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Donald Trump is scared. The Senate trial following his impeachment for a blackmail and campaign cheating scheme starts next week, and it's driving him to distraction. He was supposed to hosta lame event at the White House on Thursday to bolster fake concerns that white evangelicals are being oppressed, butblew off pandering to his strongest supporters for an hour, likely because he couldn'tpry himself away from news coverage of the impeachment trial's kickoff. After ending the event swiftly, Trump then tweeted angrily, "I JUST GOT IMPEACHED FOR MAKING A PERFECT PHONE CALL!"

(As with most things the president says, this was untrue he was impeached weeks ago, in December.)

Trump's cold sweats are significant, becauseeveryone who has been following this case knows that the Senate will acquit him. Not because he's innocent no one who has actually consulted the evidence is foolish enough to believe that but because Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and the Republicans who control the Senate decided long ago that they wouldcover up for their shamelessly corrupt president no matter what he does. With such an assured outcome, Trump's fears seem overblown and silly, even for someone crippled by sociopathic narcissism and its accompanying paranoia.

But it's also true that high-profile travesties of justice, such as the oneSenate Republicans are currently preparingto commit, can often provoke major political backlash. Getting a jury to acquit the obviously guilty can, as history shows,cause a public that's already outraged about the crime to get even more furious. That, I suspect, is what Trump is sweating.

What the Senate is about to do is akin to the practice of jury nullification. That's where a jury decides that either they don't think the crime should be a crime at all, or that they believe people like the defendant should above the law, and so refuse to convict no matter how guilty the defendant is. This something thatin theory, and sometimes in practice, canbe used for good as when a jury refusesto throw someone in prison for a low-level drug offense, or refuses to enforce a law restricting free speech. Buthistorically in the U.S., jury nullification has tended to be used to uphold injustice and reinforce racist or sexist systems of power.

In other words, exactly what Senate Republicans are planning to do. Thatbecomes more obvious every day as more evidence of Trump's guilt comes out, from the revelations byRudy Giuliani's former associateLev Parnas to the Government Accountability Office declaring that Trump broke the law by withholding military aid to Ukraine.

The most disturbing and frequenthistorical examples of jury nullification come from the Jim Crow South, where it was normal for all-white juries to acquit Klansmen and others who committed racist murders not because they genuinely believed they wereinnocent, but because they believed it should be legal for white people to murder black people in cold blood.

The most famous of these cases was that of Roy Bryant and J.W. Milam, two white men who murdered a black teenager named Emmett Till in Mississippi in 1955. That the men had committed the crime was not in doubt they described the murder in great detail to a reporter for Look magazine. But the all-white, all-male jury refused to convict, and didn't really bother to hide the fact that they did sobecause they didn't think white men should be punished for killing black people.

Unfortunately, this problem of white jurors refusing toconvictin cases where the victimsare black has not gone away. For instance, in the 2012 Florida killing of black teenager Trayvon Martin by George Zimmerman, a nearly all-white jury votedto acquit Zimmerman, even though Martin was apparently just walking home after buying some snacks and Zimmerman had been warned by a 911 operator not to pursue him and even though Zimmerman's only basis for suspecting Martin of anything was his race.The one woman of color on the juryhas since publicly lamented the process and describes what sounds a lot like bullying from the white women in the room.

The defendants in those cases walked free, but the outrage that followed had political ramifications. Till's murder helped draw national attention to the evils of the Jim Crow South and helped bolster support for the burgeoning civil rights movement. Martin's murder, decades later, helped build support for what became known as the Black Lives Matter movement.

Sometimes the backlash to injustice can be earth-shaking, as happened in 1992, when Los Angeles was torn up by riots in the wake of the acquittal by a majority-white juryof four cops who were caught on video severely beating Rodney King, a black motorist they had pulled overfor speeding.

These are all racially loaded cases, of course, which sets them apart from Trump's impeachment overhis efforts to cheat in the 2020 election and his cavalier willingness to use government resources to force foreign leaders to help him do so. Trump's inevitable acquittal in the Senate won't bequite the gut-punchso many people feel when white men get sprung for committing racist crimes.

Still,the social circumstances of Trump's upcoming acquittal go straight back to those same forces of white supremacy that have led to so many other travesties of justice in the past. After all, the main reason Senate Republicans are averse to taking what seems to be an easy way out convicting the obviously guilty Trump and letting his Republican Vice President, Mike Pence, take over is because they fear crossing the notoriously loyal Trump base, who represent their only possiblechance of holding onto the Senate or retaking the House this November.

And the reason that base is so loyal, as with many things in this country, relates to racism. Trump's base is motivated by what sociologists delicately call "racial resentment,"which is a nice way of saying that these white people see changing demographics in the U.S. and growing challengesto white domination, and they're angry about it. Furthermore,they see President Trump, a blatant and shameless racist, as their best weapon to fight to preserve a system of white supremacy.

As long as Trump keeps delivering on the racism which he has donein a myriad of ways his base doesn't care what crimes he commits. After all, Trump committed his crime to hang onto powerso he can continue to inflict cruelracist policies on our entire nation.In that sense, this case shares a common root with thosemore explicitly racist acquittals of the past. They're allpart of thelong and ugly American tradition of letting white people get away with crime, so long as they do it in the name of white supremacy.

But watching obviously guilty people get away with it can also have a galvanizing political effect, and not just when the crime itself is racially provocative. As the #MeToo movement and the Women's March demonstrated, Americans have also been roused to outrage when men commit sexual assaults and get away with it. And the ongoing fascination with gangsters who finally get caught after evading justice for years Al Capone, Whitey Bulger, John Gotti suggests areal hungerto see bad guys pay for what they do.

That'swhat Donald Trump fears: That hisacquittal will not be read as an exoneration, but as yet another famous miscarriage of justice that leads to outrage across the nation. Let's hopehis worst fears come true.

See the article here:
Why the Senate's impeachment trial has way too much in common with the Jim Crow past - Salon

TV host Piers Morgan recently blasted Prince Harry and Meghan Markle as being the "most woke, over-sensitive, woe-is-me couple in the world".

But what does the term "woke" actually mean? Here's what we know:

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According to the Oxford English Dictionary "woke" is defined as: "Originally: well-informed, up-to-date. Now chiefly: alert to racial or social discrimination and injustice."

The Urban Dictionary, however, simply says: "Being woke means being aware

knowing whats going on in the community (related to racism and social injustice)."

To summarise: woke means a person is consciously awake.

The word first came into circulation in the 1800s when it simply meant the state of not being asleep.

And it started emerging in Black English at least by the 1940s, according to dictionary.com.

An "Atlantic" article from 1943 reportedly quoted a black United Mine Workers official from 1940 playing with wokein a metaphor for social justice:Waking up is a damn sight than going to sleep, but well stay woke up longer.

By the 1960s, woke was still used in the context of political awareness, especially regarding the Civil Rights Movement in the 195060s.

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The term even prompted a 1962 New York Times article commenting on black slang, titled If Youre Woke You Dig It".

A 1972 play about the black nationalist Marcus Garvey, Garvey Lives! by Barry Beckham, used woke for awareness of racial injustice in the black community.

A line reads: I been sleeping all my life. And now that Mr Garvey done woke me up, Im gon' stay woke. And Im gon' help him wake up other black folk.

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In 2012, unarmed teenager Trayvon Martin was shot dead in Florida by neighbourhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman.

The shooting sparked the Black Lives Matter movement amid a public outcry over the gunman's controversial acquittal.

Many in the black community issued calls to "stay woke" to the discrimination and injustice black people face in the US, particularly in the form of police brutality.

Under the hashtag #staywoke on social media, the term took off again in 2014 after the tragic shooting of two other young, unarmed black men by police officers.

Read more:
What does woke mean? Definition and meaning explained - The Sun

Sean Bell, above, one of the many Black victims of racist American policing.

The following is an excerpt from the upcoming book "The Roots of Racism in American Policing: From Slave Patrols to Stop-and-Frisk." Over the next few weeks, the Black Star News will be publishing selected portions from the book. This excerpt is from the book's preface.

Over the last several years, especially since the killings of Eric Garner on July 17, 2014, in Staten Island, New York; and that of Michael Brown on August 9, 2014, in Ferguson, Missouri; the everyday brutality Black America receives at the hands of police has been nakedly exposed for all to see.

In the weeks and months after the deaths of Garner and Brown, we witnessed an ongoing orgy of unjustified killings and murders of Black men, and women, perpetrated by police. The ubiquity of video and cellphone technology revealed outrage after outrage.

That trend continueswith police killings like that of 26-year-old St. Lucian native Botham Jean, on September 6, 2018, in Dallas, Texas; and the more recent killing of 28-year-old Atatiana Jefferson. Both Jean and Jefferson were killed inside their homes.

Racist American policing brutalizes all types of Black peoplenot just those who are characterized as criminals and thugs. Weve seen well-to-do and rich Black Americans being harassed as like everyone else. We should remember when Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates was manhandled and arrested by police on July 16, 2009, at his Cambridge, Massachusetts home after someone thought Dr. Gates must be a burglar and couldnt really live in such an affluent neighborhood.

Comedian Chris Rock has also complained about being profiled several times as he was driving while Black. And, on August 26, 2017, Seattle Seahawks football star Michael Bennett (who everyone agrees is the kind of role model for kids to emulate) had a gun pulled on him, by an Arizona policeman, while he was face down on the ground. According to Bennett, the officer told him if he moved, he would blow my fucking head off.

From Black men and women, to Black boys and girls, old and young, none are immune from the viciousness of White Americas institution of racial policing. The bad apples argument police apologists parrot, to excuse police barbarisms, that are primarily perpetrated on Black folk, have been debunked by the sheer regular frequency of these atrocities.

The real truth, as it relates to Black Americans, is that: the police represent a domestic terrorist organization that is sanctioned by Americas White political structure to control Black people. This has always been so.

Black Americans must realize that anything good done by police to Blacks, in Black communities, is merely incidental or accidental. Good deeds by police towards us are anomalies that happen primarily because of the conscience and humanity of some copsand not because of America's institution of policing. Police are not there to protect and serve Blacks. There are there to oppress us.

This is why police who brazenly kill, and murder Blacks, are protected by this racist system. This is why there is a Blue Wall of Silence, which facilitates the cover-up culture of cop corruption and allows for its continuance. Why dont more good cops speak out and expose the bigots, brutes, and killers amongst them?

When some cops try to do the right thing by speaking out, they are called rats and snitches and are ostracized, like former NYPD Officer Adrian Schoolcraft and NYPD Officer Adhyl Polanco. Some, like former NYPD Detective Frank Serpico, nearly lost his life (on February 3, 1971in Brooklyn) after he was left without backup as he tried to arrest an armed suspect, who shot him in the face. This was done because Serpico dared to speak out against the corruption he saw in the NYPD.

Even worse, with a wink-and-nod, bigoted police behavior is blessed by corrupt, often grandstanding, American politicians and those in the American court system. Indeed, they assist the abuses of their police partners in crime and are complicit in their atrocities against African-Americans.

Why does the White American political system permit police to treat Black people this way?

Well, some will say, or insinuate, that Black Americans commit an inordinate amount of the crime in America. Indeed, former Secretary of Education William Bennett, who served under President Ronald Reagan, once opined on his radio show, that "If you wanted to reduce crime, you couldif that were the sole purposeyou could abort every Black baby in this country and the crime rate would go down." No doubt, many White Americans, and even some Black Americans, have been indoctrinated into this warped racist view of crime as it relates to Blacks, and believe it.

But, we must remember this: White America has always demonized and criminalize those they have wronged and exploited. Native-Americans were called savages and portrayed despicably in Hollywood Western movies (with racist frauds like John Wayne often playing the role of the valiant White savior) to justify the genocidal actionsand the land-theft of White-Europeans. Similar methods, like the American minstrel tradition, where White actors wore blackface, were used to denigrate African-Americans.

D.W Griffiths 1915 silent film Birth of a Nation did much to criminalize African-Americans in the minds of Whites. One of the films main charge is portraying Black men as the serial rapists of White women. The historical records show us that White men are, in fact, the main serial rapists in American societywho got plenty of practice raping Black women over the centuries.

President Woodrow Wilson, one of Americas most racist presidents, gave a viewing of this contemptible piece of propaganda in the White House. Reportedly, (some contest this) he said, of this character assassination movie, "It is like writing history with lightning. And my only regret is that it is all so terribly true."

In terms of the contemporary criminalization of Blacks by White America, we must understand this: the statistics these folks use to justify the bogus claim, that Blacks commit more crime, is largely manufactured and manipulated to create the desired results. Dr. Amos Wilson, in his book Black-on-Black Violence: The Psychodynamics of Black Self-Annihilation in Service of White Domination, pointed out that these crime statistics are used to create the false and scandalous impression that African-Americans have some sort of monopoly on crime and are inherently more criminal than are White Americans. Over the years, weve heard much talk about Black-on-Black crime. This malicious characterization seeks to give the deceitful impression that Blacks commit crimes against Blacks at higher rates than other racial groups do against their own. Of course, this is false stereotypingand is an example of the racist mindset of those who have always criminalized Blacks, by finding devious ways to promote prejudice.

Relevant statistics show us that crime, in America, happens, largely, within all racial groups. The segregated nature of American society has much to do with this reality. Some also like to insinuate that Black-Americans are prone to attacking White-Americans at high rates, a claim white supremacist killer Dylann Roof (who murdered 9 Black parishioners on June 17, 2015, in South Carolina) made. However, the reverse is true: Blacks are more likely to be the target of vicious racist attacks by Whites.

From the days of Slavery, to the days when KKK nightriders went around lynching Blacks, thru the Jim Crow Era, to the present where police murder us with impunity in 21st Century America, Whites have always had an obsessive penchant for shedding Black blood. Indeed, murdering Black people was a rites-of-passage for White men and boys.

Today, we now have other traditionally non- White people deciding they too can arbitrarily kill Black people. Such was the case when wannabe cop, George Zimmerman, killed 17-year-old Trayvon Martin on February 26, 2012, in Sanford, Florida.

Read more from the original source:
THE ROOTS OF RACISM IN AMERICAN POLICING: FROM SLAVE PATROLS TO STOP-AND FRISK (BOOK EXCERPT #1) - Black Star News

WASHINGTON These days, it feels like theres a petition for every cause imaginable. Saving the Amazon rainforest?Check. Making Baby Yoda an emoji? Alsocheck. But some petitions are more successful than others.

The petition-hosting site Change.org considers a number of factors in determining which had the biggest impact: the number of people who signed, the zeitgeist and the conversations sparked and whether anything changed as a result, said Michael Jones, the platforms managing director of campaigns.

People really see online petitions as a tool to help them fix something that is systemically broken, Jones said.

Over the past decade, people took to Change.org to raise attention to criminal justice issues, honor community heroes and challenge pharmaceutical companies and other businesses.

These are 10 of the biggest victories, according to Change.org.

After 17-year-old Trayvon Martin waswas killedon February 26, 2012, his parents Tracy Martin and Sybrina Fultonstarted a petitioncalling for the arrest of George Zimmerman, the neighborhood watch leader who shot him.

More than 2.2 million people signed in support of the cause. Within a week, it had become the one of themost popular petitionsin the websites history, with 877,110 signatures.

The local tragedy soon became an international movement. Civil rights activists, politicians and protesters rallied behind Trayvons family and took to the streets to demonstrate against his killing.

In April 2012, Change.org declared the petition a victory after a Florida state attorney announced that charges of second-degree murder would be lodged against Zimmerman.

Zimmerman wasacquittedin 2013. But Trayvons death forced a conversation about police brutality and inequality and helped give rise to one of the most prominent movements of the decade: Black Lives Matter.

Zimmermanis now suingTrayvons parents, prosecutors and state authorities, alleging there was a conspiracy to frame him and demanding more than $100 million in damages.

Trayvons parents and their attorney called the lawsuit unfounded and reckless.

Maryland high school student Sydney Helfandstarted a petitionin January urging Congress to pass the Preventing Animal Cruelty and Torture (PACT) Act to make animal cruelty a federal felony.

The PACT Act had come extremely close to becoming law in 2017. Though the Senatepassed it unanimously, it stalled in the House.

Nearly 800,000 people signed the petition and in November, theSenate passed the bipartisan legislationthat the House had approved a month earlier.

US Rep. Ted Deutch of Floridacredited Helfand, in part, for the bills success. President Donald Trumpsigned the PACT Actinto law.

As thetrial of Casey Anthony, who was accused of killing her 2-year-old daughter Caylee in 2008, played out in 2011,a petitioncalled for the creation of Caylees Law, which would make it a felony for a parent of a guardian to fail to report a missing child if the child could be in danger.

It was one of the first petitions of the decade to go viral, Change.org says, ultimately attracting more than 1.3 million signatures.

At least 10 statessince then have passed versions of Caylees Law. Critics say the laws wouldnegatively affectmostly innocent parents who may be grieving the tragic loss of a child.

Death row prisoner Rodney Reed was sentenced more than 20 years ago for the 1996 murder of 19-year-old Stacey Stites in Bastrop, Texas.

Reed says he is innocent, and attorneys from the Innocence Project say they have evidence that exonerates him. The lead prosecutor in his case maintains that he is guilty.

Reed was scheduled to be executed on November 20. But in the weeks leading up to that date,outcry to stop the execution grew from supporters, including celebrities, clergy and lawmakers.

More than 2 million people signed a petition atfreerodneyreed.com, and apetition on Change.orggarnered more than 300,000 signatures.

Days before he was scheduled to die, the Texas Court of Criminal Appealsblocked Reeds execution, allowing a lower court to consider additional evidence.

After West Coast rapper and activistNipsey Husslewas killed in 2019, Najee Ali, a community organizer and Los Angeles resident,called on a city councilmanto name an intersection for the artist.

More than 500,000 people signed the petition in the days after Nipseys death. Less than two weeks later, the Los Angeles City Councilvoted unanimouslyto rename the intersection of West Slauson Avenue and Crenshaw Boulevard in South Central Los Angeles as Nipsey Hussle Square. Its thesite of Nipseys Marathon Clothing store, near where he wasfatally shot.

After a woman who goes by K said she was sexually assaulted by a tour guide who worked at a business promoted by TripAdvisor, she contacted the website in an effort to warn other tourists,The Guardian reportedin March.

But the company suggested that she leave a review about the incident,K said in a Change.org petition. When she wrote a review, TripAdvisor did not publish it because it wasnt written as first-person account, according to The Guardian.

With the help of the Change.org team, Kstarted a petitiondemanding that TripAdvisor stop covering up sexual assaults, calling on the company to do more to warn users about businesses where assaults had been reported.

The petition received more than 500,000 signatures in the weeks after, and TripAdvisorannounced changesto how it handles reviews and reports of sexual assault. But K and other activists maintained that the company still hadnt gone far enough.

After protests outside TripAdvisors New York offices and continued pressure, the companyannounced further changesto its policies, including commitments to partner with sexual assault support groups.

In June, K declared that the petition had been successful.

With these updates, TripAdvisor has shown that they are committed to both improving the experience for survivors and providing people with the information they need to travel safely, she wrote. Im thrilled to declare our campaign a victory.

After 12 years as a Scout, Ryan Andresen was told by his Boy Scout troop in the San Francisco Bay Area in 2012 that he couldnt receive the Eagle Scout award, the highest rank in the organization.

The reason? Because he had come out as gay.

Ryans mother Karen Andresenstarted a petitionto protest the troops decision, garnering hundreds of thousands of signatures andnational media attention.

In ahistoric decisionin 2013, the Boy Scouts of America voted to end its ban on openly gay youth. But it wasnt until 2015 that the organization announced it wouldlift its banon gay adult leaders.

When she was 16 years old,Cyntoia Brownwas tried as an adult and sentenced to life in prison for killing a man who had bought her for sex.

Years after her sentencing, her case gained widespread attention and inspired the viral hashtag #FreeCyntoiaBrown after A-list celebrities like Rihanna and Kim Kardashian West publicly advocated for Browns release.

In 2018, the Tennessee Supreme Court ruled that Brown must serve at least 51 years in prison before she would be eligible for release. After that ruling, apetition on Change.orgcalled for then-Gov. Bill Haslam to grant her clemency.

He did so in January, and Brown wasreleased from prisonin August at the age of 31.

In July, Teva Pharmaceuticals announced it had made a business decision todiscontinue Vincristine a drug used to treat childhood cancers including leukemia, lymphoma and brain tumors.

Childhood cancer survivor and pediatric oncology nurse Liliana Haas said the drug helped save her life and the lives of many children she works with each day. So, shetook to Change.orgin October to demand that the pharmaceutical company bring the drug back.

More than 215,000 people signed the petition, and the issue garnerednational media attention. In November, Teva Pharmaceuticalresponded directlyto Haas petition and announced it would again start producing the life-saving drug.

Five years after a New York Police Department officer was accused of fatally choking Eric Garner, theJustice Department announcedit would not bring charges against him.

Days later, Emerald Snipes Garner, Eric Garners youngest daughter,launched a petitiondemanding that NYPD Officer Daniel Pantaleo be fired.

The petition received more than 144,000 signatures. Protesters interrupted the Democratic presidential debate in July to call attention to the issue, and New York Mayor and then-presidential candidate Bill de Blasio was asked why Pantaleo was still on the force.

In August, New York Police Commissioner James ONeillfired Pantaleo. Heis suingto get his job back.

Link:
10 petitions that made the biggest impact this decade - fox5sandiego.com

December 31 always marks the end of the year, but in 2019, it marks the end of a decade. In Florida, the past 10 years were defined by horrific tragedies, natural disasters, historic court cases, iconic sports teams and the quintessential (and often bizarre) "Florida Man" story. Tears were shed, local activists strove to make national change, a banana was duct-taped to a wall and was sold for millions of dollars and the Sunshine State was the epicenter of all things tragic, wonderful and weird.

Heres a look at the stories that defined the past decade.

No hurricanes had hit Florida since 2005 before Hermine made landfall near the Big Bend in 2016 as a Category 1. In 2017, Hurricane Irma hit Florida as a Category 4 storm: 12 patients at a Hollywood nursing home died of heat exposure after Irma knocked out the air conditioner. Three nurses and an administrator were charged recently with their deaths. The strongest hurricane was Michael, which struck the Panhandle as a Category 5 in October 2018, killing 43 and devastating the town of Mexico Beach.

Four times Florida found itself in the 2010s dealing with a high-profile mass shooting, leaving 74 victims dead, changes to its gun laws and a group of motivated young survivors who pushed their message nationally.

It began in June 2016 when security guard Omar Mateen attacked Orlando's Pulse nightclub, killing 49. During the standoff, Mateen told negotiators he had sworn allegiance to the Islamic State and the attack was revenge for U.S. intervention in Iraq and Syria. He died when officers broke through a wall to engage him. The assault on the gay nightclub was deemed a terrorist attack.

In January 2017, Iraq War veteran Esteban Santiago flew from his Alaska home to Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport, where he fatally shot five people. Santiago pleaded guilty and is serving a life sentence.

A year later, also in Broward County, a 19-year-old former Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School student returned to the Parkland campus on Valentine's Day and opened fire with a semi-automatic rifle, killing 17. Suspect Nikolas Cruz had a history of violent behavior, but calls to the FBI and Broward Sheriff's Office warning he might attack a school were not investigated. Weeks later, Scott and the Legislature outlawed the sale of rifles to most people under 21 and allowed judges to ban those deemed dangerous from owning guns for a year. Stoneman Douglas survivors founded the March For Our Lives" movement that has pushed for tougher gun laws nationwide. Cruz is awaiting trial next year.

This month, Saudi Arabian air force 2nd Lt. Mohammed Alshamrani opened fire at Naval Air Station Pensacola, killing three American sailors before a sheriff's deputy killed him. Investigators have called it a terrorist attack.

In 2010, basketball's biggest star Lebron James kicked off the decade by announcing he would be taking his talents to South Beach. His arrival in Miami completed a series of off-season moves that created the Big Three: James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh.

After four straight trips to the NBA Finals, which resulted in two championships and two MVPs for James, the trio disbanded in 2014. Lebron returned to his hometown team, the Cleveland Cavaliers, while Bosh and Wade were forced to keep the magic alive. Unfortunately, Lebron's departure left a void in Miami's championship ways, but the banners still hang in what will soon become the former American Airlines Arena.

At the tail end of the decade, unofficial ambassador to Wade-County Dwyane Wade announced his retirement. The Miami legend went on a successful farewell tour and ended his career with one final all-star appearance.

Florida murder trials captured national attention twice in the early 2010s. In both, the suspect was acquitted.

The first was Casey Anthony, who went on trial in 2011 for the 2008 death of her 2-year-old daughter Caylee, whose body was found near the family's Orlando home five months after she disappeared. Prosecutors said Anthony, 25 when the trial began, killed her daughter because she hated parenting and then lied to investigators. Anthony's attorney stunned observers during opening statements when he alleged Caylee accidentally drowned in the family's pool and Casey's father dumped the body. The attorney presented no evidence supporting that claim, but the jury acquitted Anthony of murder, finding her guilty only of lying.

The next year, neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman fatally shot 17-year-old Trayvon Martin during a fight that began as the African-American teen walked to his father's fiancee's house in the central Florida city of Sanford. Prosecutors charged Zimmerman, who identifies as Hispanic, with second-degree murder, saying he stalked the teen, provoking the altercation. Zimmerman's attorneys argued that Martin attacked Zimmerman and was bashing his head when the neighborhood watchman fired. Zimmerman was acquitted, but has been arrested since on domestic violence and other charges. He recently sued Martin's family, prosecutors and others for $100 million, saying they fabricated evidence against him.

New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft found himself in an embarrassing plight in February when prosecutors charged him with paying for sex at a Palm Beach County massage parlor. He apologized but challenged the legality of video recordings that allegedly show him and others engaged in sex. The judge threw out the video, but prosecutors have appealed.

When 2010 began, Rick Scott was nearly unknown. The wealthy former hospital CEO had been forced out in 1997 after Columbia/HCA came under investigation for Medicare fraud. Scott was never charged, but the company paid $1.7 billion in fines. Scott, riding the tea party wave, announced early that year he would seek the Republican gubernatorial nomination against state Attorney General Bill McCollum. Scott won and narrowly defeated Democrat Alex Sink in the general election, spending $75 million of his own money. Scott won re-election in 2014 over former Gov. Charlie Crist, who changed his registration from Republican to Democrat. In 2018, Scott challenged Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson, who was seeking a fourth term. Scott narrowly won, ending Nelson's long career that included stints in state government and the U.S. House.

When 2016 dawned, it appeared Jeb Bush or Marco Rubio could be the Republican presidential nominee. But Trump beat both and then carried the state that November, edging Hillary Clinton. In 2019, Trump announced he was changing his official residence from New York City to his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach.

In 2018, Republicans won their sixth straight gubernatorial election as former U.S. Rep. Ron DeSantis edged Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum.

In 2013, Miami-born Steven Sotloff was working as a freelance journalist before he was kidnapped after crossing into Syria from Turkey. The following year, he was beheaded by ISIS, and the brutal killing was recorded and distributed around the world.Sotloff's beheading, along with fellow journalist James Foley's death a month prior, raised awareness of the Islamic State. The 31-year-old told stories about conflict in the Middle East and was remembered as a "voice for the voiceless."

In February 2010, a SeaWorld Orlando killer whale named Tillikum fatally attacked trainer Dawn Brancheau as terrified spectators watched. Her death was the focus of the 2013 documentary Blackfish, which criticized SeaWorld's captivity of killer whales. The company's income and SeaWorld parks attendance fell after the movie's release. SeaWorld eventually ended the orca shows.

On July 8, 2011, NASA launched Atlantis on the 135th and final space shuttle mission. Since then, no astronauts have rocketed into orbit from Florida or anywhere else in the U.S. The drought may end next year; SpaceX and Boeing are getting closer to launching astronauts to the International Space Station under NASAs commercial crew program.

Moonlight, a film shot and based in Miami, won Best Picture at the Oscars in 2017. The movie is based on a true South Florida story about a young man growing up in a tough neighborhood, grappling with his sexuality. It was directed by Miami native Barry Jenkins, cost just $1.5 million to make and brought in just $22 million at the box office making it one of the lowest-grossing films to win the best picture award.

See the article here:
The Top Florida Stories of the Decade - NBC 6 South Florida