First, let's not pretend that a New England or west coast court would have likely found Zimmermann not guilty. What we're seeing is an escalation of race and class war that varies from place to place, and rests on novel changes in how the perception of threats are treated by the courts. In a place like Florida, which has a Stand You Ground law, it is only the perception of the survivor that matters, and only the survivor stands to gain from benefit of the doubt.
No one in the trial thought that a response from Martin would be understandable under the circumstances (and therefore place an expectation on Zimmermann to anticipate any reaction) because no one allowed it.
The simple fact is that Zimmermann never saw a weapon on Martin (unless the former was hallucinating) and he put himself into physical conflict with Martin by pursuing him by vehicle and foot... aggressive behavior that he initiated. Zimmermann therefore has a burden of proof in light of the fact that he did actually initiate the conflict and shoot Martin dead.
BTW, accusing anyone of supporting any kind of "anarchy" when defending a precedent that encourages people to run after and shoot "scary" individuals on the streets is the height of irony.
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