Witness for the prosecution defense

The other day I wrote about the Trayvon Martin/George Zimmerman case: "Call me when we get to witness 'John'."  This was Jonathan Good who was the only person known to have seen the actual fight between Martin and Zimmerman; he was unwavering in his testimony that Martin was on top of Zimmerman, raining down blows "MMA-style."  Today he was called to the stand by the State and, well, I'll let the unparalleled blogging from Legal Insurrection take it from here:

The testimony of State witness Jonathan Good was remarkably, almost shockingly, destructive to the State’s theory of the case.

The prosecutor for the was reduced to asking if Good could tell who exactly was calling for "help": the pummeler or the pummel-ee.  And pummelled Zimmerman was as evidenced by the pictures shown in conjunction with testimony by physician's assistant Linzee Folgate.  Andrew Branca explains how this narrative helped the defense:

This line of questioning seems remarkably foolish, for two reasons. First, there is no requirement under the law of self defense in Florida, or any other state, that a person must suffer so much as a scratch before they can use force, and even deadly force, in self-defense. All that the law of self-defense requires is that you have been REASONABLY IN FEAR of imminent death or grave bodily harm–it does NOT require that you ACTUALLY EXPERIENCE death or grave bodily harm before you can act in self-defense.

The State's push for a second-degree murder charge now seems like a ridiculous overreach.  This case never should have gone to court and appears to have been moved forward strictly for political cover.

Extra - Minuteman: "I'm proud to be an American, a great country that does a miserable job with show trials."

More - The Conversation.