Zimmerman was not even on "duty" when he went after Trayvon

[Hugabear]

Zimmerman wasn't even doing his "neighborhood watch" patrol when he went after Trayvon. He was on his way to Target. This tells me he was so paranoid, so ingrained to see young black men as a threat, that he took it upon himself to put off his trip to the store and go after Trayvon instead.

[NYC_SKP]

1. Yup. Because racist bigots are always on the clock.

They never sleep.

[lolly]

2. I once suspected some young men of stealing mail in our neighborhood

We'd had a rash of mail thefts, and I saw a car with 2 young men lingering around a mailbox.

I called the police.

It took them quite a while, I'll admit. It was a mail theft, not an ax murder.

Anyway, turned out to be the son of the owner of that house and some friends. Don't know why they were lingering so long around the mailbox, but they were.

Felt kind of stupid when the cop interviewed everyone, but she (yes, she) was very nice and assured me that I'd done the right thing.

So, I can see being a little overzealous and making a mistake.

Sure glad I didn't decide to take matters into my own hands and go after them with a gun myself.

[Hoyt]

3. Unfortunately, there are a bunch of so-called "responsible" gun toters who would have.

Glad it worked out.

[TorchTheWitch]

4. there are no patrols

Neighborhood Watch is really nothing more than concerned neighbors getting together, learning who each other is and keeping an eye out for each other. You go about your regular daily life and just be more aware, so that anything that you might see you call the police about and it ends there. You don't actually go out patrolling the neighborhood like a security guard. But Zimmerman took it upon himself to act more like a security guard or cop when he never should have in the first place.