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points by eesmith 10 hours ago | 0 comments
Acquitted means that the jury did not find the evidence persuasive enough to decide guilt for the charged person for the charged crime. It does not mean the victim was not found to have been murdered. Juries don't decide that.

Otherwise there would not be things like "List of unsolved murders (2000–present)". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unsolved_murders_(2000...

[–] rootusrootus 6 hours ago
IMO Trayvon was murdered. But I don't get the same reading from the acquittal that you do. Nobody disputes that Zimmerman killed Trayvon. But murder is a crime, and the jury decided that Zimmerman did not commit murder. Therefore Trayvon is a victim of homicide, but not a victim of murder. Legally, I mean, which is what the jury is deciding.

The unsolved murders list is probably the same deal, it is colloquial and not legal, and with nobody accused and put to trial, it may yet end up legally murder.

[–] bawolff 6 hours ago
I feel like you are really picking apart hairs here.

There is not a huge difference between "the victim was not found to have been murdered." and "the jury did not find the evidence persuasive enough to decide guilt for the charged person for the charged crime". If you want to get really nitpicky, just because "the victim was not found to have been murdered", doesn't mean that they weren't murdered. Whether they were found to be murdered is a different statement than if they were actually murdered.

[–] eesmith 42 minutes ago
My reading of nsoam's comment is the implication that they are identical.

Remember, this is someone who never heard of Trayvon Martin, which suggests to me someone who doesn't know much about the US criminal court system.

While I remember that Nicole Brown Simpson and friend Ron Goldman were murdered, and are widely described as being murdered, even after O. J. Simpson was acquitted of that murder, so I have no surprise seeing Martin listed as a '“Murdered” person' even after Zimmerman's acquittal.