Yes, the phone records exist to prove that the call was or was not made. But we have only her word (I think) about the nature of the conversation. And once again, she at best only heard some of what happened - she did not see it. Even if she is not lying (or simply not remembering correctly), her testimony gives only an incomplete picture.
No. With Stand Your Ground the way it seems to be interpreted here, Martin is justified in using force -- even lethal force -- if he reasonably thought he was in danger. So, he'd be justified in hitting or even killing Zimmerman if a reasonable person would have thought he was a danger. And, since there were no witnesses to the start of the confrontation besides Zimmerman, I doubt you could prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Martin was not acting in self-defense.
If this story is true it is even more favorable to Zimmerman than the narrative I offered earlier in this thread. If this is in fact what happened, Zimmerman likely should get off. It's interesting though. Earlier when I said the cries may have been from Zimmerman people seemed 100% that it was impossible. This is why we should wait for all the facts to come out before we jump to conclusions. We still don't know.
1. That's not what his own statute says. 2. Once again, there is no mention of proportionality in the statute:
That actually is a bit murky. you provoke someone verbally using "fighting words" then you cannot claim self-defense. Here is something from another site http://www.bicyclelaw.com/articles/a.cfm/legally-speaking-deliverance-of-the-bird-man1 [rquoter]There’s one more limitation to self-defense that we should consider: You can’t provoke somebody into attacking you so that you can retaliate and call it “self-defense.” Well, what does that mean? What exactly is“provocation”? Generally, provocation would be an act or words that provoke the other person into fighting. So does that mean that any act or word could be provocation, no matter how sensitive the other person? No—it would all depend on whether a jury considers the act or words to be provocation. Obviously, provocation would include an assault or battery; if you provoke somebody into fighting by assaulting them, you would be the aggressor, and you would therefore be unable to claim “self-defense” if you subsequently respond to the other person’s act of self-defense. It could also include other words or acts that provoke a fight, including words or acts intended to provoke a fight. What about flipping the bird? Could that be a provocation? It appears so—indecent gestures are considered to be the equivalent of indecent oroffensive language—what the Supreme Court has called “fighting words.” If the person uttering the fighting words or the making the indecent gesture provokes a fight, and a jury considers the fighting words or indecent gesture to be a provocation, the person can’t then fight back and claim self-defense.What about that buzzing—could that be provocation? Yes, if that’s how a jury sees it.[/rquoter]
I am not sure that is correct. It used to be that way, but I think there has been a shift in who has the burden of proof.
The proportionality is in the statement "meet force with force". He elaborated on what that meant by stating that is proportional. It includes deadly force but as the rest of the clause shows that is subject to a reasonable standard. I will agree though that the law seems poorly written and addressed that in another thread.
That seems to contradict what is reported in the LA Times story that according to police testimony. [rquoter]Zimmerman told police he he'd lost sight of Martin and was heading back to his car when the youth suddenly stepped into his path. [/rquoter] So does Martin step in front of Zimmerman or does he approach from the left rear? The latter seems more likely but I will stand by the scenario I outlined earlier that since Zimmerman had lost sight of Martin he was didn't realize how close Martin was.
Numerous stories have contradicted each other. In reality, we are still going on about the same crap.
Honestly, we're probably not qualified to say (at least I'm not). Even if the law doesn't specify proportionality, it may be affected by some other law, or have precedent that dictates proportionality and we wouldn't know without being a lawyer with some experience in Florida criminal law.
I'm calling this thread dead. The horse has now been turned into pink slime. Unless something new happens that materially changes the facts, it comes down to how the law will be interpreted. And I also hope that FL revisits this law and clarifies it so we don't have a bunch of vigilantes setting up people and then shooting them.
Blows to the head and certainly beating someones head on the ground is deadly force. Once you pass the deadly force thresh hold, it doesn't matter the method.
Martin likely would have been justified to defend himself since Zimmereman started it. But who cares, that's a hypothetical situation that has little to no bearing on this case. This thread is dead to me. I'm claiming self defense on this thread.
With the new account of events, people obviously looked past several key physical pieces of evidence. cuts on the back of his head and marks verifying his head being beat to the ground and him being punched in the face an extremely close range gunshot wound a bullet trajectory that indicates Martin was on top of him If all of these are true (pure speculation on my part but all of these are at least KNOWN to be true or not) there is no way you get a murder conviction
If those physical pieces of evidence are there that I mentioned, they are concrete. Bullet trajectory and range is something that can be determined very accurately. You likely have several cops and paramedics to testify about wounds. Unless he has a crap lawyer, I don't see anything sticking. I mean seriously, guy on top of you, beating your head on concrete means you are basically pwn3d.
