re: #331 Lidane

Bullshit. Absolute bullshit.

First, he followed the kid in his car. Then he chased him on foot, terrorizing Martin. Then he attacks him, pulls a gun on him, and murders him in the streets.

All of that counts as breaking the law.

But regardless of what happened during the fight, Zimmerman’s actions went well beyond defending himself and others from physical threats, and into the territory of vigilantism — and they should be illegal. Zimmerman sought out this confrontation, and as a result a young man is dead — a young man who was unarmed, who was not carrying drugs, and who very well may have done nothing more than defend himself against a stranger who followed him on the street. Trayvon Martin visited his father, walked to 7-Eleven to buy some Skittles during the halftime of the NBA All-Star game, and for that wound up dead at the hands of the “neighborhood watch.”

VerBruggen is a lawyer, looking at the case from that perspective. He makes very clear that he thinks Zimmerman did wrong and Martin died because of it. What he is uncertain about is given what all has happened, if Zimmerman can actually be convicted of anything. I’d add that part of the reason for that state of affairs is the Sanford police department, who dropped the ball in truly epic fashion.