mistermack wrote:Seth, you claim to have been in the police, but I have severe doubts.
I'm not responsible for any mental incapacity you may suffer from. Facts are facts.
Injuries like Zimmerman's are nothing, you would see tens of thousands of people with worse, most weekends in the US. Fights happen all the time. Any cop would know that.
It's not about what injuries Zimmerman actually ended up with, it's about what Zimmerman THOUGHT (reasonably believed) his injuries WOULD BE if he did not use deadly force to defend himself. As a certified EMT (yes, I also worked in emergency services and a hospital ER) I can tell you that in my professional opinion, someone having the back of his skull bashed on a concrete sidewalk by an enraged attacker is in grave danger of concussion, skull fracture, subdural hematoma, epidural hematoma, contra-coup brain injury, direct brain injury, coma and death. That is sufficient justification for the use of deadly force in self defense by ANYONE in a similar situation.
Does every person who gets involved in a fight, and is losing, have the right to pull a gun and shoot the person they are fighting?
If they reasonably believe that their life is in danger of death OR serious bodily injury, and they reasonably believe that a lesser degree of force would be inadequate to stop the attack, and they are not the initial aggressor, then yes, every person who gets involved in a fight has the right to pull and gun and shoot the person whom they are fighting. That's what the law says.
Because if you are in a fight, then by definition, you are defending yourself, and so is your opponent. Absolutely ANYBODY could claim that they feared serious injury, if they were in a fight.
Indeed. As an ER EMT, I saw many people who suffered serious bodily harm from a "simple bar fight," including permanent scarring, damage to and loss of function of limbs and organs, loss of eyesight, brain damage, permanent injury to joints in the hands, and even death. In any case where the individual was attacked by another and where they were not the initial aggressor, every one of those individuals I treated would have been fully justified in pulling out a gun and killing their attacker. That's the law. I support that law. People don't have a right to punch you in the face, which can kill you instantly by driving bone shards into the brain if the punch is applied in a particular direction with enough force, and those who attack others even with their fists can and should risk being shot dead as a result.
You could have tens of thousands of deaths by shooting every weekend, all perfectly legal.
Yup. And perhaps we should, because very quickly the sorts of thugs who attack people and punch and kick other people, or bash their heads on concrete sidewalks, or (as in the case of Paul Kelly in Boulder) attack as a group, knock the victim down and kick him repeatedly in the head causing permanent and irreversible brain injury, which I understand is a particular favorite of the thugs who roam around England and Scotland on weekend nights looking for trouble, would all be dead and we'd have a much more civilized and polite society where roving gangs of thugs do not randomly beat and rob law-abiding citizens at will and with utter impunity because they know that their victims are unarmed and cannot oppose them.
Zimmerman's injuries are insignificant, compared to most people who have been fighting. So according to your 'logic' practically every person in a fight has the right to blow someone away. It's the american dream. For gun-nuts.
As I said, it doesn't matter what Zimmerman's injuries were, only what he feared they MIGHT BE if he did not put a stop to the attack. It's asinine and stupid beyond belief to expect someone who was jumped from behind to sit there an allow himself to be pummled until AFTER he's suffered a fatal brain injury before exercising his right of self defense. But then again, I'm unsurprised that you would make such an implicit suggestion.
In reality, Zimmerman's ONLY hope is that he can convince a jury that he had a reasonable fear of very serious injury or death. Not just that he was losing a fight.
Yup. But as any physician or person with any small amount of medical knowledge (which does not evidently include you) knows, having your skull bashed on the sidewalk is bound to cause serious bodily injury or death and so he was completely justified in his fear.
If he just leaves it to his lawyer to argue, he's fucked. If he takes the stand, he'll get ripped to shreds. So he's fucked either way.
No matter how many times those of us who actually know what US law is tell you, you seem utterly incapable of comprehending the fact that his lawyer doesn't have to argue ANYTHING. Having invoked self defense, the burden is now on the prosecutor to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Zimmerman DID NOT have a reasonable fear of imminent death or serious bodily harm. The prosecution is going to have a tough go of that because all the defense has to do is call a physician to testify to the potential for death or serious bodily harm that exists from having someone bash your skull on a sidewalk. The prosecutor must then find some way to argue that either Zimmerman was NOT in that physical position having his head bashed on the ground, a claim that is completely consistent with the physical evidence, or that Zimmerman bashed his own head on the sidewalk after shooting Martin, which is highly improbable and implausible, or he must convince the jury that it's not reasonable to use deadly force in that situation, which is even less likely to succeed.
You see, it doesn't matter that Zimmerman first approached Martin, or even that he may have said something Martin took offense to. Unless it can be proven that Zimmerman PHYSICALLY ATTACKED Martin, which would trigger Martin's right of self-defense and would derogate Zimmerman's right of self defense, the fact that there was a verbal confrontation that Zimmerman may have started that ended in Martin attacking him is not relevant because when Martin went too far by attacking Zimmerman physically and began bashing his head on the concrete Martin sealed his own fate by giving Zimmerman legal authority to shoot him.
Even in a simple fistfight, the kind you love to toss out as being harmless (they aren't), once one person has knocked the other person down the "victor" cannot continue the attack and pummel the other person when he's down and has either surrendered or is incapacitated. While defending yourself with fists in a bar brawl may be permissible self defense, kicking the other guy when he's down, or sitting on his chest and smashing his skull on the floor is NOT, and what was self defense turns instantly into a criminal assault that triggers the other person's right to defend himself against death or serious bodily harm.
Mutual combat is one thing, but what Martin is alleged to have done goes far beyond engaging in mutual combat, and justifies the use of deadly force in response.
Zimmerman is almost certainly going to be acquitted, based on the facts before us right now. And he should be, based on those facts.
"Seth is Grandmaster Zen Troll who trains his victims to troll themselves every time they think of him" Robert_S
"All that is required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Edmund Burke
"Those who support denying anyone the right to keep and bear arms for personal defense are fully complicit in every crime that might have been prevented had the victim been effectively armed." Seth
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