Trayvon Martin Rally

For more information about Trayvon Martin and on-campus events about the situation, look for an article in this Thursday’s issue of The Sandspur.

Taken from an email sent from the Office of Multicultural Affairs to the student body:

On February 26, 2012, Trayvon Martin, a 17 year-old high school student was shot twice and killed while walking home in the rain in Sanford, FL. The man who shot him, George Zimmerman, 28, was a self-appointed neighborhood watch captain. Zimmerman saw Martin walking down the street from his truck while patrolling the neighborhood. At 7:09 he called 911. On the phone with the dispatcher, Zimmerman states, “we’ve had some break-ins in my neighborhood, and there’s a real suspicious guy . . . This guy looks like he’s up to no good, or he’s on drugs or something. It’s raining and he’s just walking around, looking about.” While on the phone, Zimmerman claims that Martin looked at him and began to approach him. Eventually, Martin began to run away. The dispatcher asked Zimmerman if he was following Martin and Zimmerman replied, “Yeah.” The dispatcher responded that “we don’t need you to do that.” The dispatcher continued to talk to Zimmerman, and told him that police were in route and that they would meet up with him. At 7:16 the police began receiving calls from neighbors, and at 7:17 shots can be heard on the phone calls. Zimmerman was found, with a bloody nose and wound on the back of his neck, standing over Martin’s body. Martin was unarmed and had only a pack of Skittles and a can of Nestea.

In Florida, there is a law called the “Stand Your Ground Law”, which implies that anyone has the right to defend themselves if they feel their life is in jeopardy. Because Zimmerman stated that he felt threatened by Martin and he was acting in self-defense, he is being protected from being arrested by this law. As young adults, many of us are around the same age as Trayvon and this could have happened to us.

On Monday, April 16th, at 6:30p a Diversity Dialogue will be held to discuss the Stand Your Ground Law and the correlation to racial profiling.

The photos below were taken at the Rally held outside the campus center on March 27.

All photos taken by Annamarie Carlson.