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Zimmerman trial has all the ingredients for a miscarriage of justice
The Chicago Tribune ^ | June 30, 2013 | Eric Zorn

Posted on 06/29/2013 4:06:07 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet

In following the George Zimmerman trial somewhat closely online last week, I noted a familiar pattern:

A "heater" case that draws intense media interest.

Sympathetic victim.

Unsympathetic defendant.

Evidence of innocence explained away with far-fetched theories or else ignored.

Evidence of guilt magnified and bolstered with irrelevant detail and innuendo.

These are among the key ingredients for all the wrongful convictions I've written about in the last 20 years.

Investigators and prosecutors put on the blinders early, before all the facts come in. They fill the gaps and inconsistencies in the case with suppositions inspired by sympathy for the victim, rage at the defendant and a desire for what they've decided is justice.

I don't presume to know exactly what happened between Zimmerman and Trayvon Martin on the subdivision walkway on that rainy night in Sanford, Fla., in early 2012. And, a week into the prosecution's case, I don't know how anyone else can presume to know....

(Excerpt) Read more at chicagotribune.com ...


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; Editorial; Government
KEYWORDS: florida; kangaroocourt; trayvon; zimmerman
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Just the spin comin’ out to make sure the riots and burning will make it a hot time summer in the city when Zimmerman is acquitted. And since most low information types don’t realize the Trayvon image they’ve been told about is a total fabrication, it’ll work.


21 posted on 06/29/2013 4:28:25 PM PDT by bigbob
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
"Sympathetic victim"?

One of the posts on Conservative Treehouse suggests that Trayvon's parents divorced when he was young, but until fairly recently he'd been raised by his father and stepmother, whom the post suggests were decent people. When the father and stepmother divorced, Trayvon went back to live with his mother. I don't know what the cause and effect relationship exists between Trayvon's return to his mother and his getting into trouble, but does seem that Trayvon may have been a decent kid at one point. It would be ironic, but not necessarily surprising, if one of the person clamoring most louding for "justice" (and money) was, of all persons still living, the one most responsible for his demise.

22 posted on 06/29/2013 4:28:27 PM PDT by supercat (Renounce Covetousness.)
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To: Vision

I must not be reading the same article you are...because this article is indicating the Zimmerman is getting screwed..


23 posted on 06/29/2013 4:28:38 PM PDT by RummyChick
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To: Political Junkie Too
Absolutely.

And knowing how Obama considers patriots and tea partiers and conservatives as enemies...we can pretty much conclude that WE are his targets, not the rioters.

24 posted on 06/29/2013 4:28:52 PM PDT by RoosterRedux (You can't eat Sharia)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Miscarriage? More like a Gosnell back room abortion.


25 posted on 06/29/2013 4:29:15 PM PDT by UCANSEE2 (The monsters are due on Maple Street)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Sympathetic as viewed from afar via the mass media’s projections, I believe is what is meant here.

If even the Chicago Tribune sees a potential problem here, it has to be bad.

Fortunately, the fellow who testified of Zimmerman being on the bottom will likely, at least, hang the jury if not be the factor to clear Zimmerman.


26 posted on 06/29/2013 4:30:47 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (Whatever promise that God has made, in Jesus it is yes. See my page.)
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To: Diogenesis

Has there been ANY followup, correction, apology for that subtitle?


27 posted on 06/29/2013 4:30:58 PM PDT by AnAmericanMother (Ecce Crucem Domini, fugite partes adversae. Vicit Leo de Tribu Iuda, Radix David, Alleluia!)
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To: Vision
Can the media get ant more evil? Why yes, yes they can!
28 posted on 06/29/2013 4:31:45 PM PDT by JimSEA
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To: BlueStateRightist

If that’s the best that can be had of the Chicago Tribune, and Eric Zorn has a long history of nosing into crying injustices, we’ll take it.

Reasonable doubt = acquittal. In any sane system.


29 posted on 06/29/2013 4:32:26 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (Whatever promise that God has made, in Jesus it is yes. See my page.)
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To: RummyChick

You think painting them as “Sympathetic victim” “Unsympathetic defendant” is pro Zimmerman?


30 posted on 06/29/2013 4:33:19 PM PDT by Vision (Political Correctness is unAmerican)
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To: RoosterRedux

They win these so often, that they are outraged when they lose.

This was supposed to fly, just as the Duke LaCrosse frame was supposed to work.


31 posted on 06/29/2013 4:33:26 PM PDT by MrEdd (Heck? Geewhiz Cripes, thats the place where people who don't believe in Gosh think they aint going.)
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To: Vision

The fifth-column media steals oxygen and then exhales treason when they speak.


32 posted on 06/29/2013 4:33:51 PM PDT by Carl Vehse
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To: AnAmericanMother

Sure looks like a pants-down moment for CNN. If low info people who happened to latch into this have a hissy fit if and probably when Zimmerman walks... will CNN say they regretted it?


33 posted on 06/29/2013 4:34:48 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (Whatever promise that God has made, in Jesus it is yes. See my page.)
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To: RummyChick
I must not be reading the same article you are...because this article is indicating the Zimmerman is getting screwed..

I'm must be following a different trial.In the one I am watching the state seems to be presenting the defenses case and doing an admirable job. I keep wondering when the state will present the case against Zimmerman instead of for him.

34 posted on 06/29/2013 4:35:30 PM PDT by DaveyB (Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. -John Adams)
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To: RoosterRedux
The question is "what does Obama have planned in response to acquittal?"

Our man child King is currently out of the country...so he has plausible deniability...

35 posted on 06/29/2013 4:36:06 PM PDT by Popman (Godlessness is always the first step to the concentration camp.)
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To: DaveyB

Well, I believe a lot of prayers have been shot that direction, and the ones to God trump the ones to Satan. Basically, the prosecution “wisdom” is being turned to foolishness, to use a biblical meme here.


36 posted on 06/29/2013 4:36:40 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck (Whatever promise that God has made, in Jesus it is yes. See my page.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

“A trouble-making gangbanger suspended for marijuana possession and possibly assault on a bus driver who had burglar’s tools and women’s jewelry on his person? A young man who had just bought the ingredients for “Purple Drank/Purple Lean” when shot and had THC in his blood system? “

WE know all that, but the average yahoos who get their information only from the MSM and daytime talk shows, do NOT!;)


37 posted on 06/29/2013 4:36:44 PM PDT by Frank_2001
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To: max americana

Well said.


38 posted on 06/29/2013 4:39:02 PM PDT by Vision (Political Correctness is unAmerican)
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To: HiTech RedNeck

No matter how poor the prosecution case, it only matters if the jury can see the truth, and of that I am not confident at all.


39 posted on 06/29/2013 4:40:55 PM PDT by Theodore R. ("Hey, the American people must all be crazy out there!")
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

I’ve encountered enough Trayvons in my life to use up any sympathy I might have for him. I look at his death as a type of suicide, in as much as he set out on that path long before Zimmerman had to shoot him.


40 posted on 06/29/2013 4:41:10 PM PDT by pallis
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