Neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman turned himself in
Wednesday to face a charge of second-degree murder after a Florida
special prosecutor announced she had concluded that his claims of self
defense were not supported in the shooting death of unarmed 17-year-old
Trayvon Martin.
Special prosecutor Angela Corey's announcement marked a turning
point in the high-profile case, as weeks of outrage and speculation
about Zimmerman's motives culminated in his arrest -- something that
Martin's family and their supporters have argued for since the Feb. 26
shooting in a gated community in Sanford, Fla.
But Zimmerman's new lawyer, Mark O'Mara, said his client will plead
not guilty, and he is "hoping that the community will calm down" after
the intense scrutiny of the case in the community and the media drove
Zimmerman into hiding.
Zimmerman, 28, was booked Wednesday evening into the Seminole County
Jail, and he could face a minimum of 25 years in prison or a maximum of
life if convicted. He is expected to make his first appearance in court
in the next day or two, and O'Mara plans to ask for bail.
In announcing the arrest, Corey would not discuss how she reconciled
the conflicting accounts of what happened or explain how she arrived at
the charges, saying too much information had been made public already.
But she made it clear she was not influenced by the uproar over the
past six weeks.
"We do not prosecute by public pressure or by petition. We prosecute
based on the facts on any given case as well as the laws of the state
of Florida," Corey said.
A second-degree murder charge in Florida is typically charged when
there is a fight or other confrontation that results in death and where
there is no premeditated plan to kill someone.
Meanwhile, Martin's parents said charges against Zimmerman in the
killing of their son would start the healing process, but they won't
stop fighting until the shooter is convicted.
"We just wanted an arrest and we got it," Martin's mother, Sybrina Fulton, said.
"The question I would really like to ask him is, if he could look
into Trayvon's eyes and see how innocent he was, would he have then
pulled the trigger? Or would he have just let him go on home?" father,
Tracy Martin, said.
The shooting brought outspoken demands from black leaders for
Zimmerman arrest and set off a furious nationwide debate over race and
self-defense that reached all the way to the White House. Martin was
black. Zimmerman's father is white and his mother is Hispanic.
One of the biggest hurdles to Zimmerman's arrest over the past month
was Florida's "stand your ground" law, which gives people wide leeway
to use deadly force without having to retreat in the face of danger.
The lack of an arrest had sparked outrage and rallies for justice in
the Orlando suburb and across the country.
Many legal experts had expected the prosecutor to opt for the lesser
charge of manslaughter, which usually carries 15 years behind bars and
covers reckless or negligent killings, rather than second-degree
murder, which involves a killing that results from a "depraved"
disregard for human life.
The most severe homicide charge, first-degree murder, is subject to
the death penalty in Florida and requires premeditation -- something
that all sides agreed was not present in this case.
The confrontation took place in a gated community where Martin was
staying with his father and his father's fiancee. In phone calls,
Zimmerman told an emergency dispatcher that Martin looked suspicious,
and he followed the teen despite the dispatcher's advice.
Zimmerman's father said that Martin threatened to kill his son and
that Zimmerman suffered a broken nose. A video taken about 40 minutes
after the shooting as Zimmerman arrived at the Sanford police station
showed him walking unassisted without difficulty. There were no plainly
visible bandages or blood on his clothing, but Zimmerman may have had a
small wound on the back of his head.
On Tuesday, Zimmerman's lawyers announced they were withdrawing from
the case because they hadn't heard from him since Sunday and didn't
know where he was. They portrayed his mental state as fragile.
Zimmerman had been in hiding for weeks, his former lawyers, Craig Sonner and Hal Uhrig, said.
"He is largely alone. You might even say he is emotionally crippled by virtue of the pressure of this case," Uhrig said.
The U.S. Justice Department's civil rights division is conducting
its own investigation. But federal authorities typically wait until a
state prosecution is complete before deciding how to proceed.