Prosecutors: Trayvon Martin’s pot smoking, previous troubles irrelevant at Zimmerman trial
Florida prosecutors say Trayvon Martin’s troubles at school and his marijuana smoking should not be talked about at a trial for neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman.
Prosecutors asked a judge on Monday to block Zimmerman’s attorneys from presenting this evidence as well as information about Martin getting into a fight and wearing fake gold teeth. Prosecutors also want to keep out of the trial any social media screen names Martin used, the contents of his text messages and his school records.
Prosecutors say such information is irrelevant to the trial.
Depends on the context of each event. Now certainly ANY violent conduct of the late Mr. Martin is VERY relevant, given that the crux of the Defense’s argument is that Mr. Zimmerman was attacked by Mr. Martin, and Mr. Martin fully intended to do grave physical harm to George Zimmerman.
Wearing gold teeth, or smoking pot is debatable. If they are just incidentals, they’re just that. If they show a strong history of drug abuse, and interest in violent Urban Gang Culture, well again, that paints more of a picture of the type of person who would attempt to kill another man with his bare hands on a rainy Florida night.
I really think you need to look up the word “Irrelevant”!
Good article about it here.
I can see the points. If Trayvon had a consistent history of violence and drug use – not isolated events, but a solid history – then it might be admissible by the defense, even if George didn’t know about it at the time. It presents a reasonable probability that Trayvon might attack without provocation rather than walk away. Isolated events, though, aren’t usually admissible; many (most?) kids get in fights at some point, and it doesn’t mean they’re particularly violent or bad kids unless they constantly seek out or pick fights.
The prosecutor will also have to be careful as to what she presents. If she brings up what a sweet boy Trayvon was, it opens the door for the defense to question that and introduce a history of violence and drugs (again, consistent history, not individual events).
We’ll see what happens when the trial starts, but for now it’s interesting to discuss.
Don’t forget that the excessive use of marijuana is associated with paranoia; given that a witness Martin was being followed, the use is definitely relevant.
Paranoia is also associated with the use of “lean” or “purple drank” — again, his previous drug use is relevant.
The biggest fight, in my opinion, will be getting his school records into evidence. Since the school district failed to follow its own policies and call the police when evidence of drug use was found, it will be difficult.
I think the defense will be able to get the school records in due to the 911 recording. Zimmerman clearly articulated observed behavior; showing that others had observed signs of illegal activity should be supporting evidence.
If the prosecution bring in “Witness 8” aka DeeDee; they will open the door to presentation of all that for rebuttal of her testimony.
One of the things I really hope the defense does is simply put up life sized photos of Martin and Zimmerman as they appeared at the time of the incident. It would really let the jury see that Martin wasn’t the cute youngest in the football jersey shown so many times in the media.