Just days after retweeting a picture of Trayvon Martin’s corpse, George Zimmerman went on a racist rant on Twitter. Zimmerman shot and killed the unarmed black teenager Martin during a scuffle three years ago, sparking national protests in the US.
The Twitter post featuring Martin’s body was sent over the weekend by an admirer of Zimmerman, calling him a “one man army.”
The post stayed up for a few days for Zimmerman’s 11,000 followers before it was removed by Twitter.
Additionally, the tweet prompted Zimmerman to post another offensive image of “Wanted” posters showing his face, wondering when the company would do the same and delete photos that he tweets.
"I wonder when Twitter will take these images down???" he wrote.
As of Monday evening the “Wanted” posters remained up.
The photo of Martin, who was killed by Zimmerman on February 26, 2012, was used as evidence during Zimmerman’s second-degree murder trial in 2013. He was acquitted under Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” statute, which allows people to use deadly force instead of retreating if they believe they face an imminent threat of deadly force.
The Department of Justice also investigated Zimmerman for three years over whether he violated Martin’s civil rights, before it decided there was insufficient evidence to claim he had.
After the Twitter removals, Zimmerman posted several racist tweets that were self-pitying.
"Gee…I sure hate offending people that have plotted and tried to kill me and my family...," Zimmerman wrote with one tweet that featured a photo matching President Obama with Virginia murderer Vester Flanagan, who killed a reporter and cameraman during a live television segment.
One tweet directed all media inquiries to a phone number for a Ms. Micah Williams. It featured a photoshopped image of President Obama leaning on a sign that read “George Zimmerman Fan Club.”
Ms. Micah Williams turned out to be an auto worker from Clarksville, Tennessee, who was inundated with callers, according to the New York Daily News.
Williams did not return a request for comment, but one coworker told the Daily News that Williams was slammed with "thousands" of harassing calls after the tweet. It is not clear what the relationship is between Micah Williams and Zimmerman.
A representative for Martin's family told the Daily News they will not comment on Zimmerman's frenzy.
Near the end of his outburst, Zimmerman posted a photo of himself smoking a cigar on a beach.
"As much as I love owning all you trolls I have to work... On my tan!" he wrote. "Tell 'Karma' she's worthless, God protects me."
Zimmerman has courted controversy ever since his acquittal, and has had a number of encounters with law enforcement.
In May, Zimmerman was on the receiving end of a gunshot and suffered a minor injury when a bullet struck his car window and glass sprayed back at him during a confrontation with another driver.
In January, he was arrested for aggravated assault against his girlfriend. She later recanted her story and he was not charged in the incident, which allegedly occurred in November 2013.
In September 2013, he was detained after his estranged wife called the police, claiming he had threatened her and her father with a gun and punched her father in the face. He didn’t face action for either of those alleged incidents, either, as the victims declined to press charges.
After a Florida jury acquitted Martin, thousands took to streets across the US. He could have been sentenced to life in prison or up to 30 years for manslaughter had he been found guilty.
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