The Zimmerman thing reminds me of the local case of Fredy Villanueva.
A cop ended up shooting a Hispanic kid who, with his 'gang', surrounded her and was about to get physical.
As the case went on, more and more info pilled up to show that the kid was far from being an angel.
Yet, it was obvious that some people didn't want to see that because to them, a cop shot a racial minority.
Of course, some parts are very grey akin to the ZImmerman story... but the similarity is that if those kids didn't get aggressive, they would both be alive today.