What Exactly is George Zimmerman Guilty of?

by Pat Brown

The trial of George Zimmerman is about half-way though and the six woman jury is gong to have to decide what George is guilty of and if what he is guilty of deserves any time in prison. It is an odd case in that there is no disputing the man on trial killed someone, but there are two questions which make the final verdict a tough one; did George shoot Trayvon Martin in self-defense and how responsible was George for instigating the incident in question?

Both of these questions revolve around the definition of self-defense and one's right to resort to lethal force. Basically it comes down to this: you have the right to defend yourself from injury if you are being attacked (the key words here are "being attacked" and not that your opponent is fighting back after you attacked him nor are the two of you brawling with equal participation) and you have the right to  resort to lethal force if you are in immediate danger of extreme injury or death (and you can't shoot someone because you start losing a fight; you must have conceded and your opponent must be continuing to beat you up). I think anyone listens to this 911 call would easily conclude that George Zimmerman was screaming in terror and felt he was about to be killed.

Let me pause for a minute and discuss whether that is Trayvon or George screaming "Help me!" in the 911 call. Even if we ignore George's statement about how Trayvon punched him in the nose, knocked him down to the pavement, mounted him and started doing an MMA "ground and pound," the scenario one hears in the background of the 911 call has someone repeatedly screaming for help which would be the guy who is losing the fight. George Zimmerman clearly was not winning the battle since Trayvon had no injuries other than the bullet wound. A person who is punching the daylights out of someone or smashing their head into the pavement is not going to be screaming "Help me!" at the same time. Only someone needing a referee to stop the fight is going to be screaming for someone to save him and that someone would be George Zimmerman.

So, George passes the first test of rightful self-defense; he really was on the receiving end of a brutal assault and he thought he was going to die. It is interesting to note that one hears a bunch of screams in the tape so it is clear that George didn't get punched once and then blow away his opponent. This meant Trayvon had ample time to stop beating up George. George's screams also show that Trayvon knew George was terrified and he was not fighting back and, therefore, continuing to attack George is nothing but straight-up assault.

However, one thing that has always troubled me; George Zimmerman's cop-wanna-be attitude and some of his behaviors while in jail and in court. George has issues and one of them is taking on the role of a cop, an armed cop, while patrolling the neighborhood. Clearly, the dude can't fight for shit and following tougher, younger, possibly violent men when you are a wuss and come off like a wuss can only invite trouble. The Guardian Angels patrol neighborhoods, too, but these are usually tough young men and women who don't carry firearms. When they approach someone they think might be dangerous, they do it with the full realization they are putting their life on the line and may have to protect themselves with their fists. If a fight ensues, likely both will walk away, albeit with some damage. And, if you aren't going to carry a gun, you better go out on a group patrol or be a pretty big, tough dude.

George Zimmerman, on the other hand, brought a gun because he felt unsafe, probably because he knew he would lose if he ended up in a fight with anyone. Since George obviously hasn't spent much time in a gym, he quickly did end up on not being able to defend himself with his fists after Trayvon hit him, leaving his only resort to pull his weapon and shoot. Of course, Trayvon clearly went on far too long fighting a man who was no match for him and you do take your chances that the man down is going to pull out the only weapon that will work for him...in this case... a gun.  George says that he only pulled the gun when he realized Trevon was going for it, which actually gives George even more right to pull the weapon and fire. Considering how long the screaming went on, I would have to give George credit for holding off for as long as he did (assuming the reason wasn't that he simply couldn't get to the gun).

So, I conclude that George Zimmerman legally shot Trayvon Martin at the moment he pulled the trigger, but, I still feel like he deserves some penalty for instigating the confrontation, only because anyone carrying a weapon (except the police) should avoid trouble. George, carrying a gun on patrol bothers me because Trayvon might not have retaliated for having his presence be questioned if it had been a police officer. Doing so while armed and without a badge raises the level of risk for both parties. However, manslaughter does not really work in this case and the sentence would likely be way too high.

It is a difficult case for six untrained jurors to decide (and most of you folks know I dislike the jury system). I don't know if I could fault them for going any direction with their verdict because there the beginning of the exact confrontation is unknown although evidence seems to indicate Trayvon circled around and then sucker punched Zimmerman which would mean at that point Trayvon was the aggressor and the attacker. I wish them the best in trying to come up with a satisfactory conclusion and I hope the public will not burst out in anger regardless of which way these jurors go. Sometimes the law cannot so clearly address a complicated scenario in which both parties deserves some of the blame for the outcome, although Trayvon Martin actually is responsible for the criminal action.

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The Tragedy of the Trayvon Martin Homicide: A Profiler's View

Trayvon Martin

by Pat Brown

When the news reports started rolling in on the homicide of African-American teenager Trayvon Martin by Sandford, Florida neighborhood watchman, George Zimmerman, the first thought that went through my head was, "I hope justice prevails," but then my second thought was, "Oh, this is going to get nasty." I am already being proven right on my latter thought but as to justice being meted out properly, I am not sure the national emotional outburst over this case with its racial overtones is going to interfere with that. What makes so much of this case difficult is the murky waters of what really happened and who was justified in doing what and who was profiling who and who was profiling out of racism and who was not.

Let's take a look at how the first news reports (blithely paraphrased and made simple for impact) brought the incident to light (and the left and the right are general categories for the purposes of pointing out the issues, not for saying everyone is so "black and white" and absolute on the incident) :

The left: White dude chases down innocent black child and wastes him.

The right: Citizen protecting his neighborhood shoots thug while defending his life.

Then, more information comes out:

The left: Okay, not-totally White dude scares the crap out of innocent not-so-small teen and teen hits stalker in fear and then not-totally White dude shoots teen dead when all teen has is Skittles in his pocket.

The right: Okay, the citizen is a bit aggressive trying to keep his neighborhood safe and maybe shouldn't have followed the kid but he has the right to shoot someone who then becomes the physical aggressor and smashes in his nose and is on top of him beating him on the ground.

The left: Regardless of who did what first, George Zimmerman is clearly a racist because he profiled Trayvon Martin as up to no good for no reason other than he was black and wearing a hoodie and standing around and he said "f***ing coons" on the 911 call to the police, so it is a hate crime.

The right: Trayvon was suspended from school so he obviously is a troublemaker and he was acting shady in Zimmerman's neighborhood and Zimmerman never said "f***ing coons" on the 911 tape but "f***ing goons,"or "f***ing tools," or "f***ing cons," etc.

Whew! Okay, so what do I think? I think this is going to be a mess for a long time no matter how you slice it or view it. But, here is my profiler's take.

George Zimmerman

Let's start with George Zimmerman. He has got some issues that is for sure (read Gina Simmons previous Women in Crime post, Anger, Race, and Psychology in the Trayvon Martin Case)  but some of Zimmerman's black friends say he is all broken up about the shooting and isn't a racist. From what I have read, he is a wannabe cop, the neighborhood ninja, the overzealous protector of the community. My guess is he might qualify for a personality disorder and be more into his role as superhero than he is into being concerned about the welfare of the local citizens or being a racist of any sort. He clearly overstepped his bounds and should have left the approach of Trayvon up to the police unless he saw the young man attacking someone. In other words, causing another bodily harm is only acceptable if you are in fear of being severely injured or killed or someone else is likely to be severely injured or killed. Even with Florida Stand-Your-Ground laws which removes the duty to retreat and permits the citizen to fight force with force and still claim self-defense, you still can't actually be the one who is the aggressor because that makes you the perpetrator and not the victim.

Zimmerman was not in that position at the time he saw Trayvon walking away from him, so he clearly moved in on Trayvon, with or without his gun drawn, and Trayvon reacted either in self-defense or a fit of anger at being harassed without proper cause. I think Zimmerman's defense lawyer has his work cut out for him to prove that he in no way threatened Trayvon and Trayvon, if he punched him, did not do so when Zimmerman made a physical move on him or tried to draw his gun on him. Just because Zimmerman ended up on the ground at one point with Trayvon standing over him as one witness claims to have seen (and the supposed broken nose and damage to the back of Zimmerman's head could be the result of one punched that knocked him backwards and no further aggression), this doesn't mean Trayvon wasn't the defender and well within his rights to take Zimmerman down.

Alternatively, there is the possibility that Zimmerman followed Trayvon, not too closely and Trayvon turned on him, approached him aggressively, started cussing at him and then assaulted him at which point Zimmerman though he was going to die and pulled his gun from his holster/waistband and shot Trayvon. In this case, Zimmerman may have been stupid and annoying but if at no point did Trayvon actually have a claim to being in fear of being severely injured or killed, he would have no right to claim self-defense any more than Zimmerman if there was no immediate threat. Of course, Trayvon isn't around to speak of his emotions or Zimmerman's behavior at the time, so we will have to rely on direct and circumstantial evidence hopefully handled with a scientific objectiveness and not runaway emotion.

Okay, so right now, I am on the fence as to who was defending himself and who was the aggressor. I have to say since Zimmerman clearly escalated the whole incident and was armed at the time, it is my opinion he was far more responsible for the ensuing events than a seventeen-year-old kid who didn't see it coming.

I do want to stop and look at the issues of racial profiling and racism, both of which I think may have been blown way out of proportion in this case. Let me take you to an example that happened in my own son's experience.

I was visiting my friend, Jenny, at her home in a cul-de-sac. My son came to pick me up in my little red Mazda Miata convertible. He pulled in front of her house and was patiently waiting with engine running. All of a sudden, the woman from across the street comes straight towards the car, and standing in the middle of the street, she starts blasting an air horn and asking what he was doing there. My son was a bit taken aback as he had never had this happen before. Here was a white woman in her sixties dressed in a housecoat barking at him, a twenty-eight year old biracial young man dressed in a t-shirt, demanding that he tell her what business he had on her street. How did he react? Well, I wouldn't be surprised if many men of his age might not say "Bitch, this is a public street; mind your own damn business." Some might have even called her a racial slur.

My son said, "Ma'am, I am waiting on my mother who is inside visiting her friend, Jenny." To which the woman replied, "Oh, sorry, we have had a bunch of drug dealers and burglars around the neighborhood and I keep an eye out for anyone who doesn't belong." Then when I came out, she apologized to me as well.

My sons, David and Jeremy

Why did my son behave so politely? Well, first of all because he immediately recognized the woman in the housecoat as an overzealous neighborhood watch type of lady, the kind who shows up every month at the town council meeting and drives everyone nuts. Basically, it never really occurred to him that this white lady was dangerous or was being racist, just that she was a bit bats. And, truthfully, the lady wasn't being racist; I think she would have approached a white boy in a hoodie with the same zeal and not bothered to approach a fifty-year-old black man dressed in a suit with a Bible on his dashboard. She profiled incorrectly but not with any real racial bias.

I asked my son how he might have reacted if George Zimmerman was trailing him down the street. He had to stop and think about that. The first problem he had was that  Zimmerman wouldn't have been a uniformed cop in which case he would know he should be polite for a good reason if questioned. Nor would Zimmerman have on the uniform of the Guardian Angels who you know are out patrolling the neighborhood. And he wouldn't look like an old crazy lady, but a young crazy man, possible a psychopath will ill intentions, or an asshole looking for trouble.

What then if my son had turned on Zimmerman and said, "What the f*** is your problem, dog?" And Zimmerman got all loud and obnoxious and moved in on him. My son works as a bouncer and I can see him taking defensive action not realizing that the man had brought a gun to a fistfight. It is one thing to have a concealed weapon for the purposes of protecting oneself in a surprise attack but bringing hardware to a fight that should be with fists is a bit sneaky and dangerous and premeditated; almost rings of entrapment, some kind of set-up.

Okay, so I am still having trouble getting Zimmerman out of the wrong here, but let's check out the racist issue. I am not convinced this was racial in any way, that Zimmerman wouldn't have chased down a white teenage thug looking boy either. I didn't find his description to the police very racially biased...just a calm description of the "suspect" and a general term of "asshole" to describe people getting away with crime in the neighborhood. I didn't hear any spouting of racist slurs throughout his conversation with 911.

Of course, there is that bit he muttered under his breath during that call that has become the explosive "smoking gun" that is making this "clearly" a hate crime. Zimmerman is supposed to have muttered, "F***ing coons," and it sure does sound like that.

I listened to those two words over and over and I still had problems with turning "coons" into "goons" or into anything else nonracist... until I asked myself if there could be any less objectionable thing he might have muttered offhandedly at that moment, and I came up with "F***ing cones." In other words, when he parked and exited the car in chasing down Trayvon and he might have hit or stepped on a road cone, those two words might be just a normal expletive one might let out at that moment. So I listened over and over again and it does sound more like "F***ing cones" to me. How will we know? I would guess the crime scene photos ought to let us know if there were traffic cones at that location or any other object or possible circumstance to influence Zimmerman into saying something that sounded like "coons." If not, interviews with everyone possible is necessary to find out whether Zimmerman was the type to ever say use such ugly derogatory racist language or not.

So, until I learn absolutely that Zimmerman has uttered racial slurs in his past, I will not assume he is being racist. A possible aggressor, a troublemaker, a bad profiler, an annoyance, a fool, and a dangerous whack job, but not necessarily a racist.

Let's not forget that there are youths of all races and cultural backgrounds that trouble our neighborhoods. In my own town, there are some bratty kids who play in the streets and dance in front of cars and make nasty comments when we slow to drive by. We have had break-ins in my town and there are signs of gang activity here. My town has become much thuggier looking in recent years, with young men and women of all colors in hoodies and other clothing that makes many citizens raise an eyebrow as to the character of the young people within them. Regardless of the right to dress as one pleases, certain clothing sends certain messages and it behooves parents to make sure their sons and daughters don't look or act like criminals when walking about the neighborhood just to be on the safe side. But, back to the issue at hand, at this point (unless Zimmerman is proven to be a racist or that Trayvon chased him down and assaulted him), I think George Zimmerman was "gunning" to be a hero and Trayvon ended up being the unsuspecting victim of Zimmerman's overactive zealous power trip. We shall see how it all plays out; let's just hope it is on the evidence and not the result of a bunch of political, personal, and emotional issues. The tragedy of the killing of Trayvon Martin is bad enough, but I hope we don't add to that, the tragedy of fueling racial division if this case turns out not to be about racism at all.

Now available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Smashwords! Only the Truth by Pat Brown

Everyone loves Sweet Billy Ray!

Harkening back to the writing styles of the earlier American authors – John Steinbeck, Harper Lee, and Carson McCullers, Only the Truth is a story of soul searching, a psychological mystery which examines the question, “Whom should one love and when should one quit doing so?” Billy Ray, a lonely and rather slow, uneducated African-American man living in the mountains of Tennessee, runs across a mysterious young woman at the railroad tracks. She asks to go home with him and Billy Ray takes her with him as she requests. He comes to love this woman, Charlene, unconditionally. She is the only woman he has ever loved, and life is finally good for Billy Ray. Then Charlene shoots the neighbor and burns down the neighbor’s house. His happy life destroyed, a confused and devastated Billy Ray is at a loss. Is the woman he loves “just a troubled girl” or a psychopathic killer? Billy Ray sets out on a quest to find the truth, only the truth, whether it leads him to be able to save Charlene from a death sentence or it frees him from her spell.

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Anger, Race and Psychology in The Trayvon Martin Case

by Gina Simmons, Ph.D.

After 17 year old Trayvon Martin was shot last month by a neighbor as he walked home from a convenience store, it poked the deep wound of racial injustice in this country. As more protests mount and African American leaders shout out for justice in this case, we should all seek to understand the emotional and psychological issues that led to this young man's death.

It's likely that Martin's shooter, George Zimmerman, had some unresolved anger issues. As a psychotherapist who specializes in anger and conflict management, in my opinion Zimmerman's comments to emergency and non-emergency police revealed smoldering anger. As he speaks to the police dispatcher he mutters what sounds like a racial slur. He also says, "These a**holes. They always get away."

Perhaps Zimmerman experienced a heightened threat sensitivity, anxiety or paranoia. As neighborhood watch captain he likely perceived any stranger walking through the area as a potential threat. The 46 calls he made to police, in the months prior to the Martin shooting, suggest he took his volunteer position very seriously. Zimmerman, angry about recent burglaries in the area, may have suffered from irrational fears that warped his perceptions.

All of us fall victim to perceptual biases that cloud our judgement and decision-making abilities. The confirmation bias makes us see only the information that confirms our prior beliefs, while ignoring evidence that contradicts them. When racial prejudice mixes with the confirmation bias, we often won't even see behavior outside the stereotype. You can't make decisions based on evidence that you can't see.

Anger distorts our perception by narrowing our focus to the perceived threat. Our brain uses short cuts, called heuristics, to rapidly sort through information. The availability heuristic leads us to make decisions based on what easily comes to mind from our memory. So if we've been reading lots of news reports about terrorist attacks and we hear a loud boom, our first thought might be "we've been attacked by terrorists."

Trayvon Martin likely felt fear in his last moments of life as well. Walking through the neighborhood, talking on the phone to a girl, he may have felt pretty relaxed until he saw a large white man following him. He allegedly mentioned this to the girl. She said she told him to run. Witnesses reportedly heard cries for help, a shot, and then nothing.

In 2005 Zimmerman was twice accused of either criminal misconduct or violence. He reportedly had a spotty employment history and financial problems. As a teen he was the victim of a minor criminal assault. When people feel like victims they often act like abusers, as fear leads them to overreact to minor events. Zimmerman, feeling a renewed purpose as neighborhood watch captain, may have felt a warped sense of urgency about a young black man on his street.

Strong emotions and preexisting anxiety distort perception. You see threats when they are not there. After the 9/11 attacks I worked a 12 hour day. A patient told me they contacted the FBI regarding information they had related to the attacks. Tired and stressed I got into my car, late at night, tossed my purse on the passenger seat and heard a strange crunch. The seat was covered with glass. I leaped out of my car and my first thought, "terrorist." After I got my heart rate under control I noticed that the window was broken and a black trash container was stolen.

The availability heuristic led me to a perceptual error clouded by fatigue and anxiety. This happens to all of us. In my case, no one was harmed by my distortion of perception. Unfortunately for the Martin family, Zimmerman carried a concealed weapon, and apparently felt entitled to use it.

Photos courtesy of David Shankbone and bMethe.

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