trayvon martin / george zimmerman 2012

I made two trips to Sanford, Florida in 2012, first to report on the shooting of Trayvon Martin in March, and then later during George Zimmerman's murder trial in July.

The video below is from our report in March, where I had the only TV news camera on scene to capture the FDLE's follow up crime scene investigation. There are also interviews with neighbors, one of whom was an African American teenager who recounted how on one occasion before the shooting, George Zimmerman, acting in his capacity on "neighborhood watch", accused the teen of stealing a bike that was parked in his garage, which actually had been a gift from his father. 

Our report also focused on Florida's stand your ground law, passage of which led to a stunning increase in classifications of justifiable homicides, which tripled in the first couple of years after being enacted in 2005. 

While reporting near the scene of the deadly confrontation, a local blogger I chatted with captured this image of former Fuji TV anchor Yutaka Hasegawa and I retracing Zimmerman's path