{"id":12980,"date":"2014-02-12T18:36:36","date_gmt":"2014-02-12T18:36:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/praag.org\/?p=12980"},"modified":"2014-02-12T18:38:36","modified_gmt":"2014-02-12T18:38:36","slug":"another-trayvon-martin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/praag.org\/?p=12980","title":{"rendered":"The return of Trayvon Martin"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Dunn<\/a>
Dunn and Davis<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A Florida man who shot and killed a black teenager in a dispute over loud music defended himself in court at a racially-charged trial which has revived memories of a notorious case that gripped the United States last year.<\/p>\n

The murder trial of Michael Dunn has drawn comparisons to that of neighbourhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman, who was cleared of killing teenager Trayvon Martin after claiming self-defence under Florida\u2019s controversial \u2018stand your ground\u2019 law.<\/p>\n

Dunn, 47, who is white, insisted he was in fear for his life when he opened fire on a red sport utility vehicle after exchanging words with the black teenagers inside when he asked them to turn their music down.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was just going \u2018oh my God, where is all this hostility coming from?\u2019\u201d Dunn told the court as he described seeing one of the teens pull out what looked to him like a shotgun.<\/p>\n

Police did not find evidence of a gun in the vehicle and the three surviving teens testified that they never threatened Dunn.<\/p>\n

Dunn insisted he was \u201cin a panic\u201d when he yanked his pistol out of his glove box as one of the teens started to get out of their car and come towards him.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the point where he is coming to kill me, coming to beat me,\u201d Dunn testified. \u201cHe made it quite clear what his intentions were.\u201d Dunn said he kept firing as the sport utility drove away because he was afraid that he or his fianc\u00e9 \u2014 who had rushed out of the gas station shop when she heard the shots \u2014 might get hit by returning fire.<\/p>\n

On the night of the fatal gas station shooting, Dunn said the music from a red Dodge Durango parked next to him grew \u2018really loud\u2019 after his fianc\u00e9e went into the store.<\/p>\n

\u2018My review mirror was shaking, my eardrums were vibrating. It was ridiculously loud,\u2019 Dunn said.<\/p>\n

\u2018I said, \u201dCan you turn that down please?\u201d\u2019 he testified. \u2018They turned it off. I said thank you.\u2019<\/p>\n

Dunn claimed that the music had not made him angry but described it as \u2018rap c***\u2019 and \u2018obnoxiously loud\u2019.<\/p>\n

The young men in the Durango soon began using expletives, the word \u2018cracker\u2019 and then turned the volume back up, Dunn claimed.<\/p>\n

\u2018I start hearing things like F-him and F-that,\u2019 Dunn said. \u2018It was mean-spirited.<\/p>\n

\u2018When they turned the music on the second time i wasn\u2019t going to ask them for any more favors again.<\/p>\n

\u2018Now it got ugly. I had no reaction\u2013I\u2019m looking forward and hoping Rhonda comes out [of the store].<\/p>\n

\u2018Now there\u2019s thumping bass and he\u2019s yelling over the bass. I hear \u201dI should kill that m***********.\u201d\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2018I\u2019m flabbergasted. Now I\u2019m paying attention to what they are saying. Then I hear in a more elevated voice: \u201dI should f****** kill, that m**********.\u201d\u2019<\/p>\n

Dunn added: \u2018At this point, I think I should try and deescalate this.\u2019<\/p>\n

Dunn then claims that a young man, identified as Jordan Davis, who was seated in the rear of the car, bent down and appeared to pick up something by his feet.<\/p>\n

The accused said that at this point, he did not reach for his pistol stored in the glove compartment of his car.<\/p>\n

Dunn said Davis \u2018came back up and slammed whatever it was against the door\u2019.<\/p>\n

He said: \u2018I saw sticking above the windowsill about four inches of a barrel. It was a thump I heard against the door. It looked like a 12-gauge or maybe 20-gauge [shotgun].\u2019<\/p>\n

Dunn testified: \u2018I was in fear for my life and I was stunned. I\u2019ve never been threatened, let alone threatened with a firearm. I was incredulous\u2013I couldn\u2019t believe what I was hearing and seeing.\u2019<\/p>\n

The accused said that Davis began to get out of the car and yelled at him: \u2018This s*** is going down now.\u2019<\/p>\n

Dunn said: \u2018This is the point where my death is imminent, he made it very clear what his intentions were. I\u2019ve never been in that position.\u2019<\/p>\n

Dunn testified that he had no idea that he had shot and killed Jordan Davis, 17, until he saw a news alert on his phone once he got back to his hotel.<\/p>\n

He explained that he did not immediately contact local police because he wanted to get the advice of a neighbour who works in law enforcement and was convinced it was an open and shut case of self-defence.<\/p>\n

Unlike Zimmerman \u2014 who did not face charges for weeks after claiming self-defence in the shooting of an unarmed teenager \u2014 Dunn was arrested and charged with murder the day after the shooting. He has been held in jail pending his trial.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Florida man who shot and killed a black teenager in a dispute over loud music defended himself in court at a racially-charged trial which has revived memories of a notorious case that gripped the United States last year. The murder trial of Michael Dunn has drawn comparisons to that of neighbourhood watch volunteer George … Continue reading “The return of Trayvon Martin”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12981,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,10],"tags":[5747,8328,8327,40,5982,157],"class_list":["post-12980","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-united-states","tag-black-teenagers","tag-jordan-davis","tag-michael-dunn","tag-murder","tag-racial-attack","tag-racism"],"cc_featured_image_caption":{"caption_text":false,"source_text":false,"source_url":false},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/praag.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/dunn.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12980","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12980"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12980\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12983,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12980\/revisions\/12983"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/12981"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12980"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12980"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/praag.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12980"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}