Media Selectively Sees 'Trayvon' in Violence Victims

Thanks to the media’s irresponsible reporting, “Trayvon-like” victims of shootings are turning up everywhere.

According to the LA Times, “‘Trayvon’ was invoked by the parents of Canard Arnold, a 17-year-old African American who was shot and killed by a security guard…”.

What they don’t tell you in that case is Canard seems to have been in the middle of something of a gunfight before aiming at security guard Christopher Hambrick, causing Hambrick to fire in apparent self-defense. Someone was arrested, though. Perhaps his family and attorney will find a way to make him Trayvon-like, too?

Charged instead, with felony murder, was Anthony Hines, 22, who police say was involved in the gunfight that precipitated Hambrick’s involvement.

In reading the Times’ story, it appears there are cases where circumstances aren’t clear and local, or federal officials are still investigating. As it stands, the L.A. Times didn’t produce the number of Trayvon-like victims I thought it might going in. Perhaps there really aren’t that many and the media is still spinning its spin?

Unfortunately, from page two of the same story, it doesn’t apply when the victims are white.

Nunn, the law professor, said it will be difficult to compare the Alabama case to Trayvon because “it’s less of an extreme case–the racial dimension is not there.” But, he said, the Trayvon case may still have an influence, making prosecutors more likely to bring charges in this and other cases where shooters plead self-defense.

They will have to rely on the courts, police, and federal investigators for justice. That doesn’t really sound so far off from what the Founders anticipated when they wrote the Constitution. So, I’m not sure there’s much to complain about on that end. Still, thanks again to the media and bad, if not malicious, reporting, there does seem to be something of a mob mentality driving an alleged search for justice in parts of America today.

It’s a shame to see facts and the rule of law supplanted by emotion in every case. Hopefully, all of these so called Trayvon-like cases will play out on that basis and people will be found innocent or guilty by the rule of law. Anything else would be something of a travesty the national media seemed all too happy to encourage–and they may still be fueling it if one reads deeply enough to see it.