The Trayvon Trial

I've thought manslaughter would be a better charge to bring for quite awhile.

The thing is that if Martin did walk down the dog path and then returned and confronted Zimmerman, legally speaking, that would be initiating a new encounter, as the last one technically ended once Zimmerman stopped following Martin and Martin moved to the end of the street.

That's why the time line of events is so important.

But yeah, I'd say if anything a manslaughter charge would stick easier than 2nd degree murder charges.

Or wreckless homicide. Negligent homicide.

Something along those lines.

Cad_sl said:

Those are lesser included charges that the jury could find him guilty of. Unless Florida criminal proceedings work very strangely.

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I should have thought about that. Its a good point, they could find him not guilty of murder in 2nd degree and instead find him guilty of a lesser charge.

I'd say that's far more likely than him being found guilty or completely exonerated at this point.

With the way the media has handled things I dunno man. The all female jury might feel more sympathetic towards the witness yesterday, and empathize with Trayvon's mother's grief, etc. this might swing them to find him guilty of a lesser charge where in other cases they might have found him not guilty.

Araysar_sl said:

Confrontation didnt end, had Zimmerman not followed Martin, Martin would have had no reason to confront Zimmerman.

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I could be wrong, because I'm not a lawyer nor an arm chair lawyer, but the way the law works from my understanding is that if Martin returned up the path and confronted Zimmerman after getting away from him, then Martin would unfortunately become the aggressor in that situation. The law is funnily specific like that. If you and I get in a fight, and I get away and then return a few minutes later and attack you again, I became the aggressor, regardless if you actually initiated the fight. To take that example further, if you and I get in a fight, and I flee and come back with a gun and shoot you, I can be charged with basically 1st degree murder. I premeditated, grabbed my gun, and returned to the fight to shoot you.

Intent and the order of events becomes all important.

Ah but that would imply that Zimmerman was still following Martin when the attack happened. Apparently Zimmerman had stopped at the entrance to the dog path, and Martin moved all the way down the street to his father's townhome, then returned and confronted Zimmerman. So there was no ambush. And ambushing someone who is following you when they haven't engaged in physical violence against you probably makes you the aggressor as well, which I agree, a little weird.

However, I could see the jury finding Zimmerman's actions as mitigating circumstances that prevent him from total exoneration, hence why I think manslaughter or negligent homicide might be better charges to find him guilty of.

The problem is determining to what extent Zimmerman's actions justified Martin attacking him, if at all. And that, of course, seems to boil down to perspective. I do think Zimmerman was a retarded mall cop wannabe who was far over reaching what he should have been doing in terms of self policing his neighborhood, but if Martin initiated the physical violence after escaping Zimmerman for a period of time, from the legal point of view, all that stuff becomes sort of moot.

From an non legal standpoint, I completely agree with you, these should all be mitigating circumstances, but when thinking about it like a juror and from the instructions jurors are given and the context of the law, I'm just not sure any of these other factors (Zimmerman racially profiling, Zimmerman intiating the original event by being basically a neighborhood vigilante, Zimmerman listening or not listening to the 911 operator, etc) are going to have any impact whatsoever.

Of course since its a jury trial, who really knows what could be considered an important factor to any particular juror. They could very well consider Zimmerman's actions to be the cause of the killing and find him guilty of second degree murder. I just don't think its likely at this point.