The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #143916   Message #3324298
Posted By: Paul Burke
17-Mar-12 - 05:33 PM
Thread Name: BS: Killed for being black? Florida today
Subject: BS: Killed for being black? Florida today
This is an unashamed cut and paste from PZ Myers' excellent blog, Pharyngula. I don't know if it's true; in fact I really hope it's not. But I'd like comments from American catters, especially those of the law/n/order tendency.

Trayvon Martin went to a convenience store in his family's neighborhood to buy some candy. He was 17. He was unarmed. He was black.

George Zimmerman, a self-appointed "neighborhood watch leader", called the police to report a "suspicious person"; he was told not to confront him, but somehow in the next few minutes Zimmerman got out there and shot and murdered Trayvon Martin. The puffed-up coward Zimmerman grabbed his gun, confronted a teenager carrying nothing but a bag of Skittles, and murdered him. There is no possible excuse, no way that there could be some exculpatory fact to justify his actions: Zimmerman was carrying a loaded gun and on a mission of self-inflated importance to defend his neighborhood (which was also Martin's neighborhood) from suspicious young black men.

What do you think happened next, when the police arrived on the scene and found Zimmerman with a smoking gun, who immediately admitted to gunning Trayvon Martin down?

Nothing.

Zimmerman is still free. It's been two weeks; no action is being taken. The Florida district attorney is even dragging his heels about deciding to investigate the murder, and claiming that Zimmerman was a pillar of the community.

Sign the petition. Tell racist goddamned Florida they can't just ignore a vigilante who murders young black people.

It gets worse. Recordings of 911 calls on the night of the murder are available: Martin was screaming for help and begging for his life when Zimmerman gunned him down. And apparently what sent Zimmerman on his macho crusade to stop a suspicious suspect was that Martin was running away.

Why hasn't he been arrested?