cocaine users when both are powder drugs that either get injected into a vein or snorted up the nostril? Simple. To look tough to us, prosecutors throw the book at crack offenders [mostly black] while cocaine violators receive lighter sentences and rehabilitation opportunities. In this case, gun laws and racism have been intertwined since the 1800s. Remember reading about Turner's Revolt? What about state laws that limited gun ownership to certain folks post-Civil War in fear of retribution? Even nearly fifty years ago when conservative icon (and later President) Gov. Ronald Reagan enacted the Mulford Act with the NRA's blessing to keep guns out of black hands? Stand Your Ground continues a time honored Jim Crow tradition of separate rules for prosecuting the same crime. If you're white, then you're right; if you're black, you're wrong even if the event was warranted. Sad to say that in 2013, white privilege still exists; the legal system of law enforcement, politicians, and judges, all have every incentive to do the morally correct thing  yet the laws have become more restrictive than open. It also exposes the hypocrisy of today's Republican Party: pro-life, yet pro-death penalty. Disagree? Look at any of the sixteen states that make up the American South and tell me that black or brown life matters. It's already difficult enough to get a fair trial when skin color equals guilt; this is an epidemic, as I've lived in the Northeast several years ago. Until we realize that many of our laws are discriminatory in their current language, the same end result will continue.

While I hope Zimmerman is found guilty, I'm pretty certain he will walk a free man albeit a marked man for the remainder of his days. Our judicial system has not progressed to where a defining characteristic such as race can be minimized. All we can do is pray those six women make the correct decision versus the convenient one because if Sanford erupts, that could be the domino that tips off riots throughout the nation. Will we have learned anything?