I wasn't aware that people were usually not arrested before their case goes before a grand jury.
The grand jury was called for political reasons. It is highly unusual for a grand jury to be called absent an arrest, but it is also highly unusual for a President to weigh in on a local case he knows nothing about and has no jurisdiction over. In any event, the grand jury has no impact on what the police do. A grand jury convening does not excuse them from their responsibilities. They found no probable cause. If they made an arrest under such circumstances, they'd be putting themselves in legal peril.
Ok you understand the law better than me. Explain to me how this works:
1. Let's say Zimmerman started the fight.
We can stop right there. The statute is clear:
776.013(3)
A person who is not engaged in an unlawful activity, and who is attacked in any other place where he or she has a right to be has no duty to retreat and has the right to stand his or her ground and meet force with force, including deadly force if he or she reasonably believes it is necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm to himself or herself or another or to prevent the commission of a forcible felony.
If Zimmerman started the fight, he would have been engaged in an unlawful activity. 776.013(3) no longer applies and the shooting is no longer a justifiable use of force.
2. Let's even go further. Say Trayvon started the fight. Is Zimmerman allowed to shoot an unarmed man over a fistfight?
If Trayvon started the fight, then the statute applies so long as Zimmerman reasonably believed he would otherwise incur great bodily harm. Witness has Martin on top of Zimmerman punching him in the face, so great bodily harm threshold was clearly satisfied. If this is what happened (Martin starting the fight), and the police clearly think it the most likely scenario, then no crime has occurred (other than Martin's assault of Zimmerman).
Here's the thing: I've been in many fist fights in my life. More so in my youth when I was hyperactive and dumb. In none of the fights did anyone sustain injury that didn't heal in 30 days and in none of the fights were police involved. Are you saying that if during the fistfight I was involved in whoever I was fighting could have used a gun to shoot and kill me and that would have been acceptable since we were in a fight?
If your fights occurred in the State of Florida after 2006, then yes, whomever you were fighting could have used a gun to shoot and kill you so long as they reasonably feared great bodily harm. Injuries that take 4 weeks to heal are almost by definition great bodily harm, and that is just the injury you actually inflicted. In theory, anytime you punch someone repeatedly to the face you are highly likely to break their nose or eye socket, quite likely to cause skull fracture, and if you aren't stopped, you will eventually kill the person.
This is mind boggling to me. The ONLY defense of Zimmerman (if true) is that he was losing a fistfight? Is that justification to shoot and kill an unarmed man?
No. First, it is not really a "defense" since the statute provides immunity from prosecution, not an affirmative defense. And second, the critical element in making it a justifiable use of force is not who was winning the fight, but who started it. If you attack someone else in the state of Florida, and they reasonably fear great bodily harm, they can shoot you dead. This is the law, and why Zimmerman has not been charged with a crime.
