And 45 days later…
Category: trayvon martin
Attorney General Eric Holder said Wednesday that the Justice Department will take appropriate action in the killing of Trayvon Martin if it finds evidence that a federal criminal civil rights crime has been committed.
The attorney general made the comments in an appearance before a civil rights organization founded by the Rev. Al Sharpton.
Holder said the department will conduct a thorough and independent review of the evidence in the Martin matter. One of the department’s top priorities, said Holder, is preventing and combating youth violence and victimization.
The Justice Department launched an investigation of the Martin killing three weeks ago.
Source: Yahoo News
The Conservative Website The Daily Caller revealed this Exclusive letter from a member of the Zimmerman Family. The letter is addressed to the Attorney General Eric Holder, and asked Holder why he has not arrested members of the new Black Panthers, suggesting that recent actions by the Panthers qualifies them as a “hate group.”
Leaders of the new Black Panthers have called for George Zimmerman to be captured, “dead or alive.”
The writer of the letter then asked if the arrests weren’t being made because Eric Holder is “black.”
The letter continued;
“George has done more for the black community than a lot of the black individual/organizations that are calling for his arrest (or death),” the family member assures, and refuses to “go into the intricacies of the case.” Instead, they ask, “why, when the law of the land is crystal clear, is your office not arresting the New Black Panthers for hate crimes?” The letter goes on to quote the legal definition of a hate crime and ask, “Since when can a group of people put a bounty on someone’s head, circulate Wanted posters publicly, and still be walking the streets?”
Strange enough, the question asked by the Zimmerman family member makes me remember what happened in Florida the night Trayvon Martin was killed and his killer is still “walking the streets.”
The letter is posted below.
A special prosecutor has decided not to use a grand jury in the Trayvon Martin case.
State Attorney Angela Corey’s decision is not to be considered a factor in whether charges are eventually brought against George Zimmerman, Corey’s office said in a statement.
The grand jury, which was previously scheduled by a previous prosecutor, was set to convene on Tuesday in Sanford, Fla.
That means the decision now rests solely with Corey.
Martin, a 17-year-old from Miami Gardens, was shot to death by Zimmerman, a neighborhood watch volunteer, at a gated community in Sanford on Feb. 26.
Source: MSNBC
While the Sandford police continues their fumble allowing George Zimmerman to walk as a free man, the case against the murderer of Trayvon Martin continue in the public forum. Today, the Orlando Sentinel introduced us to two independent voice analysis, both saying that George Zimmerman was not the voice heard on the 911 tapes asking for help.
Zimmerman and his supporters have maintained that Trayvon was the attacker and George was justified in pulling the trigger, ultimately taking Trayvon’s life. They also claim that the voice heard on various 911 tapes screaming for help is that of George Zimmerman.
Categories
Skittles and Broccoli
Every once in a while, a week comes along that brings clarity and definition to the world and enables us to find meaning in the beautiful things that make up our lives.
Perhaps next week will be such a week.
For the parents of Trayvon Martin, this was a week that saw the world finally notice the tragedy that befell their child. It’s a story that is easily told but terribly difficult to understand:
The circumstances – an unarmed teen carrying Skittles, a gated suburban community and a man with no official authority – along with simmering economic frustrations in the nation’s African-American community turned the death into a social touchstone. Social media, black radio and cable television drove the debate about racial profiling and the state of black males, helping give rise to an indelible image that seems to be everywhere: Trayvon Martin and his hoodie.
It shed light on the Florida Stand Your Ground Law, which essentially allows people with guns to decide who’s a threat and who’s not, and to allow suburban vigilante justice in the guise of neighborhood watch. And as more evidence comes out about what might have happened on that fateful night, more questions are raised. Finally, what about Wrigley, the company that makes Skittles? That’s complicated. Sales are up, but for all the wrong reasons.
As if the Martin story wasn’t complicated enough, this was also the week of health care. Ironic, no?
Enough words have been senselessly killed since Monday in an effort to describe, analyze, parse, interpret, divine, enunciate, explicate and pontificate on what exactly the justices meant, when it’s fairly clear that the conservatives would rather make love to a broccoli stalk than rule the law to be constitutional.
And the broccoli bit is the heart of the problem. Is it just me or did anyone else get the sense that Antonin Scalia didn’t merely complain about having a 2,700 page law to leaf through, he never actually read any of the briefs related to it? How else to explain his repetition of the broccoli conundrum that was standard fare in the mainstream press for the past 6 months? Or his mis-citation of the Cornhusker Kickback, which was troubling enough for a man of his intellect? I thought the justices were supposed to focus on the law, not repeat the talking points that radiate from all corners of the Cable News/Twitter/Blogosphere Axis.
At least we’ll know the outcome of the health care law at the end of June. After that, President Obama and Mitt Romney can adjust their campaigns and move forward with their lives.
Trayvon Martin’s parents might not get that kind of closure for many months after that. And they’ll always have more questions than answers.
Justice indeed.
Please join me on Facebook at www.facebook.com/WhereDemocracyLives and Twitter @rigrundfest
The video below shows George Zimmerman on the night he killed Trayvon Martin. Zimmerman is shown stepping out of a police car and walking into a precinct in Sandford Florida. Zimmerman was eventually released with no charges filed.
video platform video management video solutions video player
“Racial profiling has to stop. Just because someone wears a hoodie does not make them a hoodlum.”
That was Democratic Representative Bobbie Rush of Illinois, as he took off his jacket on the House floor and revealed his hoodie. The representative then put on his sunglasses and quoted from the Bible as he was asked to leave the floor.
NEW ORLEANS – A New Orleans police officer placed on desk duty following a deadly shooting incident was suspended for posting a comment on a local TV station’s website calling Trayvon Martin a thug who deserved to die.
Jason Giroir identified himself as a New Orleans Police Department employee when he posted a comment over the weekend on the WWVTV.com website in response to an article about a rally supporting Martin. He wrote, “Act like a thug die like one!”
Martin, 17, was unarmed when he was fatally shot last month in Sanford, Fla., by a neighborhood watch volunteer.
The Times-Picayune reports that when another commenter called Giroir’s comments racist, Giroir responded: “Eddie come on down to our town with a ‘Hoodie’ and you can join Martin in HELL and talk about your racist stories!:-P”
Source: CBS News
UPDATE
NEW ORLEANS – A New Orleans police officer has resigned after being suspended for posting a comment on a local television station’s website about the fatal shooting of Trayvon Martin in which he suggested the Florida teen died like a “thug.”
Jason Giroir used his full name and identified himself as a New Orleans Police Department employee when he wrote, “Act like a thug die like one!” in response to
Police Superintendent Ronal Serpas suspended Giroir indefinitely without pay Monday. On Tuesday, Giroir resigned after being told allegations against him had been sustained and a hearing to begin his termination was in motion.
Source: AP
Taking to his Facebook Page, Fox host Geraldo Rivera apologized for comparing Trayvon Martin’s hoodie to George Zimmerman’s gun, a comparison that caused Mr. Rivera to conclude that the hoodie was equally to be blamed for Trayvon’s murder as the gunman himself. In his so-called apology, Rivera basically said he was sorry for using “very practical and potentially life-saving” words advising blacks and Hispanics to discard their hoodies.
“I apologize to anyone offended by what one prominent black conservative called my, “very practical and potentially life-saving campaign urging black and Hispanic parents not to let their children go around wearing hoodies.”But here’s the rub, according to my legion of critics, by putting responsibility on what kids wear instead of how people react to them I have obscured the main point that someone shot and killed an unarmed teenager, and I began today’s program with a sincere and heartfelt apology to anyone I may have offended by my crusade to warn minority families of the danger to their young sons inherent in gangsta style clothing; like hoodies.
Over the last week, I’ve been buried under an avalanche of rage and the ridicule; essentially saying that I was blaming Trayvon Martin for his own death.
I wasn’t and I don’t. And, I remain absolutely convinced of what I said about asking for trouble. There’s trouble enough for minority boys and young men not to provoke mad responses from paranoid jerk offs.But that doesn’t change what many, including members of my own family and friends believe.
That I have obscured or diverted attention from the principal fact, which is that an unarmed 17-year old was shot dead by a man who was never seriously investigated by local police. And if that is true, I apologize.”– Geraldo Rivera
In other words, I’m sorry, but I was right for saying what I said. Some apology!
Rapper Plies pays tribute to Trayvon Martin. Seventeen year old Martin was killed by George Zimmerman in Florida on February 26th, for apparently being black and walking the street with a pack of Skittles in his hand and his hoodie on, trying to shelter himself from the rain.
As of today, Zimmerman has not been charged with a crime.
Kyle Mantyla writes: As we have noted several times in the past, Jesse Lee Peterson of the Brotherhood Organization of a New Destiny (BOND) has carved out a very unique niche as a black right-wing activist who specializes in accusing Democrats, and especially black Democrats, of being racist while defending white people who are accused of racism.
Earlier this year, Peterson made news when he declared that he would like “to take all black people back to the South and put them on the plantation so they would understand the ethic of working.” So it comes as no surprise that Peterson has now decided to weigh in on the Trayvon Martin tragedy by declaring that the outrage over his death is not about justice but rather “about getting even with whites and gaining political power”:
“It’s hypocritical for so-called black ‘leaders’ to call for the prosecution of George Zimmerman and accuse the police of racism without knowing the facts. Black-on-black crime takes place every day. And blacks kill whites in far greater numbers than whites kill blacks. Yet, we only see these leaders and their hypnotized black followers worked up when a black is victimized by another race. This is racist and evil.
“Where were the NAACP, Al Sharpton, the Black Caucus and black ministers when black flash mobs were terrorizing the city of Philadelphia and attacking whites and others? It was so bad that Mayor Michael Nutter threatened to jail parents if they were not willing to get their thug children under control. In Kansas City, a 13-year-old white kid was attacked by two black teens who poured gasoline on him and set him on fire saying, ‘you get what you deserve, white boy.’ If these leaders were sincere, they would condemn crime across the board.
“I’ve said for the last 22 years that most black Americans are brainwashed. The recent actions of these black leaders and their followers are not about justice—it’s about getting even with whites and gaining political power. This is black hatred of white people and a result of more than fifty years of brainwashing by racist civil-rights leaders.