July 15, 2013

NYT/NBC: "Zimmerman Prosecutors Duck the Race Issue"

An op-ed in the NYT by Gloria Allred's daughter elaborates the emerging spin I remarked upon earlier: George Zimmerman wasn't convicted of murder because the judge only allowed the prosecution to accuse him in the opening statement of "profiling," not the high crime of "racial profiling." 

The interesting question now is not the details of this run-of-the-mill exurban tragedy, but why so many people these days find this kind of condemnation of pattern recognition so persuasive.

Being right is racist.
Zimmerman Prosecutors Duck the Race Issue 
By LISA BLOOM 
Driving to Target on his Sunday grocery run on Feb. 26, 2012, George Zimmerman looked out the window of his S.U.V. and saw a stranger who he instantly concluded was “a real suspicious guy.” 
“Punks,” he said, adding an expletive. “They always get away.” There were unsolved burglaries in his community, and as he said in a call he made to the police, “this guy looks like he’s up to no good.” Mr. Zimmerman’s recorded profanity-laden police call became a focal point at his murder trial, but not because of its obvious significance: that Mr. Zimmerman jumped to insulting conclusions about Trayvon Martin primarily on account of Mr. Martin’s race. 
What began as a local crime story gained national attention after African-American journalists and civil rights leaders immediately grasped the racial implications of the confrontation between Mr. Zimmerman and Mr. Martin, and ended with Mr. Martin’s death. Mr. Zimmerman’s acquittal on Saturday sparked nationwide civil demonstrations against racial profiling and hate crimes. But in the courtroom, race was a topic carefully controlled by the judge and handled awkwardly by the prosecution team. 
In an odd ruling, Judge Debra Nelson decided that the word “profiling” — but not the phrase “racial profiling” — could be used in opening statements. But what other kind of profiling could possibly have been involved here? Could jurors — and the public — seriously imagine that Mr. Zimmerman considered Mr. Martin a criminal solely because he was walking slowly in the rain as he chatted on the phone? Lawyers were free to use the profanity involved in the case over and over again, but initially the “r” word was off limits. 
Shortly thereafter, it seemed the prosecution was building its case, at least partly, around Mr. Zimmerman’s obvious racial profiling, which was the run-up for the altercation and shooting that followed. The state fought hard outside the jury’s presence to enter into evidence police calls Mr. Zimmerman had made in the months before the shooting; 100 percent of the calls about suspicious persons involved African-Americans. 

Think about that for awhile.
Though the judge ultimately granted the state’s request and admitted tapes of these calls into evidence, the prosecution did not use the evidence and remained strangely silent on Mr. Zimmerman’s pattern of racial profiling during its two closing arguments. ...
To those who followed the trial closely, as I did, it seemed a decision was made midstream to abandon the strategy that included calling attention to Mr. Zimmerman’s pattern. Prosecutors apparently trusted jurors to dispassionately evaluate photos of a dead teenager’s remains and of the bullet hole through his heart as well as photos of blood dripping from George Zimmerman’s head. But the state was too squeamish to put the touchy issue of race squarely before the six-woman jury. ...
The most discordant note in the entire three-week trial came in the prosecution’s rebuttal closing argument, its last chance to drive its points home with the jury. John Guy, a prosecutor in the case, insisted forcefully that the case was not about race; relying on a strategy reminiscent of John Grisham’s book “A Time to Kill,” Mr. Guy asked the jury to consider a role reversal: would Martin be convicted if he had followed and then shot George Zimmerman? After this obvious, if implicit, reference to race, Mr. Guy finished up by reminding the jury that the case was not about race. 
Huh? 
Mr. Martin’s family, too, wavered on the subject. Mr. Guy’s remarks mirrored those made by Benjamin Crump, the Martin family lawyer, who said in September that the case “shouldn’t be about race,” though if the roles of the two young men were reversed, an arrest would have occurred quickly. (Mr. Crump had concluded with “that’s why race is involved in this case.”) 
And after Mr. Martin’s friend Rachel Jeantel testified to the only racial epithet uttered in the courtroom — Mr. Martin’s characterization of Mr. Zimmerman as a “creepy-ass cracker” — another family attorney stood alongside Mr. Martin’s parents at a news conference and said, “To this family, race is not a part of this process. Anybody who tries to inject race into it is wrong.”

I like that part about Trayvon Martin's expression of racial and sexual orientation animus being "the only racial epithet uttered in the courtroom." Obviously, the prosecution was remiss in not simply making up some some racial epithets and wrongly attributing them to the defendant.
Lisa Bloom is a lawyer, author and NBC News legal analyst.

Unlike the wimpy prosecutors, you won't catch NBC News failing to edit the tape to make Zimmerman look racist.

29 comments:

  1. God, It is seeming more and more like the prosecution helped the jury make the not guilty decision.

    Also, do you guys think it would have played a big role if they found out Zimmerman made all those suspicious calls on African Americans? Would love to hear some commentary.

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  2. Bloom wrote: "What began as a local crime story gained national attention after African-American journalists and civil rights leaders immediately grasped the racial implications of the confrontation between Mr. Zimmerman and Mr. Martin, and ended with Mr. Martin’s death."

    Hunsdon said: This sentence, she sense make does not try even. THIS is the NYTimes? This is Gloria Allred's whelp?

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  3. Mr. Lomez says:

    That's what I predicted would happen after a not-guilty verdict, but to be honest, I really don't see it. I got this one wrong. I thought the lefty media would shut the door on this and move on. The response to this verdict is schizophrenic but in hindsight unsurprising. The protests and "outrage" speak to a general desire for hysteria. The object of that hysteria is irrelevant. It's the same phenomenon that played out with the Occupy Movement. This image perfectly illustrates the idea. I wonder how the reaction to this case might be different if Trayvon had said something like, "Yeah, some faggot-ass cracker be following me!" One of the tropes you keep hearing over and over is: What would have happened had the races been reversed, if Trayvon was a "white" and Zimmerman black? Unfortunately no one seems interested in the follow up question. What do we make of white Trayvon Martin calling black GZ "a creepy ass n-word"?

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  4. Lisa Bloom
    - Hey, let's you and him fight!

    Meanwhile in New York, LA and DC black people are being quietly - or not so quietly in LA - sundowned.

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  5. Poor little baby Trayvon just wanted some skittles and watermelon Arizona Tea to make some codeine-laced "Sizzurp". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purple_drank"
    He was denied the opportunity we afford to all young men to become a fully fledged gangsta by a white-devil wannabe-cop and now will be remembered as mere wannabe-thug. A tragedy. The city of Detroit? A statistic.

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  6. The death of the No Limit Negro is getting as much media coverage as the 9/11 attacks and hurricane Katrina.

    This will go down among the top 5 most covered stories in the history of The United States.

    I have never seen the death of any regular White civilian get this much level of media attention. So much for "White privilege".

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  7. OT but it doesn't look like we are going to have lettuce rotting in the fields: http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_FOOD_AND_FARM_ROBOTS_ON_THE_FARM?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2013-07-15-04-32-51

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  8. Also unnoticed and unremarked by Ms Bloom is that the FBI found NO evidence that George Zimmerman was in fact a racist.
    Oops. Forgot to include that little small detail, didn't she?
    Or did she forget to include it since it might mess up her narrative.

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  9. By LISA BLOOM

    I think I'm noticing a pattern.

    But, really, the noteworthy thing about the profiling here is that GZ did such a damn good job of it!

    I don't know what his batting average was, but he sure was right in this instance.

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  10. Derb's Mossberg7/15/13, 6:37 PM

    "The state fought hard outside the jury’s presence to enter into evidence police calls Mr. Zimmerman had made in the months before the shooting; 100 percent of the calls about suspicious persons involved African-Americans."

    And why would that be Ms. Bloom? Might it indicate that Mr. Zimmerman had a rational reason to be suspicious when yet another black male teenager he'd never seen before was wandering around at night in his neighborhood dressed in black, particularly after all the recent break-ins by young black males? Shouldn't this be admissible when the prosecution and black activists want to claim that Zimmerman made it all occur by profiling Martin?

    I find it insane that they even talk about profiling. In reality, profiling is just trying to attach a bad label to common sense.

    What's more, so what if he did view him with suspicion (i.e.- the dreaded 'profiling')? I've been 'profiled' before in younger days, apparently because I was a teenager at the time, and had people question me with suspicion when I was doing nothing wrong, including police. I calmly and respectfully explained why I was there, what I was doing, and where I was going. And that was that. I did not respond with 'pound and ground'.

    The truth, which blacks and leftists never want to hear, is that if Martin had more common sense or if his parents had the sense to raise him properly, he never would've ended up a sad story in the news.





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  11. They forgot to mention Zimmerman's mentoring of African American children and his crusade to hold local police responsible for beating a homeless black man which was caught on videotape.

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  12. Semi-employed White Guy7/15/13, 6:46 PM

    More reactions:

    Ted Nugent hits a grand slam here.

    A member of the Tribe wants "person(s) of color" to "pick up a brick and start walking toward that courthouse in Sanford".

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  13. Question that should be asked of the columnist,

    So if the prosecution bungled the case by not exploiting the racial angle more (rather than downplaying it) is the question then: From here on in, should a person's race be relevant and forefront to the case itself in every single instance or only when the defendant is a white male? Also, since we are living in a post-racial society, doesnt the content of the person's character matter and count more than the person's race? Or does all that be damned if the state can "win at all costs" even if it does drag down the society since they would be in effect saying "Yes, we only should judge on character-content, but in THIS particular case, you see, the person's MOTIVES are completely suspect and as we the state have already prejudged and predetermined his motives it must go forward since the person is so obviously guilty. Obviously he's guilty."

    Funny, I don't see the columnist espousing this theory on the usual minority vs minority crimes, or am I wrong?

    Indirectly (or maybe directly) perhaps Mr Zimmerman can now present Ms Bloom's column as prime facie evidence in his lawsuit vs NBC since she is a paid employer for NBC when she wrote this NYT article and thus is indirectly "continuing" to try Mr Zimmerman in public opinion's court as a currently paid employee of NBC, the network which wa among the first of the media to attempt to tar, brush, and brand him as a racist.

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  14. Completely OT (or is it?), but in New York City deaf Starbucks patrons have sued due to harassment by Starbucks employees. Wanna place bets on the likelihood these employees are white?

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  15. "Also unnoticed and unremarked by Ms Bloom is that the FBI found NO evidence that George Zimmerman was in fact a racist."

    Why the hell should that matter? A person holds un-PC views on race and he loses his right to self-defense?

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  16. iSteve readers better not ever have to defend themselves. The various agencies will use your browsing history as evidence that you are a racist and that therefore you lose the right to defend yourself against attacks by the vibrant.

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  17. Actually:

    http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505263_162-57593438/george-zimmerman-trial-prosecutors-attempt-to-insinuate-racial-profiling-expert-says/

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  18. Also unnoticed and unremarked by Ms Bloom is that the FBI found NO evidence that George Zimmerman was in fact a racist.
    Oops. Forgot to include that little small detail, didn't she?


    It really is a small detail, if that, if you're talking about his being guilty of a crime. A case based on racial motivation makes absolutely no sense. No "racist" would decide to commit a "racist" murder after calling the cops to the scene. The killing would have to be done on the spur of the moment as a result of a new development like getting your head pounded into a concrete sidewalk.

    Of course, if she's just accusing him of racism, the FBI's findings would seem to be awfully relevant.

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  19. Ichabod Crane7/15/13, 8:01 PM

    "And after Mr. Martin’s friend Rachel Jeantel testified to the only racial epithet uttered in the courtroom — Mr. Martin’s characterization of Mr. Zimmerman as a 'creepy-ass cracker.'"

    Mr Martin also characterized Mr. Zimmerman as a N****. Isn't N**** a racial epithet? Is it not a racial epithet b.c. Zimmerman isn't black?

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  20. Of course, if she's just accusing him of racism, the FBI's findings would seem to be awfully relevant.

    And if the Government wants to try him for a "hate crime" they would have to base a large part of their case on the possibility of him if not being a racist, at the very least attempting to racially profile Trayvon.

    Thus, the FBI's findings are indeed relevant and would tend to negate most if not entirely the US government's potential hate crimes charge vs Zimmerman.

    In the MSM, Racial Profiling = that particular person doing the profiling is automatically a racist and "obviously" guilty of a hate crime. If this is indeed the government's case vs Zimmerman, the FBI should be called as a witness in Zimmerman's own behalf.

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  21. Ted Nugent wrote:
    youthful athleticism

    Frickin' lol.

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  22. >100 percent of [Zimmerman's] calls about suspicious persons involved African-Americans<

    Well, what's not Zimmerman's fault.

    Should he have invented some suspicious-acting white persons, just to keep it even?

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  23. If Zimmerman wins his defamation suit against NBC, will it make any difference to the media coverage the next time around? My natural pessimism says "No", but I do think this was something of a "perfect storm" of a racial brouhaha. It was originally ginned up while a black man in the White House was seeking reelection, tied in nicely with the big push for gun control, the GWD was a pillar of his (admittedly unremarkable) community*, and the case had a "victim" who was under the age of 18 and could technically be called (somewhat inaccurately) a "child". It will probably be a long time before there's another Bonfire of the Vanities on this massive a scale.

    If Zimmerman wins a substantial settlement (and goodness knows there's more than enough written material out there to prove that NBC's editing made people think he was a "racist"), the media might be marginally more restrained next time they want to jump on a Bonfire-style case. It won't stop them, of course, but they probably won't resort to anything as blatant as editing tapes again (showing pictures of the "victim" as a doe-eyed child, sadly, is still on the table).


    *Zimmerman's general do-goodery and neighborhood activism, along with his close ties to the police and his father's status as a former judge, are an important factor in why this case was selected by the media. Real white-on-black hate crimes do happen, but the perpetrators are usually dysfunctional, antisocial losers, often with extensive criminal records- the kind of men with whom you wouldn't want to share an elevator. It's hard to allege that "the system is racist" when the perp is so obviously not a part of the system.

    A black teenager is killed by an upstanding neighborhood watch captain, who then goes free- news.

    A black teenager is murdered by a toothless meth-head who has a grudge against blacks because he was raped in prison. He then gets arrested and tried promptly like the piece of garbage he is- not news.

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  24. Zimmerman's general do-goodery and neighborhood activism, along with his close ties to the police and his father's status as a former judge, are an important factor in why this case was selected by the media.

    That's especially true for the gun-control push that it'll be used for next. The fear of non-gun-owning SWPLs is that every legal gun-owner is one bad day from going on a rampage. That basically never happens, but the fear isn't about reality, it's about emotion. This case wasn't that either, but it's close enough that the media think they can convince people it fits ("If you've ever stopped and bought Skittles, an over-zealous wannabe cop could shoot you too!"), so they'll use it as best they can.

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  25. iSteve readers better not ever have to defend themselves. The various agencies will use your browsing history as evidence that you are a racist and that therefore you lose the right to defend yourself against attacks by the vibrant.

    It's a pretty compelling argument for racial separatism at the community level, no?

    Even if we could just will our thoughts and beliefs away, the media and gov't would never believe us. They'd just railroad us twice as hard as Zim, if they found, say, my posting history and background. So it's not enough to be politically-correct; we must have been politically-correct our entire lives, like Zim.

    Only racial separatism can protect us on this one. Otherwise, we have to hope our luck holds.

    But the media and gov't don't want us to be able to protect ourselves. They want to force us to live with these people, who we supposedly can't be trusted to live around, and lie in wait salivating over the day we're unfortunate enough to have to protect ourselves.

    Or we can just take the assault/beating/mugging/rape/murder attempt/whatever and hope for the best.

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  26. but I do think this was something of a "perfect storm"

    I've been struck by similar thoughts several times with this case. Just lots of little things adding up. E.g., Martin was talking on a phone, but using a headset, which contributed to Zimmerman's impression that Martin was acting strangely; Martin was legitimately staying in the neighborhood, not interloping; it was dark and raining, reducing visibility; Martin may have made gestures designed to impart the idea that he was armed, in an effort to warn off Zimmerman, which gave Zimmerman more reason to suspect him of criminality; it was raining, thus casting doubt on whether Martin was loitering about to get out of the rain, or to case the surrounding houses; et cetera.

    Which is certainly not to say that the primary factor was not the media with their giant Soviet Media Weather Control Device, because it was. That, and their venal gov't enablers and lapdogs.

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  27. Wow, they really screwed up an easy to verify fact. The vast majority of the calls Zimmerman made were about vehicles or other inanimate objects (with no race of the driver mentioned). Of the 46 calls 6 mention black suspects.

    http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/03/22/george-zimmerman-s-history-of-911-calls-a-complete-log.html

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  28. Guess a white guy can't be a punk or possible criminal. That's odd, because I sure do know quite a few white idiots going around with their pants on the ground and imitating rappers as they walk, holding their crotches.

    Still, it's time people just said that profiling is nothing more than taking in one's surroundings and using all the data they've been able to collect over a lifetime to make them consider some possibilities. Heck, the whole Neighborhood Watch program (we have one in our neighborhood, had a meeting two weeks ago and are having a bar-b-que street party on Aug 6, a National Night Out) instructs people on what to look for ...and that includes people behaving "suspiciously" and it also includes keeping a neighborhood email and phone list, the purpose of which is to issue alerts, including descriptions of people that might have been involved in a crime (police are looking for them) and people in the neighborhood who have been deemed, essentially, strangers behaving a bit oddly.

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  29. Don't forget----Zimmerman, while on the phone in his car with the person at the non-emergency police number, said, "He's looking at me now, walking around my truck."

    This gets lost in every account on tv. You know and so do I, so does everyone who knows an aggressive black male that age, that TM was doing his "I be watchin' you, cracka, don't f... with me."

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