Judge in ‘stop-and-frisk’ case cites Trayvon Martin’s death

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The judge who ruled that New York’s “stop-and-frisk” practice violated the Constitutional rights of the city’s citizens seemed to have had Trayvon Martin on her mind.

Judge Shira Scheindlin references his death three times in her ruling in which she found the New York Police Department’s stop-and-frisk policy amounted to racial profiling. Scheindlin refers to Martin as “a black teenager” in the body of the opinion, but then cites his name in the footnotes as she quotes directly from three sources, including President Obama’s remarks following the verdict. She references Martin as a touchstone for the pain and frustration experienced by black men facing constant suspicion by the authorities.

George Zimmerman was acquitted of second-degree murder and manslaughter in July by a jury after he shot Martin, an unarmed black teen in Sanford, Fla., the prior year. Zimmerman said he acted in self-defense. Americans are divided along racial lines about the justness of the verdict with many black Americans believing that Martin was unjustly profiled by Zimmerman because of his race.

Scheindlin quotes two op-eds and Obama’s remarks in her opinion. Here is the passage quoted in Sheindlin’s ruling from Obama.

There are very few African-American men in this country who haven’t had the experience of being followed when they were shopping in a department store. That includes me. And there are very few African-American men who haven’t had the experience of walking across the street and hearing the locks click on the doors of cars. That happens to me, at least before I was a senator. There are very few African-Americans who haven’t had the experience of getting on an elevator and a woman clutching her purse nervously and holding her breath until she had a chance to get off. That happens often.

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