On the Monday before Rachel Jeantel took the stand in the George Zimmerman trail, CBS re-aired an episode of Two Broke Girls. In that episode, Caroline had to go to a deposition and Max was excited about it because she is a fan of Law and Order. She kept referencing Law and Order when she was with the lawyers and during the deposition. She couldn’t understand why things she saw on the show didn’t match up with the real lawyers she was with. Of course, the audience laughed because no one would think Law and Order was the way the law or the courts really worked because it is a TV show.

Tell that to a 19 year old girl.

With all the comments made about Rachel Jeantel, with all the derogatory statements and the pity some have used in describing her court appearance, there was a clip I saw that put everything in perspective for me into the thinking of this young woman. The defense lawyer asked her why she didn’t come forward right away to the police when she found out Trayvon was dead. She said she was waiting for the police to call her because that is how they (the police) do it. Under further questioning she said, not in such precise words, that the first thing the police do is check the last numbered dialed on a person’s cellphone and interview them. When she said that my mind flashed to hundreds of Law and Order franchise shows and you know what, when a victim is killed and a cellphone is found the first thing they do is check to see the last number called and they contact that person.  It is done so much that you could have a drinking game based on it.

When I realized she was in a Law and Order mode about the court, I looked at her demeanor from the perspective of someone on the stand in Law and Order. Her frustration at the amount of time on the stand made sense because from what she knew of the law, which is from a fictional TV show, a person would be on the stand for maybe 15 minutes and the lawyers would get to the point on their questions. In this real life drama, you had a defense attorney who was being hostile to her and had her on the stand for two days for a total of five hours. In Law and Order shows if the defense attorney is hostile to you, you can dramatically shout, talk back or become hostile to them because that is when the tide will turn in the case. I suspect, even though she was prepped by the prosecution on what court would be like, after the first hour and a half on the stand she got frustrated. She did what any person would do outside the courtroom. She talked back, she lashed out in a restrained way and got confused by the repetitive questions. When court resumed the second day, she was slightly different in her attitude.

Her treating the trial like a Law and Order episode illustrates a disturbing aspect of this case. In my opinion, the subtle thing that the defense is doing is painting Trayvon Martin as THOSE TV black kids. He’s not one of the Cosby kids, he’s Tyrone the street hustler, and he’s Chris Brown the tough thug playa. That’s why the defense posted pictures before the trail of Trayvon sporting gold teeth, why they wanted his school records released of his truancy. When Rachel mentioned the call she was on with Trayvon, the defense focused on the ‘crazy ass cracker’ statement and the use of the n-word by Trayvon. If you look at Rachel from a surface perception, she fits all of the dark and dirty stereotypes people have about blacks and especially young black males. They want the jury to see a picture of Trayvon through the prism of Rachel.

Rachel has been described as his friend but we know they were dating, or at least they were flirting and there was some attraction between the two. Rachel is an unpolished, heart on her sleeve, quiet but won’t take any attitude teenager. It came up in court that she is 19 years old but a senior in high school. Her youth and lower middle class lifestyle she lives in is vastly different from the suit and tie world of the court. Her neighborhood might have lawyers and doctors, but they probably won’t have the income or expereince of the lawyers she is dealing with in court. The defense lawyers want to chip away at the image of an average all American kid. They want the jury to see Martin as a street thug with gold chains, platinum teeth and a hostile attitude. Those people say the n-word. Those people aren’t educated. Those people don’t know how to have the right decorum in the court. Those people, when asked a simple question, will become hostile and attack.

If you are a professional, if you are an upper middle class person, if you don’t have relatives in that part of town you may not relate to people like Rachel and Trayvon. When Trayvon’s picture was first shown, some in the media (yes Fox News) wanted to portray the kid as a thug. His class records were released to prove he was ‘suspect.’ The crowds in support of his parents, while influential in getting Zimmerman arrested and into the court, were described as mobs by the right wing. You had the hoddie issue. Rachel, for good or ill, is the representation of Trayvon, in my opinion. The defense wants the jury to see Rachel, as the girlfriend of Trayvon, as the person who best represents the attitude of Trayvon. It isn’t a fair position to put her in, but when I thought about the Law and Order angle, I thought about those defense lawyers on the show and wondered what a super defense lawyer might do to sway a jury. If I were writing the script, as a defense I would try to get the jury to see if his girlfriend was hostile, uneducated, prone to saying derogatory words and having ‘an attitude,’ then they might believe that Trayvon was a thug kid, even if all he had was a pack of Skittles and an Ice Tea.

More than one pundit has talked about court as being a game. It seems the game of court can shake down and misrepresent a 19 year old girl.

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Conjuring Trayvon through Rachel Jeantel - June 28, 2013
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