Trayvon Martin

Martin was born in 1995 in Miami, Florida, to Tracy Martin and Sybrina Fulton, who divorced in 1999. At the time of the shooting, Fulton was a program coordinator for the Miami Dade Housing Authority, and Tracy Martin was a truck driver; they lived near each other in Miami Gardens. Martin's older maternal half-brother, Jahvaris Fulton, was a college student at the time (who would later testify in the Zimmerman trial). After being divorced, Martin's father married Alicia Stanley, who had two daughters from a previous marriage. They met when Martin was about three years old and were together for about 14 years. Stanley told CNN's Anderson Cooper that before she and Tracy Martin separated, Trayvon was with her 90% of the time, and that she went to all his football games and took care of him when he was sick. She said that Trayvon was a kind and loving person, not a "thug" as the media portrayed him. When Martin was nine years old, he pulled his father, who had been immobilized by burns to the legs, out of a fire in their apartment, saving his life. Martin had played football at the park since he was five years old and his team was coached in part by his father. Another of Martin's former football coaches said Martin had been one of the best players on their football team (The Wolverines) that played at Forzano Park in Miramar, Florida. Martin played for the Wolverines from ages 8 to 13. He sometimes sat out when his father benched him "because he messed up in school". Martin had wanted to fly or repair airplanes, and in mid-2009 enrolled in "Experience Aviation", a seven-week program in Opa-locka, Florida, run by award-winning aviator Barrington Irving. According to Irving, Martin was a polite youth "[who] reminded me of myself because I had a strong interest in football until I fell in love with aviation". After Martin graduated from the program, he spent the next summer as a volunteer, helping out new students in the aviation program. According to his parents, Martin had hoped to attend the University of Miami or Florida A&M University. When Martin started high school, his goal of playing professional football was put aside in favor of a career working with airplanes. Digital footprint Martin posted on Twitter under the username "Slimm", according to the Miami Herald. Martin tweeted his last message two days before he was killed. A picture of Martin making an obscene gesture from his account was widely circulated, while pictures from his account of Martin with a birthday cake, fishing with his father, and dressed in a prom suit were not. The website Gawker obtained a screenshot of Martin's email account inbox before it was deleted, showing emails referring to SAT exams and scholarship opportunities. During Zimmerman's trial, the judge granted defense lawyers access to Martin's cell phone, social media posts, and Facebook and Twitter accounts, saying that the defense team needed to be able to review the evidence for any indications of violent tendencies. Cell phone texts the defense wanted to use showed Martin had discussed about his fights, marijuana use, and guns, and that he had described himself as "gangsta". Benjamin Crump, the Martins' family attorney, said whether Martin had worn gold teeth or used an obscene gesture had nothing to do with his death. The judge eventually ruled that Martin's social media posts would not be mentioned during the trial, although his marijuana use could be. The defense did not present any of this information to the jury, and it was not entered into evidence. Friends of Martin, who had known him from Highland Oaks Middle School and Carol City High School and corresponded with him over Twitter, said Martin was not prone to violence. One friend said he was the "walk away" type of guy: "he'd rather walk away than fight." Another friend from Twitter who had known him since middle school said he was funny and liked to joke around and make people laugh. == Shooting ==

Tracy Martin said he took his son to Sanford "to disconnect and get his priorities straight". On the night of the shooting, Tracy was out to dinner with his fiancée, Brandy Green, while Tracy's and Green's sons stayed at home, watching TV and playing video games. Trayvon went out, walking to a local 7-Eleven store where he bought Skittles candy and an Arizona watermelon drink. As Martin was returning from the store to the Twin Lakes neighborhood, George Zimmerman, a volunteer Neighborhood Watch person, spotted Martin, who was tall and weighed at the time of his death. ==Aftermath and media discourse==

2012 Martin's parents, upset that an arrest had not been made in their son's death, contacted Martin's sister-in-law, an attorney who put them in touch with Benjamin Crump, a civil rights attorney from Tallahassee, Florida. Crump took their case pro bono and retained Natalie Jackson, an attorney familiar with Sanford and Seminole County who specialized in women's and children's cases, to help with the Martin case. On March 5, Jackson asked Ryan Julison to help as well. A publicist, Julison initially approached several national media contacts about covering the shooting. Over the next few days and weeks, the national media started reporting on the shooting, including: Reuters, CBS This Morning, ABC World News, and CNN. The Miami Herald reported that in the 30 days following the shooting, the name Trayvon was tweeted more than two million times. One of the larger rallies, the "Million Hoodie March", was held in Manhattan's Union Square in New York City on March 21. People wore hoodies to symbolize their support for Martin and against profiling used against non-white youths in hoodies. According to Salon, close to five thousand people attended the March, while other media outlets estimated the supporters to be in the hundreds. Martin's parents spoke at the event, and many of the participants at the event were Occupiers who had been evicted the night before from Union Square and returned for the March. At a White House press conference in March, President Obama was asked about the Martin shooting and said, "If I had a son he would look like Trayvon and I think they [his parents] are right to expect that all of us as Americans are going to take this with the seriousness it deserves." Mitt Romney, the Republican presidential candidate at the time, said that a full inquiry was needed so that "justice could be carried out with impartiality and integrity". The Project for Excellence in Journalism reported in March that media coverage of the Martin case had become the first news story in 2012 to be reported on more than the presidential race. In June, Martin's parents and members of the Second Chance on Shoot First campaign delivered a petition with 340,000 signatures to the Citizen Safety and Protection task force asking for changes to the stand-your-ground law in Florida. Governor Rick Scott had established the task force after Martin's death to review and make recommendations about the law. Florida was the first state to pass a law that allowed an individual who felt threatened to stand their ground. Joëlle Anne Moreno, a former federal prosecutor, who was part of the task force said it was "clear that there was lots of confusion around the statute". Marion Hammer, a National Rifle Association of America (NRA) lobbyist and former NRA president who had helped write Florida's law, said the law was not about one incident and there was nothing wrong with the law. The task force eventually recommended against repealing the statute, saying Florida residents had a right to defend themselves with deadly force without a duty to retreat if they feel threatened. Stand-your-ground laws were not used as a legal defense in the trial of George Zimmerman and had no legal role in his eventual acquittal. In March 2012, Martin's parents created the Trayvon Martin Foundation, which is dedicated to helping families that have lost children to gun violence. 2013 Martin's parents and their legal team enlisted the public relations services of The TASC Group to manage media attention around Martin's death and Zimmerman's subsequent trial. In an interview with New York Times columnist Charles Blow in June, Martin's mother was asked about the texts recovered from her son's cell phone, which "appeared to show a boy who used marijuana, was involved in fights and had a handgun". She said that she was skeptical about the truthfulness of those claims and did not know if they were real or not. She wanted the world to remember him "as just an average teenager, somebody that was struggling through life, but nevertheless had a life". Politicians, celebrities, musicians, civil rights leaders, and citizens all expressed their opinions on every form of media following the acquittal of Zimmerman. Four days after the acquittal, a group calling themselves the Dream Defenders began a sit-in at the Florida State Capitol to force a special legislative session on Florida's stand-your-ground law. After 31 days, their occupation of the Capitol ended without a special session being called. A group of Martin supporters walked from Jacksonville, Florida, to Sanford to highlight what they believed were injustices concerning Florida's stand-your-ground law. The six-day walk was called the "Walk for Dignity" and ended with a community forum being held and a dedication of the Trayvon Martin memorial at the Goldsboro Westside Historical Museum in Sanford. In July, President Obama made comments about the death of Martin after the acquittal of Zimmerman. He said, "I think it would be useful for us to examine some state and local laws to see ... if they are designed in such a way that they may encourage the kinds of altercations and confrontations and tragedies that we saw in the Florida case, rather than defuse potential altercations." He stated that "The African-American community is also knowledgeable that there is a history of racial disparities in the application of our criminal laws, everything from the death penalty to enforcement of our drug laws". It was during these remarks when President Obama said, "Trayvon Martin could have been me 35 years ago." 2014 and later On July 19, 2014, Crenshaw High School in Los Angeles was scheduled to hold a "peace walk and peace talk" hosted by Martin's parents, Sybrina Fulton and Tracy Martin. On May 13, 2017, Martin posthumously received a bachelor's degree in aeronautical science from Florida Memorial University "in honor of the steps he took during his young life toward becoming a pilot". Martin's parents accepted the award for their son. Frank Ocean's 2016 album, Blonde, gave homage to Martin among others in the album's lead single, "Nikes". In January 2017, Martin's parents (under Penguin Random House) published a book about Martin's life and death entitled Rest in Power: The Enduring Life of Trayvon Martin. In October 2020, a street in front of the Dr. Michael M. Krop High School in Miami that Martin attended was named "Trayvon Martin Avenue". == See also ==