During her testimony before the Senate Travon Martin's mother had to listen to the Tea Party distortions and dissembling of the likes of Theodore Cruz (Asshat Esq.)
http://www.rawstory.com/...
The conservative Cruz said during the Senate hearing that everything that was known about the events leading to Martin’s death had been presented to a jury, which decided that Zimmerman had not committed either crime listed on the charges. [2nd Degree Murder and Manslaughter]
“The ‘stand your ground law’ was not a defense that was raised,” Cruz said.
Cruz also argued during the hearing that black defendants were more successful than whites when invoking “stand your ground” laws as a defense.
But of course, Cruz was wrong on all the above.
Cruz claim that Blacks are more successful than Whites when invoking stand your ground comes from a Daily Caller article which says that the ratio between the two groups is 55% (Black) and 53% (White), which is hardly statistically significant.
However data from that exact same report shows that the disparity isn't on the side of the shooter, it's on the side of the victim. When the victim is black, stand your ground has been used by the defendant to avoid prosecution 78% of the time, but when the victim was white - it has only been 56%.
And then when you look at inter-racial shootings, yet another study shows that those number become far more pronounced.
Another study found that white-on-black homicides were 354 percent more likely to result in an acquittal in states that have “stand your ground” laws.
On the issue of whether "Stand Your Ground" was even invoked, Sybrina pointed out how simply the fact that there wasn't a SYG pre-trial hearing doesn't mean that SYG rules weren't in play.
“The jury was given instructions that had information on there about stand your ground, so it’s not like we’re making, you know, making anything up,” Fulton said. “It’s just that it was being used.”
The jury instructions did include significant portion of "Stand Your Ground" verbiage, they also didn't include a "Initial Agressor" clause due to a ruling by the judge and were more than a little vague on the issue of "involuntary" manslaughter, which left the jury little choice but to find Zimmerman not guilty since they couldn't prove, as instructed, they he had "
committed a deliberate negligent act" which would have knowingly led to Trayvon Martin's death.
As if chasing and hunting down a scared kid who had already run away and hid while armed with a loaded gun that has no safety, after the dispatcher said "We don't need you to follow him" while cursing "Fucking Punks" who "always get away" wasn't a "deliberate act" in and of itself.
This is on top of witness opinion and physical evidence that the prosecution ignored indicating that Zimmerman Grabbed Trayvon, which would have shown that his "punches" were merely his attempt to Stand HIS Ground and escape from being illegally detained not the other way around.
“I have a problem when children have to be afraid when they go to the store for a soda and candy. You want everybody to feel comfortable and everybody to feel safe in their neighborhood,” Fulton said Tuesday night on PoliticsNation.
Yeah, you do. Stand Your Ground doesn't help with that much.
Vyan