DOJ Flails Again in Efforts to Charge George Zimmerman
Taaffe to testify to Grand Jury that he couldn’t be sure “racist call” was from Zimmerman
Earlier this month we posted news that Frank Taafe, a self-proclaimed “friend” of George Zimmerman, was going to testify before a Grand Jury that he now believed Zimmerman had a racist motivation for the shooting of Trayvon Martin. This news came just days before the hotly contested November 4 election in which the Democrats took the same kind of beating that Trayvon delivered to Zimmerman, but without the benefit of being armed. (See: Key Witness for Zimmerman Grand Jury Changes Story.)
Taaffe’s Grand Jury appearance, scheduled for last Wednesday, was delayed for unexplained reasons. (See: We interrupt post-election gloating for news about the DOJ Zimmerman Grand Jury.) According to reporting by the Orlando Sentinel newspaper, however, Taaffe was to appear before the Grand Jury today to testify about Zimmerman’s purported racial animus.
Such testimony would be a game changer in lingering efforts to seek Federal civil rights charges against Zimmerman. Despite dozens of FBI interviews of people associated with Zimmerman, there was never so much as a smidgen of evidence that Zimmerman shot Martin for reasons of racism. Indeed, what evidence was developed ran counter to that narrative.
Among those at the time who told FBI agents that they had no reason to believe Zimmerman had a racial motive for shooting Martin? Frank Taaffe. Here’s the video:
Without evidence of racial animus there was no basis for a Federal civil rights prosecution, and in fact none was forthcoming. Earlier this year, however, with public interest in him waning, Taaffe suddenly recalled that he had, after all, had a phone conversation with Zimmerman in which the media-described “white Hispanic” had voiced racial animus towards Martin. It appeared, suddenly and literally incredibly, as if there might be a hook on which to hang a civil rights prosecution of Zimmerman after all.
Could this be true?
Short answer: no.
For reasons known only to the Orlando Sentinel, they waited until the 17th paragraph of their 22 paragraph online post to un-bury the lede:
Taaffe said he expected to testify about a phone call days before Zimmerman’s arrest from someone who claimed to be Zimmerman and made a “racial comment” about the case, Taaffe said.
He said the call came from an unknown number, so he couldn’t be 100 percent sure it was Zimmerman.
Oofah. (The “emphasis added” fairy contributed to the above quote.)
Here’s Taaffe’s impromptu, and VERY lengthy (almost 20 minute) statement to the press today:
So once again the Federal Department of Justice in particular and the Zimmerman-haters in general are left without so much of a smidgen of evidence of racism on any facet–not one–of Zimmerman’s interaction with Trayvon Martin nor the entirety of Zimmerman’s life leading up to that night.
Indeed, as has always been the case the only evidence of racism that night is the racism of Trayvon Martin. Rachel Jeantel, with whom Martin was speaking on the phone up until moments before his death, gave sworn testimony that Martin referred to Zimmerman as a “cracker,” a racist term used to refer to white people.
I concluded my November 1st post on this matter with the words: “Color me cynical.”
Right again. 🙂
–-Andrew, @LawSelfDefense
Andrew F. Branca is an MA lawyer and the author of the seminal book “The Law of Self Defense, 2nd Edition,” available at the Law of Self Defense blog (autographed copies available) and Amazon.com (paperback and Kindle). He also holds Law of Self Defense Seminars around the country, and provides free online self-defense law video lectures at the Law of Self Defense Institute and podcasts through iTunes, Stitcher, and elsewhere.
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Comments
A “saltine” the justice system once again comes at a Premium.
“Color me cynical.”
So.
YOU are a person of color?
Color me (can I say that) confused…
But, yeah, this was about pre-election CRASS RACIAL politics.
Thank you, Eric HOlder.
And THAT is all.
According to Charlie Rangel “White Cracker” is a term of endearment. I can think o some other “Terms of enderament” to call Charlie…
Now if George can just get his law suit against the news agencies to be reinstated, all would be well.
Whenever I’ve seen this guy on TV, which he’s been on a lot (wasn’t he a regular on Nancy Disgrace?), I keep wondering if someone should Baker Act this clown. Something about the guy just seems off to me.
Yep from my psych days, he does seem worthy of a 72 hour hold for evaluation to me.
Traffe has some serious legal problems of his own. Lying to a Federal Agent is a crime. Lying to a Grand Jury is a crime. Forgetting is not a crime. But once he goes before the Grand Jury, forgetting is out the window.
“Martin referred to Zimmerman as a “cracker,” a racist term used to refer to white people.”
*****
I think it was “Crazy ass-cracker”, possibly indicating that Martin thought Zimmerman was a potential gay rapist and a threat to his younger brother.
Ya, that was Rachel Jeantel’s testimony during the Zimmerman trial. But she used the phrase “Creepy ass cracker”. I’m highly skeptical of anything and everything she said but let’s suppose that’s true. Trayvon still made his way back to lay a beat down on Zimmerman..
So, what are these DOJ investigations about anyways?
“So, what are these DOJ investigations about anyways?”
Nothing. The election is over. Racebaiters lost. Zimmerman will now fade away.
“Zimmerman will now fade away.”
I’m not so sure the media’s obsession with Zimmerman is over. And I’d be MSNBC or maybe CNN still has someone trying to follow him around.
I hope for his sake that he just bugs out to a remote location for a few years. Wyoming would be a good place to be.
“And I’d be MSNBC or maybe CNN still has someone trying to follow him around.”
I barely consider CNN to be ‘media”. MSNBC is nothing more than a racebaiting channel, watched only by the true believers. So, perhaps they will keep trying, but it goes nowhere. First, it’s clear Zimm is not a racist. Second, no gains to be made by the racist party, they lost. They lost in a big way. The old tactics just did not work in this election cycle. They will try again in a couple years with a new “Zimmerman”.
If you have to know something like the “Tueller Drill” before shooting someone in order to raise concept in your defense, wouldn’t Zimmerman have had to have had “racial animus” before he shot Martin in order for that to be used against him? Considering what Martin put Zimmerman through (Martin’s attack on Zimmerman precipitated the difficult times Zimmerman has faced since the shooting), would it be surprising that Zimmerman now has unkind thoughts about him? Considering the extreme stress that Zimmerman has been under, would it be surprising for those unkind thoughts to take the form (but not necessarily the substance) of racial invective? Even if real, Zimmerman’s post-incident racial animus is not necessarily an indication of his pre-incident feelings towards blacks, and couldn’t possibly be an indication of Zimmerman’s pre-incident feelings towards a man he never met.
Also, doesn’t a racist have a right to defend his life against one of the subjects of his hate when one of those subjects is beating the living daylights out of him? Does a person surrender his right to self-defense when he hates the person who is threatening his life? A racially-motivated killing can only be one that is unlawful. The Zimmerman-Martin shooting has already been adjudicated as lawful. A lawful killing is done in self-defense, regardless of any “racial animus” the shooter may have toward the person attempting to severely injure or kill him. Zimmerman may have had racial animus against Martin, but it isn’t, and can’t be, unlawful to kill a person you hate who is also threatening to take your life.
In Calif self defense requires your action to be solely from fear, if you hate someone it becomes a serious issue in proving self defense.
In Zimmerman’s case he has no apparent dislike of Trayvon despite what happened to him, but does have some anger towards those who persecuted him after Trayvon’s attack. Zimmerman’s first attorneies would have shredded Trayvon’s character, and Zimmerman dropped them in favor of O’Mara who handled Trayvon with kit gloves.
What Jeantel said Trayvon called Zimmerman was not “cracker”, a racial term, but “creepy ass cracker” urban slang for gay predator, as in “creepy” “ass cracker”.
In Trayvon’s world it is expected that a snitch or openly gay person gets a beating. Zimmerman reported Trayvon to the police, so snitches get stitches, or maybe Trayvon really did think Zimmerman was gay and beat him for that, maybe both.
Ya know I keep hearing this argument I it makes me wonder how anyone can be that stupid unless they are being willfully ignorant. It was a racial slur period any other argument is just deflection.
It can be confusing if you are ignorant of urban slang, certain phrases are used commonly with variations on the words for specific meaning.
Cracker is slang for white.
Ass cracker is gay, but not exclusively so, it implies a preferred sexual act as much as gay/straight.
Creepy ass cracker, is a gay sexual predator.
P*ssy ass cracker, is a mall cop. Mentioned because Jeantel made her statement in front of Sabrina Fulton and admitted she changed some things to not offend her.
Being openly gay, or snitching on someone in Trayvon’s culture is seen as good cause for a beating, why ignore it?
Its the only explanation for Trayvon’s attack on Zimmerman that fits the rest of the evidence, which shows Zimmerman never approached or confronted Trayvon, just watched him from a distance and called police.
I have thought that part of it though was the knock down/knock out culture thing. Martin had apparently bragged about swinging on a bus driver. Something like that. Here was a white guy all alone who dissed him a bit by tailing him.
The homophobia theory does make some sense, since young black males are some of the more homophobic around. Part of it is that 17 year old guys are probably more likely to go physically violent when they think homosexuality is involved than almost any other time. And, I think this more likely in the Black community than white, since the former has not accepted political correctness to the extent that the latter has.
Unfortunately (for Martin), we will very likely never know why he swung on Zimmerman that dark night,knocking him to the ground, and then beat on him, etc. until Zimmerman was able to stop him.
It’s “creepy-ass cracker”. This “ass cracker” meme is totally invented out of thin air. It doesn’t exist. “Pussy-ass cracker” can refer to many other things besides “mall cops”, although that is one of the derogatory terms used to insult white security guards.
For what it’s worth, the term “-ass” doesn’t mean anything in itself. It just gets added to just about everything for the sake of emphasis.
O’Mara was fabulous!
And, the Zimmerman trial, with “guy” for the prosecution, brought in a grey foam dummy … which was placed on the floor. I can still picture O’Mara straddling it.
Also, O’Mara’s close was wonderful. He spoke of the burden and the honor it is to sit on a jury. And, how the task of the jury is to sift through the evidence. This is at the heart of our system.
And, I was thrilled when the jurors came back and said Zimmerman was not guilty!
I don’t doubt Taaffe is the sort of fellow who relishes the attention and notoriety.
I doubt he came up with the idea of the ‘racist phone call’ completely on his own. He’s not an idiot. He has to know, or have consulted lawyers who would have advised him, that there is risk in contradicting under oath your previous statement to the FBI.
– –
No way to prove anything, of course, but the timing of the announcement of the new testimony, and now its downgrading, seem rather convenient for certain political interests.
IANAL, but any interrogator interested in the truth would pin Taaffe down on the date and time of the alleged conversation, and subpoena the phone records. That should settle the matter.
The “facepalm” fairy keeps smacking me. Anyway, does GZ have legal avenue or remedy to go after Taaffe? It didn’t work with NBC, and I thought that was a sure thing. The burning question I have is who, government wise, is actually interested in the truth?
Of course it had no merit.
It was just a political ruse to gin up the idiot black vote for the election.
Now that the election’s over, they don’t need it anymore.
It is not correct that “the only evidence of racism that night is the racism of Trayvon Martin.” You are overlooking the rampant, unbridled racism in the MSM and in the DoJ.
That came later, not “that night.” The shooting had almost no coverage whatever for weeks.
–Andrew, @LawSelfDefense
The race-baiter brigade hadn’t yet identified it as a good case to exploit.
Signed,
Henry Hawkins, Off-White Caucasian
“The race-baiter brigade hadn’t yet identified it as a good case to exploit.”
Agreed. I’m trying to figure out their exact metrics for choosing. They keep picking obvious losers, standing up for thugs. Why don’t they pick a case that at least has some chance of involving some nice kid that got mistreated or killed? Maybe there just aren’t any. (cases of course, not kids)
Barry, even if they did find someone like that, it’s been falsely claimed so many times that “choir boy” is common slang for a thug. Whatever the opposite of crying “wolf” is, they’ve done it too many times for them to be believed. Perhaps call it crying “lamb”.
I get that. My first impulse on anything like this is BS. Still, you would think someone would have the sense to say “no, not this one”. Of course, sense and the left don’t really hang out together.