SANFORD, Fla. — Sixteen months after the fatal shooting of Trayvon Martin convulsed the nation and forever marked this Florida city, opening arguments began on Monday in the second-degree-murder trial of George Zimmerman.
In a quiet, even delivery, John Guy, a member of the prosecution team, opened the trial with a narrative portraying Mr. Martin as the unsuspecting victim of a man who had wanted to be a police officer and who had profiled him as suspicious and murdered him in cold blood.
The basic question for the jury is: Did Mr. Zimmerman, who is Hispanic, murder Mr. Martin, an unarmed black 17-year-old, or did he shoot in self-defense?
Prosecutors portrayed Mr. Zimmerman, 29, as reckless, a man with a vigilante streak and a concealed weapon. Defense lawyers will paint their client, a volunteer neighborhood watch organizer in his condominium community, as a dutiful citizen on high alert after a string of burglaries and as the kind of man anyone would want as a neighbor.
In Florida, second-degree-murder trials are heard by a jury of six people, not the customary 12, and the jurors who were seated last week, all women, include one Hispanic and no African-Americans. They will spend their days in the courtroom and their nights in a hotel under a judicial sequestration order designed to shield them from the news media’s expected gavel-to-gavel coverage. The trial is expected to last two to four weeks.
If convicted, Mr. Zimmerman, who is married and worked at a fraud-detection company before the shooting, could face a maximum sentence of life in prison.
The case quickly evolved last year from a homicide investigation into a modern-day civil rights crusade, spurring thousands of demonstrators to don hoodies (like the one Mr. Martin had been wearing the night he died) and protest around the country in memory of Mr. Martin.
The demonstrators, along with members of the Martin family, demanded a thorough investigation of the shooting and expressed outrage over the weeks-long delay in Mr. Zimmerman’s arrest. The case also prompted an angry public debate over its racial implications.
The lawyers in the trial offer very different styles: Bernie de la Rionda, the pugnacious, fast-talking and veteran chief prosecutor, who clearly relishes legal combat, and Mark O’Mara, the lanky leader of the defense team, whose courtroom nimbleness is cloaked by a soft-spoken, almost laid-back manner.
The judge, Debra S. Nelson of Seminole County Circuit Court, is a no-nonsense, impatient, sometimes taciturn jurist who has often expressed exasperation with the sniping between the legal teams.
In a key ruling on Saturday, Judge Nelson barred the testimony of the state’s two audio experts, one of whom said a voice shouting for help during the altercation was most likely Mr. Martin’s; the other concluded that it was not Mr. Zimmerman’s. The muffled cries could be heard on phone calls that neighbors made to 911.
The judge said the science supporting the two experts’ analyses was not as widely accepted as the more established methods relied on by defense witnesses. The testimony would have been a boon to the state because it would have weakened Mr. Zimmerman’s self-defense case.
On the night of Feb. 26 last year, Mr. Martin, a high school student carrying only a phone, a soft drink and a bag of Skittles, encountered Mr. Zimmerman, an armed neighborhood watchman. Minutes later, Mr. Zimmerman was on his back, with gashes on his head and a broken nose, and Mr. Martin lay dead.
The basic story, by now, is familiar. Mr. Zimmerman was in his car at Retreat at Twin Lakes, his gated community, when he spotted Mr. Martin walking with his hoodie up. Mr. Zimmerman became suspicious. He called the police nonemergency line, as he had done numerous times before to report things like a stray dog and an open garage door.
“This guy looks like he’s up to no good,” he told the dispatcher. The dispatcher asked him about the youth’s exact whereabouts. Mr. Zimmerman got out of his car and followed in Mr. Martin’s general direction. The dispatcher said it was not necessary — “we don’t need you to do that” — and Mr. Zimmerman said, “O.K.”
Prosecutors will argue that Mr. Zimmerman disobeyed the dispatcher and deliberately pursued Mr. Martin, provoking a confrontation. The defense will argue that Mr. Zimmerman was headed back to his car when Mr. Martin accosted him, threw him to the ground and beat him. Neighbors heard cries for help but saw next to nothing in the darkness.
In part because there were no witnesses and Mr. Zimmerman’s injuries support his account, the prosecutors face a much higher legal hurdle than defense lawyers do.
In a quiet, even delivery, John Guy, a member of the prosecution team, opened the trial with a narrative portraying Mr. Martin as the unsuspecting victim of a man who had wanted to be a police officer and who had profiled him as suspicious and murdered him in cold blood.
The basic question for the jury is: Did Mr. Zimmerman, who is Hispanic, murder Mr. Martin, an unarmed black 17-year-old, or did he shoot in self-defense?
Prosecutors portrayed Mr. Zimmerman, 29, as reckless, a man with a vigilante streak and a concealed weapon. Defense lawyers will paint their client, a volunteer neighborhood watch organizer in his condominium community, as a dutiful citizen on high alert after a string of burglaries and as the kind of man anyone would want as a neighbor.
In Florida, second-degree-murder trials are heard by a jury of six people, not the customary 12, and the jurors who were seated last week, all women, include one Hispanic and no African-Americans. They will spend their days in the courtroom and their nights in a hotel under a judicial sequestration order designed to shield them from the news media’s expected gavel-to-gavel coverage. The trial is expected to last two to four weeks.
If convicted, Mr. Zimmerman, who is married and worked at a fraud-detection company before the shooting, could face a maximum sentence of life in prison.
The case quickly evolved last year from a homicide investigation into a modern-day civil rights crusade, spurring thousands of demonstrators to don hoodies (like the one Mr. Martin had been wearing the night he died) and protest around the country in memory of Mr. Martin.
The demonstrators, along with members of the Martin family, demanded a thorough investigation of the shooting and expressed outrage over the weeks-long delay in Mr. Zimmerman’s arrest. The case also prompted an angry public debate over its racial implications.
The lawyers in the trial offer very different styles: Bernie de la Rionda, the pugnacious, fast-talking and veteran chief prosecutor, who clearly relishes legal combat, and Mark O’Mara, the lanky leader of the defense team, whose courtroom nimbleness is cloaked by a soft-spoken, almost laid-back manner.
The judge, Debra S. Nelson of Seminole County Circuit Court, is a no-nonsense, impatient, sometimes taciturn jurist who has often expressed exasperation with the sniping between the legal teams.
In a key ruling on Saturday, Judge Nelson barred the testimony of the state’s two audio experts, one of whom said a voice shouting for help during the altercation was most likely Mr. Martin’s; the other concluded that it was not Mr. Zimmerman’s. The muffled cries could be heard on phone calls that neighbors made to 911.
The judge said the science supporting the two experts’ analyses was not as widely accepted as the more established methods relied on by defense witnesses. The testimony would have been a boon to the state because it would have weakened Mr. Zimmerman’s self-defense case.
On the night of Feb. 26 last year, Mr. Martin, a high school student carrying only a phone, a soft drink and a bag of Skittles, encountered Mr. Zimmerman, an armed neighborhood watchman. Minutes later, Mr. Zimmerman was on his back, with gashes on his head and a broken nose, and Mr. Martin lay dead.
The basic story, by now, is familiar. Mr. Zimmerman was in his car at Retreat at Twin Lakes, his gated community, when he spotted Mr. Martin walking with his hoodie up. Mr. Zimmerman became suspicious. He called the police nonemergency line, as he had done numerous times before to report things like a stray dog and an open garage door.
“This guy looks like he’s up to no good,” he told the dispatcher. The dispatcher asked him about the youth’s exact whereabouts. Mr. Zimmerman got out of his car and followed in Mr. Martin’s general direction. The dispatcher said it was not necessary — “we don’t need you to do that” — and Mr. Zimmerman said, “O.K.”
Prosecutors will argue that Mr. Zimmerman disobeyed the dispatcher and deliberately pursued Mr. Martin, provoking a confrontation. The defense will argue that Mr. Zimmerman was headed back to his car when Mr. Martin accosted him, threw him to the ground and beat him. Neighbors heard cries for help but saw next to nothing in the darkness.
In part because there were no witnesses and Mr. Zimmerman’s injuries support his account, the prosecutors face a much higher legal hurdle than defense lawyers do.