Stand Your Ground: George Zimmerman Charged

are you speculating here?

 

Re: George Zimmerman to be charged with 2nd degree murder

Your teacher prep program must have really been on up on the latest research to teach you such innovative, highly effective motivational techniques.

 

in a jury trial, all the defense has to do is convince 1 out of 12 people that there may be some reasonable doubt regarding what the prosecutor alleges. I don't think that will be difficult to do in this case as far as murder 2 is concerned. I don't know what all the charges are, but I'm guess the prosecutor realizes she won't get murder 2 from a jury, so she's either hoping she's able to get him to plead to something less (because of the seriousness of murder 2 and the risk Z is running by going to trial0, or that the jury will convict him of something less - either way, it'll be a win for her.

 

Yes. Every time I speculate, I say so, as I did in that post. I've never said or even implied that it's not okay to speculate.

 

if I were to speculate, I think I would find some instances though where you called out others for speculating. but I'm not going to speculate.

 

But that's not speculation. The answer to your question is available, and instead of finding out the answer, you're making a counter-factual statement and chalking it up as a "guess."

You don't have to guess. I never did that.

 

Given the less-than-stellar performance of the other law enforcement officials down there, the latter possibility is distinctly possible.

 

Hmm... maybe.

 

Once again there is more irony, because I don't think most of the people who are supporting her in this case would be comfortable with her prosecuting the 12 year old Cristian Fernandez as an adult murder defendant.

 

how am I making a counter-factual statement? I stated a simple statement of fact - "I'm not going to speculate." in addition to that, I stated what I might possibly find if I were to speculate. and that isn't a counter-factual statement either, because it was a pure hypothetical as to what I might find if I were to speculate.
it is true that I don't have to guess. I can do a great deal of research and arrive at the facts. but the fact is that I don't have the time to do the necessary research to arrive at the facts, so I would probably choose to speculate on the matter. but as I said, I'm not going to speculate.

 

Re: George Zimmerman to be charged with 2nd degree murder

I think he's talking about Second Life, not reality.

 

Okay, it's pretty clear that you don't understand what the word "speculate" means, especially as it's being applied in this context.

I'm going to use it the way you use it though. I will not speculate that you once said you are an idiot and make a fool of yourself every time you post in this forum. I'm not going to do the research and go through every single one of your past posts to see if that's true. If I did speculate I would guess that it's true. But I'm not going speculate on the matter.

 

why are you speculating about what you might find were you to review every one of my posts? why are you speculating about the matter, and then make a counter-factual statement that you are not going to speculate about the matter?

 

It would be nice to think that, but i've read enough cases of prosecutorial misconduct to know that is not always the truth.

State Attorney is an elected political position. Do you imagine that there is any politician that isn't affected by public opinion, media and political pressure? This case is a hot potato, and i have no doubt the Prosecutor is thinking mainly of the best way to pass it off while limiting the damage to her own career. If it gets dismissed at the pretrial hearing, it's the judges fault. If the jury fails to convict, then it's the jury's fault. Someone mentioned Marcia Clark earlier, do you remember her being blamed for her shamefully incompetent prosecution in the OJ case? No, they blamed the jury and she is still being trotted out in the media as a legal expert.

 

If you have time, can you clear up for me the practice of charging both second degree murder and manslaughter? Is it indeed a common practice and has there ever been a legal challange that it represents double jeopardy?

Thanks.

 

Re: George Zimmerman to be charged with 2nd degree murder

its not a hunch look at the history(colonial Cuba in particular) of Cuba and you will find you are spot on.

 

True, Vincent Bugliosi wrote a whole book about how she mishandled that case. But i didn't think that she got much blame in the media or from the general public.

It's always been my theory that she actually wasn't an incompetent prosecutor, i think she tanked it on orders from the top. There is no way an experienced trial lawyer could make that many obvious mistakes.

 

I explained why.

 

First of all, your memory is failing you. Marcia Clark was excoriated for her failure in the OJ case.

Second of all, your post reads like you didn't actually read mine. I didn't say that the prosecutor isn't being affected by political pressure. I said that I don't think an impossible-to-prove charge will be very politically beneficial to her. If Zimmerman walks, or even gets convicted on too light a charge, the political fallout will be harsh. She'd have to be fairly stupid to believe that voters will not hold her accountable simply because she charged the guy.

 

Zimmerman wasn't charged with both, was he? I thought he was only charged with murder. The question at a trial would be whether the jury needs to be given instructions to both murder and manslaughter as a lesser included offense.

If you've read the charging affidavit, there isn't much new, but one interesting tidbit is the investigators state that Zimmerman said "punks" in the much analyzed call to the police.

 

I thought that was pretty obvious once you saw the waveform. Before I saw it, I thought it might have been that misogynist term that rhymes with "runts," but it was never plausible as "coons."

From point of view of the charge I would think the first word and the overall contempt in his voice were more important than whether or not it was a racial slur, tho'

 

Oh yeah, 4 million dollar book deal, numerous TV jobs, yeah she really got ripped apart didn't she?

I read your post. I just found it incredibly naive. She's not playing to her own voters anyway, they live up in the Jacksonville area and are overwhelmingly white and Republican. She is playing to the media and trying to prove that the State of Florida isn't the racist backwater that it actually is.

Do you really think that the people screaming for justice would have been satisfied with a manslaughter charge? And if she's got the damning evidence that you believe she does, why not show it to a Grand Jury and try for Murder 1? Doesn't add up.