Agnew, Taylor lead sit-in at Scott’s office, demand new Florida civil rights act

Three days after the acquittal of George Zimmerman, the shooter who killed unarmed teenager Trayvon Martin, demonstrators across the nation continue to denounce the “not guilty” verdict. Thousands of citizens in cities such as Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Detroit, and Washington, DC have hit the streets to demand justice for the deceased child.

On Tuesday, the protest movement came to the Florida Capitol in Tallahassee as a group led by former FAMU Student Body President Phillip Agnew launched “Takeover Tuesday” in Gov. Rick Scott’s office.  

Agnew, executive director of the Dream Defenders, started a sit-in at the Florida governor’s office to push Scott to take action. Ciara Taylor (pictured below), another FAMU graduate who previously marched on the Florida Governor’s Mansion in 2011, came from Jacksonville to assist in coordinating the nonviolent protest. The sit-in activists number at about 100 and include students from both FAMU and Florida State.

“We want the governor to call a special session of the Legislature to address the environment that killed Trayvon Martin,” Agnew told Florida Watchdog. “This is a crisis situation and it’s important that (Scott) get our message.”

The Dream Defenders want the legislature and governor to approve a Trayvon Martin Civil Rights Act. According to Florida Watchdog, Agnew explained that “the group’s three-part agenda calls for the repeal of Florida’s Stand Your Ground self-defense law, an end to racial profiling and the abolition of  so-called “school-to-prison” education policies.”

The Stand Your Ground law permits citizens to use deadly force if they feel they are in danger outside their personal residences. Scott, who is away from Tallahassee, continues to support the law. A task force that he appointed to review the statute after Martin’s dead advised against repealing it.

“The task force recommended that the law should not be overturned, and Governor Scott agrees,” said Scott spokeswoman Melissa Sellers.

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder struck a very different tone during his address before the annual convention of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) on Tuesday in Orlando. Delivering his first public comments on Stand Your Ground laws, he sharply criticized them for endangering American citizens.

“By allowing -- and perhaps encouraging -- violent situations to escalate in public, such laws undermine public safety,” Holder told the NAACP.

The U.S. Department of Justice is in the process of reviewing Martin’s killing in order to determine if there are grounds for legal action by the federal government.