Posts tagged as “Trayvon Martin”
Florida Senate Judiciary Committee advanced a bill that made some changes to the state’s controversial “Stand Your Ground” law. The bill, which was passed by a vote of 7-2, has been strongly supported by the family of Trayvon Martin. The 17-year-old was shot and killed by neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman. Zimmerman was charged with second degree murder and was acquitted by a Florida jury in July.
“Tracy and I have said from the beginning that our hope is that the tragedy of Trayvon’s death can be turned into real change so that other parents don’t have to experience the grief we have endured” Sybrina Fulton, the mother of Trayvon Martin, said following the announcement of the bill’s advancement.
“The work here is not done, and we fear an uphill battle going forward to achieve real change in our son’s name.” Stand Your Ground allows citizens to use deadly force if they feel their life is in danger. New changes to the bill would include providing proper training for neighborhood watch programs, ensuring a proper investigation is conducted after Stand Your Ground is claimed, allowing lawsuits against people acting in self-defense if they negligently injure or kill an innocent bystander and limit the use of the law when aggressors claim it.
“I see this as an important first step in making sure that Florida’s Stand Your Ground Law properly protects victims and applaud the committee for taking this first step,” said Martin family attorney Ben Crump in a press release. “In light of current events in Washington D.C., It is refreshing to see legislators compromising and working together so that Florida’s citizens are protected.”
article by Carrie Healey via thegrio.com
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — A Florida woman serving 20 years in prison for firing a shot at her estranged husband during an argument will get a new trial, though she will not be able to invoke a “stand your ground” defense, an appeals court ruled Thursday.
The 1st District Court of Appeal ruled that Alexander deserves a new trial because the trial judge handling her case did not properly instruct the jury regarding what is needed to prove self-defense.
The ruling, written by Judge Robert Benton, said the instructions constituted a “fundamental error” and required Alexander to prove self-defense “beyond a reasonable doubt.” But the court also made it clear in its ruling that the judge was right to block Alexander from using the state’s “stand your ground” law as a way to defend her actions. That law generally removes people’s duty to retreat in the face of possible danger and allows them to use of deadly force if they believe their lives are in danger.
Faith Gay, one of the attorneys representing the 33-year-old Alexander, said she was grateful for the “thorough consideration” provided by the appeals court. “We are looking forward to taking the case back to trial,” Gay said.
NEW YORK – On Tuesday, the mothers of Trayvon Martin and Jordan Davis will testify on Capitol Hill. The topic: “Stand Your Ground” laws. Sybrina Fulton and Lucia McBath will testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Human Rights. The hearing, according to a notice on the Senate Judiciary Committee website is entitled “‘Stand Your Ground’ Laws: Civil Rights and Public Safety Implications of the Expanded Use of Deadly Force.”
Tallahassee, Florida-based state attorney William Meggs, and Harvard Law School professor and director of the Criminal Justice Institute Ronald S. Sullivan, Jr. are also expected to testify, along with a senior fellow from the Libertarian Cato Institute and John R. Lott, Jr., Ph.D., President of the Crime Prevention Research Center in Swarthmore, PA.
Fulton is the mother of Trayvon Martin, whose shooting death and the acquittal of his killer, George Zimmerman, on second degree murder and manslaughter charges touched off more than a year of controversy regarding Florida’s “stand your ground” laws and similar laws across the country. (Zimmerman didn’t use “Stand Your Ground” as his defense, but it was referenced by one of the jurors in the case in interviews after the verdict, and it altered Florida’s jury instructions in cases like Zimmerman’s.)
A foundation founded by Fulton and Trayvon Martin’s father, Tracy Martin, is working to amend “Stand Your Ground” laws in Florida and in the more than 20 other states with similar laws. George Zimmerman said he shot Martin in self-defense.
McBath’s son, Jordan Davis, was shot to death on November 23, 2012 at a Jacksonville gas station as he sat in a car with three friends. Michael Dunn is expected to use the “Stand Your Ground” self defense law in his upcoming trial for Davis’ killing. Dunn is expected to go to trial in January.
The mother of Trayvon Martin spoke out Sunday against the stop-and-frisk police practice in New York City, saying neither police nor civilians have the right to stop someone because of their race. Critics say the stops target blacks and Hispanics who aren’t doing anything wrong. Earlier this week, a judge told New York City that its policy was racial discrimination. The city plans to appeal. “You can’t give people the authority, whether civilian or police officers the right to just stop somebody because of the color of their skin,” Martin’s mother, Sybrina Fulton said on NBC’s Meet the Press.
Over the past decade, New York police have stopped, questioned and sometimes patted down about 5 million people; 87 percent were black or Hispanic. About 10 percent of the stops spur an arrest or summons. Police find weapons a fraction of the time. New York Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly defended the use of stop and frisk Sunday and said violent crimes would increase if the practice were abandoned. “The losers in this, if this case is allowed to stand, are people who live in minority communities,” he said on CBS’ Face the Nation.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8zGRfLBRQEM&w=420&h=315]Fulton’s attorney, Benjamin Crump, said the stop and frisk policy targeted people by race and noted it was still being used as the 50th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I have a dream” speech approached. “It actually takes us away from his poignant words of, ‘I dreamed my children would be judged by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin,’” Crump said. Fulton has said neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman “got away with murder” in the 2012 killing of her son, largely because of Florida’s self-defense law.
Protesters had been occupying part of the Capitol in Tallahassee, calling for an examination of the Florida law since Zimmerman was acquitted last month. Zimmerman claimed self-defense in shooting the 17-year-old Martin during a fight; Martin’s supporters say Zimmerman profiled and followed him because Martin was black.
article by Associated Press via blackamericaweb.com
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgNJkq53l68&w=560&h=315]
On August 28, 1955, 14-year-old Emmett Till was savagely beaten and shot through the head in Money, Mississippi, all for the crime of speaking to a 21-year-old white woman. After a widely covered trial, his murderers were acquitted — leading to national indignation and helping to catalyze the civil rights movement.
Though the specifics of each case are vastly different, it’s easy to compare Till’s murder and its aftermath to the 2012 shooting of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin. Oprah Winfrey did that very thing during the Lee Daniels’ The Butler press junket, calling the killings “parallel” — and adding, “In my mind, [they’re the] same thing.”
At the same time, Winfrey — who stars in Lee Daniels’ The Butler, a film set partially during the height of the civil rights movement — was careful to say that those outraged by Martin’s death and George Zimmerman being found not guilty shouldn’t dwell in the past. “You can get stuck in that,” she said, “and not allow yourself to move forward and to see how far we’ve come.”
article by Hillary Busis via popwatch.ew.com
TALLAHASSEE — Florida House Speaker Will Weatherford announced Friday that he will order hearings this fall on the state’s “stand your ground” law, a victory for the young protesters known as the Dream Defenders who have spent the past two weeks protesting at the Capitol. “It’s a critical first step,” said Phillip Agnew, executive director of the Dream Defenders. “We’ve been here for three weeks. We know Democracy takes time. Progress takes time.”
They shouldn’t celebrate too hard. Weatherford assigned the task of chairing the hearings to a staunch supporter of the law, Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fort Walton Beach. “I don’t support changing one damn comma of the stand your ground law,” Gaetz said Friday. “It would be reactionary and dangerous to make Floridians less safe to pacify uninformed protesters.” Gaetz, the 31-year-old son of Senate President Don Gaetz, talks tough on crime. He passed a bill this year that expedited death row cases and has been known for pushing conservative causes popular in his Panhandle district. He expects the hearings to draw national attention, and he says he’s ready for the debate.
“I want to have hearings, it’s a good idea,” Gaetz said. “Right now, the only voices on stand your ground are coming from the radical left. I want an opportunity to give a full-throated defense of the law.” He said he’s not sure when he’ll hold the hearings, how long they’ll last, or how they’ll be structured. But he said his bias shouldn’t deter those holding out hope that hearings can lead to changes in the law. “Bills I don’t support occasionally pass my committee,” he said.
Weatherford agreed to the hearings in an op-ed published Friday. “Our evaluation of its effectiveness should be guided by objective information, not by political expediency,” he wrote. “Does the law keep the innocent safer? Is it being applied fairly? Are there ways we can make this law clearer and more understandable.”
The Smithsonian’s National Museum of African-American History wants the hooded sweatshirt Trayvon Martin was wearing when he was shot and killed. The 17-year-old was shot and killed on his way home by neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman. Zimmerman was charged with second-degree murder and pleaded not guilty, arguing self defense.
On July 13th, Zimmerman was acquitted of all charges by a Florida jury. The hoodie Martin was wearing on the night of his death became a symbol for protesters and Martin family supporters. Lonnie Bunch, the museum’s director, confirmed to The Washington Times that they are seeking the hoodie for display following the Department of Justice’s investigation.
“It became the symbolic way to talk the Trayvon Martin case. It’s rare that you get one artifact that really becomes the symbol,” Bunch told The Washington Times. “Because it’s such a symbol, it would allow you to talk about race in the age of Obama.”
The National Museum of African American History and Culture is set to open in 2015.
Related Stories:
- Oprah Winfrey Donates $12 Million to New African-American Museum
- Juror B29 Says Zimmerman Got Away With Murder, Owes Martin’s Parents Apology
- Trayvon Martin’s Dad Tracy Martin Adds Voice to Help Black Men and Boys
- Demonstrations Across the Country Commemorate Trayvon Martin
- EDITORIAL: What We Can Do To Honor and Bring Justice to Trayvon Martin’s Life
article by Carrie Healey via thegrio.com
“Here in New York City, we’ve institutionalized Mr. [George] Zimmerman’s suspicion with a policy that all but requires our police officers to treat young Black and Latino men with suspicion, to stop them and frisk them because of the color of their skin.” Though Thompson has largely avoided speaking about race on the campaign trail, he said he felt urged to do so after Zimmerman’s “not guilty” verdict.
“Trayvon Martin did die because he was Black. Of that there is no doubt,” he added. Thompson also says we must begin looking at how the government enables systemic racism. “I do not believe our government can fully stop racism, but I do believe we must constantly look to see how it may enable it, even unintentionally,” he said.
“So we must ask ourselves, when fear of young Black men ends in deadly violence against the innocent, has our government perpetuated that fear by targeting people of color with suspicion?”
Thompson is the only African-American candidate in the mayoral race.
article by Hannington Dia via newsone.com