The death of Trayvon Martin sparked a national controversy.
The incident brought attention to the little-known “stand your ground” statute.
Now Martin’s death might ignite a new controversy as two figures engage in an ugly public battle.
Hip-hop mogul Jay-Z is producing a docuseries about the Trayvon Martin incident—and George Zimmerman, the man acquitted of murdering Martin, is furious.
Zimmerman claims producers hounded his family for interviews and he let Jay-Z know he wasn’t happy about it either.
Rapper Snoop Dogg later chimed in with a threat for Zimmerman.
From Deadline:
Jay-Z’s forthcoming docuseries, Rest In Power: The Trayvon Martin Story, which follows the life and legacy of the titular Martin. The timely project, like many documentaries including “Whose Streets?” has drawn much-needed attention to social injustice, but also a peripheral feud between Snoop Dogg and George Zimmerman.
Zimmerman, who was acquitted of the fatal shooting of Martin, threw in his two cents about the docuseries in a recent interview with The Blast saying that he would “beat Jay-Z” and feed him to “an alligator” after claims that executive producer Michael Gasparro and the production team behind the documentary harassed his family for interviews and footage. He also said, “I know how to handle people who f*** with me, I have since February 2012.”
Snoop Dogg took to Instagram to respond to Zimmerman’s threats, defending Jay and that if one hair is touched on his head, “the revolution will be televised.” He then went on to criticize “the system” and called Zimmerman a “b*tch ass muthaf****”.
Rest In Power was picked up earlier this year for the 2018 relaunch of Spike as the Paramount Network. Jay-Z initially teamed with the Weinstein Co. for the six-part event docuseries. Since the Harvey Weinstein sexual harassment scandal broke, his name has been removed from Rest in Power along with other Paramount Network projects Waco and Yellowstone.
The docuseries uses Lisa Bloom’s book, Suspicion Nation: The Inside Story of the Trayvon Martin Injustice as source material. Bloom, interestingly enough, was the attorney advising Weinstein during the aftermath of the New York Times expose about Weinstein’s harassment allegations.
The entire ordeal was tragic because a person lost his life, and the leftist media used the tragedy to encourage a racial divide.
Zimmerman was painted as a racist white guy even though he’s Hispanic, and his call to 9-1-1 was purposefully edited to make it seem as though he profiled Martin because he was black and not because of activity he deemed was suspicious.
The media also used pictures of Martin as a little kid instead of contemporary photos.
It seems likely the Jay-Z docuseries will reopen old wounds, so one can only hope the war of words between Zimmerman and Snoop Dogg doesn’t escalate.