{"id":235529,"date":"2012-03-30T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2012-03-30T07:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sdnews.com\/rally-and-march-held-for-trayvon-martin\/"},"modified":"2012-03-30T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2012-03-30T07:00:00","slug":"rally-and-march-held-for-trayvon-martin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/rally-and-march-held-for-trayvon-martin\/","title":{"rendered":"Rally and march held for Trayvon Martin"},"content":{"rendered":"

Florida teen\u2019s death sparks community gathering to demand justice<\/strong><\/p>\n

By Anthony King | Downtown News<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Rally<\/a>
Residents march into downtown to rally for slain Florida teen. (Photo by Daniel Solomon)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Hundreds of community members gathered in Balboa Park at 5 p.m. on Monday, March 26 for a rally to support the family of Trayvon Martin, the 17-year-old teenager killed in Sanford, Fla. on February 26. Attendees at the San Diego rally then marched along Park Boulevard into downtown, ending at the Department of Justice building at 880 Front St. with a candlelight vigil held for Martin.<\/p>\n

Martin was shot by George Zimmerman in the gated community where Zimmerman is a neighborhood watch volunteer. Zimmerman has not been arrested for the killing, citing self-defense. Martin, who was unarmed, was returning to his girlfriend\u2019s family home after a trip to a convenience store, where he purchased a bag of Skittles candy and an iced tea.<\/p>\n

The U.S. Department of Justice and the Federal Bureau of Investigation are now investigating the incident, after Sanford city commission members voted \u201cno confidence\u201d in regards to Sanford Police Department Chief Bill Lee, who initially oversaw the incident. Lee announced he temporarily stepped down from his position on March 22.<\/p>\n

Attendees at the San Diego rally demanded Zimmerman\u2019s arrest, saying they believed the shooting to be racially motivated. Marchers held signs that read, \u201cJustice for Trayvon Martin,\u201d \u201cWe demand justice\u201d and \u201cI am Trayvon.\u201d<\/p>\n

San Diego residents Abel Macias, Mario Lewis and Kuttin Kandi organized the event as part of the San Diego Justice for Trayvon Martin Coalition.<\/p>\n

Norma Chavez-Peterson, community engagement and organizing director of the San Diego & Imperial Counties American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) spoke at the event, urging the crowd to \u201cnot just be angry,\u201d but to take action by registering to vote.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need to harness our righteous anger into action. Organize. Get involved. Vote. Now is the time to say, \u2018Enough is enough,\u2019 and use strategic methods to bring sustainable change to our nation,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were grateful to participate in Monday\u2019s rally to demand justice for Trayvon Martin,\u201d Chavez-Peterson said. \u201cThe ACLU is demanding a fair, thorough [and] unbiased investigation of Trayvon\u2019s murder. We find it troubling that it took national outcry, for over a month, to get the authorities to pay attention.\u201d
\nSaying the March 26 rally was the \u201clargest gathering of young African-American people [in] San Diego that I have ever witnessed,\u201d Chavez-Peterson addressed the issue of race in the Martin shooting.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt mattered that George Zimmerman saw a young black man in his neighborhood and then called police to say he saw someone \u2018suspicious.\u2019 Too often, being young and black is enough to be stopped by police,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAmerica has a race problem. It is profoundly sad that it takes a shooting death to get Americans to talk about it or acknowledge it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another speaker at the rally was Nation of Islam Minister Hugh Muhammad. Urging people to work together, Muhammad also said there was a \u201cgreat problem of race relations\u201d in the United States.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe do not have to be divided by labels. We do not have to be divided by color. We don\u2019t have to be divided by ethnic background,\u201d Muhammad said at the rally. \u201cPay attention to truth, not color. I\u2019m not here because it is a black or brown person. I\u2019m here because it\u2019s an injustice.\u201d<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Florida teen\u2019s death sparks community gathering to demand justice By Anthony King | Downtown News Hundreds of community members gathered in Balboa Park at 5 p.m. on Monday, March 26 for a rally to support the family of Trayvon Martin, the 17-year-old teenager killed in Sanford, Fla. on February 26. Attendees at the San Diego […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":235530,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"Rally and march held for Trayvon Martin","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11551,11552,11600],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-235529","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-opinion","category-sdnews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235529","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=235529"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235529\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/235530"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=235529"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=235529"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=235529"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}