Demands like "arrest George Zimmerman!” have been the clarion call of protesters for weeks now following the Feb. 26 shooting death of Trayvon Martin, the Miami Gardens teenager who had a fatal encounter with Zimmerman in a gated community in Sanford.
Of course, authorities are quick to remind them that police cannot make an arrest just because lots of angry people demand what they believe is justice.
That's where the relative quiet of Seminole County's palatial, new justice building in Sanford will come into play as early as April 10. It’s likely a grand jury will be empanelled in a mundane second-floor room.
Jacksonville State Attorney Angela Corey was appointed by Gov. Rick Scott to replace local prosecutor Norman Wolfinger on the case. Behind closed doors, Corey and her team of prosecutors and investigators will present evidence to jurors who will then decide whether to arrest and charge Zimmerman, the 28-year-old neighborhood crime watch volunteer, for shooting and killing Martin, 17. He maintains he did so in self-defense.
The Seminole County State Attorney's Office, the Sanford Police Department and Sanford City Hall have directed all media inquiries now to Corey's office, but she is not available to discuss the grand jury.
“So this is not a trial procedure in any way, shape, or form. The rules of evidence don't apply,” says grand jury expert Brian Bieber, an attorney with the Miami law firm Hirschhorn & Bieber. "And all the grand jurors are asked to do in this process is to determine whether there is probable cause to charge an individual with a crime. Not to decide whether someone is guilty (or) innocent."
Bieber says taking this incendiary case to a grand jury will insulate the prosecutor from any political ramifications of whatever the grand jury decides, "because it's not the prosecutor who decided to bring the charge.”
There are several key factors a grand jury might consider in deciding whether to charge Zimmerman. Foremost, who attacked first? Police quote eyewitnesses who say they saw Martin hit Zimmerman first, then jump on him and pound his head into the sidewalk.
The 911 audio will be important.
Finally, in order to utilize the state’s “Stand Your Ground” law, the grand jury would need to determine which of the two feared for his life.
