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March planned to protest Zimmerman verdict

July 19, 2013
–
Mark Chapman

(Correction: George Zimmerman has been identified in media reports as white and Hispanic; he did not self-identify that  way.)

NORWALK, Conn. – A march to protest George Zimmerman’s not guilty verdict in the death of Trayvon Martin is planned for Sunday, July 21.

The event is being organized by the Rev. Nellie Mann and others.

According to a press release, the march is being billed as a peaceful march to protest the verdict and a call to action. Zimmerman, who has been identified in media reports as white and Hispanic, was found not guilty in Martin’s death in Sanford, Fla., despite admitting he shot the African-American 17-year-old during a scuffle. The verdict has spawned nationwide protests, most of them peaceful.

The march will begin at 2 p.m. at the Calvary Baptist Church Parking lot, 21 Concord St., and end at the Norwalk Police Department on the corner of Monroe and South Main.

 

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22 responses to “March planned to protest Zimmerman verdict”

  1. notaffiliated

    And so it goes – Zimmerman never identified himself as a “white hispanic”. The media did so. Although in fairness, he could claim that round about the time the President claims he’s a white black.
    (Editor’s note: The first part of your comment is accurate, and the correction has been made.)

  2. M Allen

    I hope that any of the candidates who show up for the photo opportunity here will let us know whether they support Rev. Mann’s comments from earlier in the week.

  3. Joe Espo

    How honorable it is that the Reverend Mann wants to engage in race baiting instead of race healing- a more noble endeavor for any self-respecting cleric. Could it be she’s doing this for a little publicity and a few Ward B votes? Should white people like elders Bill and Regina Krummel protest the ad hoc “acquittal” of Amanda Brown of criminal charges? Charges that would have netted her about 5 years in the slammer if Amanda were white? Where were the protest marches against OJ Simpson’s acquittal? The true motive for the protest is to express fake outrage that creepy a** cracka George Zimmerman wasn’t hit with “affirmative action justice”: a conviction on murder regardless of the lack of supporting evidence just because the victim was black. A different form of racial preference in reparation for past grudges. Let’s hope Reverend Mann doesn’t have to explain away any violence if the protest goes awry.

  4. D(ysfunctional)TC

    This is all at the feet of President Obama who fanned the flames of racism when before having any of the facts said “if I had a son, he’d look like Trayvon.”
    Actually, if the President had a son he’d be in an upper crust private academy on a guaranteed track to the Ivy league. He wouldn’t have thousands of dollars worth of tattoos and gold teeth. He might have been home doing homework on a late Sunday night, instead of being unsupervised after having been suspended from school for drugs and theft.
    The sad part is that the President could have used the tragedy to actually give constructive leadership. Instead he parties in the White House with Jay Z who’s customer base is largely children who have almost no financial means yet he inspires to be gangsta like. Really sad for black America who thought they were getting a leader.

  5. Joe Espo

    @ M Allen: you raise a good point. This protest puts the four white guys in a tough spot. If superlawyer Miklave shows up, does it mean he has contempt for the jury system he’s sworn to uphold as an “officer of the court?” If former police chief Rilling shows up, does it mean he endorses cops overcharging defendants to pursue politically motivated criminal convictions? For all four, there’s the risk that they’d alienate the pro-verdict majority of Norwalk voters. But if they don’t show up, they’d be alienating minority supporters, who tend to be more active and vocal. For Reverend Mann to put these democrat candidates in such a tough spot is a politically inept move. The only one I’d expect to show up is Mangiacopra. After all, Ernie Newton’s right hand man says that he’s the only “real democrat”, so race-baiting protests are right up his alley. Plus he’s beholden up to his eyeballs to the Ward B gang. And… he has no shame.

  6. M Allen

    I expect all candidates and local leaders to show up, as I believe they did at the previous rally in support of Mr. Martin. And that is fine. A tragedy occurred and we should all be saddened that a young man died. But Rev. Mann, who at one point was the Police Chaplain until she took some time off for her comments related to the Calf Pasture Mob of Patriots, made some extraordinarily inflammatory comments in the wake of the Zimmerman verdict. If she is going to continue to be a leader within the community with the credibility to draw our political and civic leaders, we should expect that they have a view regarding her comments.

  7. Irish Girl

    This is just absurd. The jury, who spent the time with ALL the evidence and with all the laws given to them, DID THEIR JOB.
    *
    Now get over it….unless you want to reconvict OJ Simpson for his MURDERS (PLURAL).

  8. RU4REAL

    How bout a march to get to the bottom of the racism allegation issue in the fire department!!!

  9. M Allen

    There will be a lot of tired marchers if we march about every allegation related to something one person or another thinks is march-worthy. Maybe there should just be one day a month where we combine all the marches together. Like Super Sunday or March Monday. That way those distressed about multiple issues can double-up. Just a thought.

  10. Joe Espo

    Quote from Booker T. Washington, most recently iterated by Allen West, and sanitized so as not to offend modern ersatz delicate sensibilities:

    “There is a class of (African Americans) who make a business of keeping the troubles, the wrongs, and the hardships of the (African Americans) before the public. Having learned that they are able to make a living out of their troubles, they have grown into the settled habit of advertising their wrongs-partly because they want sympathy and partly because it pays. Some of these people do not want the (African American) to lose his grievances, because they do not want to lose their jobs.” Booker T. Washington.
    .
    More:
    .
    I am afraid that there is a certain class of race-problem solvers who don’t want the patient to get well, because as long as the disease holds out they have not only an easy means of making a living, but also an easy medium through which to make themselves prominent before the public.
    My experience is that people who call themselves “The Intellectuals” understand theories, but they do not understand things. I have long been convinced that, if these men could have gone into the South and taken up and become interested in some practical work which would have brought them in touch with people and things, the whole world would have looked very different to them. Bad as conditions might have seemed at first, when they saw that actual progress was being made, they would have taken a more hopeful view of the situation.

    Read this and stand to be awed with this man:
    http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Booker_T._Washington

    .
    Can you imagine if he were alive today. He’d be “Clarence Thomas’ed” into oblivion.

  11. LWitherspoon

    “I’m very, very disappointed,” said [Rev. Nellie] Mann of Norwalk’s Calvary Baptist Church. “It’s sad to see a black boy killed who was just going to the store to get a pack of Skittles and an iced tea. Can our black boys walk down the streets (in Norwalk)? Will they be shot as well?”
    .
    Trayvon Martin’s death was a tragedy. What followed has been a tragedy for the Martin family and the Zimmerman family. One lost a son, and the other lost any hope of living a normal life. There is plenty to grieve in this terrible situation.
    .
    Unfortunately Rev. Mann’s comments have caused more pain than healing. In response to her inflammatory rhetoric, numerous commenters have noted that if black boys walking down the street in Norwalk get shot, the shooters will be of the same race. Whether or not you think that’s true, it’s ugly and unnecessary to be having a conversation about the likely skin color Norwalk’s murderers. This ugliness is the fruit of Rev. Mann’s rhetorical bomb-throwing. Clergy members that I know don’t make accusations and point fingers. They work to bring people together and promote healing and mutual understanding. Why does Rev. Mann not do the same?
    .
    The jury’s unanimous verdict was not a pronouncement that nobody cares if black boys get shot. Several of the jurors noted after the verdict that Martin’s death weighed heavily on them, and they were eager to find Zimmerman guilty of something. But the supporting evidence wasn’t there. The verdict was a declaration that the state, despite its best efforts, could not prove the charges beyond a reasonable doubt.
    .
    Ultimately we will never know for certain what happened in the moments prior to Trayvon Martin’s shooting. But it’s hard to live with uncertainty, so we project our own personal opinions into that void. If you believe that racism is everywhere, you probably believe that Martin’s shooting was an unconscionable racial injustice. If you believe that affirmative action has done more harm than good, you believe that it was justifiable self-defense. Each opinion is more a reflection of your previously-held beliefs than a true statement of what really happened on that tragic night.
    .
    Rather than helping us heal and come together after a great tragedy, Rev. Mann resorts to inflammatory rhetoric. What a disappointment. It’s even more disappointing that her comments get so much press.

  12. notaffiliated

    I was just looking through some pictures on the web. Maybe Rev. Mann and others have something worth marching to – I’ll admit I didn’t stay glued to the entire trial and Figured the verdict was correct.

    Here’s what I wonder
    1) Why did George Zimmerman have ZERO dirt, grass or mud stains on his clothing?
    2) Did they ever release/take pictures of his black eyes?

  13. M Allen

    @notaffiliated – try the pics at this link. the last two are front and back shots of Zimmerman’s head injuries.
    http://www.cfnews13.com/content/news/cfnews13/news/article.html/content/news/articles/cfn/2013/5/22/george_zimmerman_gra.html

  14. notaffiliated

    Thanks MAllen but I’ve seen those a bunch of times. According to Zimmerman’s doctor, he had two black eyes and a broken nose. I would think you’d take pictures.

    I do find it pretty amazing that in the pictures taken at the police station, he has ZERO mud or grass stains on him. How can that be? I must have really missed something in the proceedings.

  15. M Allen

    not that it really matters at this point, but that nose looks fairly broken to me. And was it reported that they fought on a surface to where mud and grass would be present? I thought it was on the sidewalk or street or something hard. Hence the slamming his head on concrete comment.

  16. Anna Duleep

    As one of the elected officials planning to walk with Rev. Mann today in honor of Trayvon, let me offer a different perspective. I believe the jury did its job. They correctly applied a very flawed public policy to the circumstances surrounding Trayvon’s death. I am protesting the underlying law that made Mr. Zimmerman’s actions legal in Florida: Stand Your Ground. Without such a law, perhaps Mr. Zimmerman would have heeded the 911 operator’s warning to leave that young man alone. If enough people in enough cities across America raise awareness of Stand Your Ground-type legislation, perhaps elected officials in Florida will change the law. Or perhaps voters in Florida will be inspired to change their elected officials.

    I hope my fellow marchers avoid ad hominem attacks involving members of the jury AND members of the Zimmerman family. While race relations certainly impact aspects of this case, the heart of this tragedy remains Florida’s poorly conceived Stand Your Ground law.

  17. M. Murray’s

    Stand your ground was not at issue in this verdict

    1. Mark Chapman

      @ M. Murray

      I thought that was true as well, but saw a partial video of the judge’s instructions to the jury last night. While the defense never used the term or the law, the judge told the jury Zimmerman had a legal right to “stand his ground” if he felt threatened or was under attack. I am posting a link to the document with the complete jury instructions, putting it in context. The section marked “Justifiable Use of Deadly Force” is a ways down, and the law is referenced in the fifth graf of that section:
      http://www.scribd.com/doc/153354467/George-Zimmerman-Trial-Final-Jury-Instructions

  18. M Allen

    Yes, stand your ground is bad. If attacked, your only option should always be to try and run away. Yield the field to the attacker because the attacker should have the right to chase you off. Why on earth would anyone believe they have the right to say “No, I won’t be made to run.” Keep giving those rights away America. Only the rights of an attacker matters. And before you say it, that Zimmerman was the attacker because he was following Mr. Martin, no evidence has been shown that he initiated the altercation. Only that he followed Mr. Martin. But in the end, stand your ground is about something bigger than this case. It is about you defending yourself rather than just being a cowering victim.

  19. M. Murray’s

    I believe the juror who spoke said that they did not consider stand your ground, but decided on self defense. Stand your ground ends once the assault begins. If he felt that he was in danger of imminent threat of serious physical injury or death, he can use deadly physical force based on self defense. If he were to have shot Martin based on a perceived threat before the assault, that would qualify as stand your ground. Once he is being assaulted it becomes self defense.

  20. M. Murray’s

    You also have to look at what point Zimmermen would have a duty to retreat if there were no stand your ground law in effect. When he got out of the car, did he perceive imminent risk? Probably not. At the point where Martin became the aggressor, would Zimmerman have the ability to run away and escape or would it be reasonable to believe that a younger Martin could catch him from behind. You would not have a duty to retreat if at the point you perceived the threat the retreat is unlikely to be successful

  21. M Allen

    Even if the Stand Your Ground law didn’t exist, Mr. Martin would still have been killed under the circumstances exhibited in this trial. Does anyone really think Zimmerman would not have followed him or gotten out of his car in the absence of Stand Your Ground? I don’t know what Zimmerman was thinking (if much of anything), but I don’t believe it was about how that law would protect him. Once again, this was a tragedy since it resulted in the death of a young man and could have been avoided in a number of ways by both parties. But the argument over Stand Your Ground seems more about trying to find something to blame when all else has failed.

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