Trayvon Martin

Critics, including Martin’s parents, have called Stand Your Ground laws (contained in Section 776 of Florida Statutes) an invitation for vigilante violence and civilian racial profiling. Despite widespread outrage over Martin’s slaying, a 19-member task force assembled by Florida Governor Rick Scott (R) has found no grounds to overturn the law. The findings of the Task Force on Citizen Safety and Protection report released on February 22nd boil down to this: The problem doesn’t lay with the law but with some people who have tried to use it. 

The fatal encounter lasted only a few seconds. According to the police report, Jude was in his car with his girlfriend placing an order at Taco Bell, and was told to drive to the front window to pick up the order. As he pulled away from the drive-through, he nearly ran over Adkins  as he was walking his dog. Adkins cursed loudly at Jude and approached the passenger window of his car. Jude and his girlfriend said they then saw Adkins swinging something that resembled a bat. At that point, said Jude, he shot Adkins with a pistol that he had on his lap, then called 911.

On April 17, the Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Human Rights listened to testimony from legislators, legal experts, law enforcement officials, and advocates expressing their views on the state of racial profiling in America. Members of the committee debated the merits of The End of Racial Profiling Act of 2011 – which supporters say would help strengthen ties between minority communities and law enforcement agencies that are supposed to serve them.

A swift exodus of corporate support from the little-known, but powerful American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) has shined light on the group’s efforts to spread conservative and corporate-backed legislation to state and local governments. Last week, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation became the latest backer to withdraw financial support for ALEC. 

In the wake of the Trayvon Martin tragedy, conservatives in media have sought to deflect from the racism and racial profiling that precipitated his untimely death by referencing the broader social malaise of supposed "black-on-black violence." The truth? As the largest racial group, whites commit the majority of crimes in America. In particular, whites are responsible for the vast majority of violent crimes. With respect to aggravated assault, whites led blacks 2-1 in arrests; in forcible-rape cases, whites led all racial and ethnic groups by more than 2-1. And in larceny theft, whites led blacks again, more than 2-1.

As the tragedy of Trayvon Martin's death calls the country to examine the racial inequities of the criminal justice system, it must go beyond our common, and justified, focus on the racist zealots or inept police officers. It has to go where the real power lies – with the prosecutors – the ones who control the levers of the system in counties and states across the country. In Martin’s case, it was prosecutor Norm Wolfinger who allowed his killer to walk free. 

In a darker reality, you would not be reading this. I would not be a writer. Nor would I be a husband to my wife or a father to my new son. Because if the shaky hands of a police officer had deemed otherwise, my brains would have been splattered all over the backseat of a tan Ford Mustang years ago. I don’t purport to know all the facts of the admitted recent killing of unarmed Trayvon Martin by George Zimmerman in Sanford, Florida. But I can tell you what it’s like to be a young man of color in a world that too often criminalizes us.