So here I am, in five-below-zero Cleveland on a Monday morning, watching CNN\u2019s sandbag interview of George Zimmerman, and listening to Nancy Grace and assorted other talking heads conflate his case with Saturday\u2019s verdict on Michael Dunn in the Jacksonville \u201cloud music\u201d homicide.<\/p>\n
It makes me want to wander outside into the snow. There\u2019s less bullshit out there in the cold, clean air.<\/p>\n
The Dunn verdict gives me no heartburn.\u00a0 He sent bullets toward three young men who were fleeing from him and had themselves shown him no overt threat; that suffices to sustain the jury\u2019s guilty verdicts on three counts of attempted murder, and for firing at the vehicle.\u00a0 There is much rage that the jury could not agree on a verdict on the charge of murdering the fourth young man, Jordan Davis.\u00a0 The defendant came across well with his testimony, unsupported by any other testimony, that he perceived Jordan to be bringing a gun to bear on him when he fired the fatal shots.<\/p>\n
Did that suffice to give at least one juror reasonable doubt as to guilt? To believe that Dunn might well be telling the truth?\u00a0 That seems to be the primary assumption of commentators so far. \u00a0It\u2019s certainly a possibility, but it might also have been that the jury simply couldn\u2019t agree on premeditated murder vis-\u00e0-vis lesser included offenses.\u00a0 In his closing statement, prosecutor John Guy told the jury that the state didn\u2019t want anything less than a Murder One conviction.\u00a0 It may turn out to be a case of \u201cbe careful what you ask for, you might just get it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Just hypothetically, if Michael Dunn was telling the truth and there was <\/i>a shotgun in the other vehicle when he opened fire upon it, the defense claim that the young men in that vehicle dumped the evidence is rendered largely moot by Dunn\u2019s own actions. When he fled the scene, he didn\u2019t just trigger the whole \u201cflight equals guilt\u201d thing; he removed from the scene the one person who could have told police that there might be a shotgun they should be looking for.\u00a0 It puts him somewhat in the position of the guy who kills his parents and then pleads the court\u2019s mercy as an orphan.\u00a0 The cops can\u2019t find something they don\u2019t know to look for.<\/p>\n
There was much fail in Michael Dunn\u2019s actions.\u00a0 The innocence he claimed was nowhere near as clear as Zimmerman\u2019s, based on his statements at the scene, and the totality of the evidence.\u00a0 The cases don\u2019t really belong in the same discussion, and neither has a damn thing to do with Florida\u2019s Stand Your Ground law.\u00a0 Dunn emerges as, at best, a bad example of stupid behavior whose only positive legacy will be learning points for more responsible armed citizens.\u00a0 Zimmeman remains a whipping boy for the willful ignorance of those who prefer superficial sensationalism to research into the actual principles of law and justice.<\/p>\n
Part One of the CNN Interview:<\/strong><\/p>\n