Trayvon Martin's mother appeared in court on Tuesday to testify for the need to change Florida's "stand your ground" law that acquitted her son's killer of second-degree murder charges in February 2012.
Sybrina Fulton went before the Senate Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Human Rights to urge members to "seriously take a look" at the piece of 2005 legislation, along with a group of similar laws that have passed in more than 12 states since the highly-covered case.
Chairman of the subcommittee Sen. Dick Durbin acknowledged that the laws should "be carefully reviewed and reconsidered."
"Whatever the motivation behind them, it's clear these laws often go too far in encouraging confrontations that escalate into deadly violence," Durbin announced in his opening statement. "They're resulting in unnecessary tragedies and they are diminishing accountability under our justice system."
Martin's case incited nationwide debate over the ambiguity of laws like stand your ground, which come along with potential racial implications and allow federal lawmakers to play a deep role in looking at the challenges associated with them. Some critics of the law said that certain aspects encouraged people to engage in a potentially dangerous exchange rather than fleeing in the interest of safety.
"These laws permit and, quite frankly, encourage individuals to use deadly force even in situations where lesser or no physical force would be appropriate," Rep. Marcia L. Fudge said at the hearing. According to the Los Angeles Times, she said that the legislation bolsters "a Wild West environment in our communities, where individuals play the role of the judge, jury and executioner."
But supporters of the law like Sen. Ted Cruz, said that a citizen's right to "stand their ground" is rooted in an 1895 Supreme Court decision. The idea that "you're obliged to turn and run rather than to defend yourself is a notion that is contrary to hundreds of years of our jurisprudence and to the rights that protect all of us."
Sybrina Fulton spoke at the National Urban League convention in Philadelphia in July, shortly after Zimmerman was acquitted. In her speech, she urged the group to fight the legislation, which she said was the reason that her son's death was never brought to justice.
"My message to you is please use my story, please use my tragedy, please use my broken heart to say to yourself, 'We cannot let this happen to anybody else's child," the LA Times reported Fulton as saying.
