Not at all, these cases can't really be compared because the main difference has to do with the amount of evidence.
People can't get convicted unless the jury is completely convinced that they committed the crime. Zimmerman and Casey weren't convicted because there wasn't sufficient evidence to prove without reasonable doubt that they did in fact commit the crime and that there couldn't have been a scenario where they could have been innocent. (There was no way to prove that Zimmerman initiated the fight, and there wasn't anything directly linking Casey to her daughters death).
Vick got convicted because a dog fighting ring was found in his home, complete with over mistreated 70 dogs. There was more than enough evidence that he did in fact commit that crime.
It's a bitch, but it just comes down to one simple thing:
Are you okay with courts being able to convict anyone they think committed a crime, which would get people like Zimmerman and Casey convicted but also would result in innocent people being imprisoned?
Or do you believe in innocent until proven guilty, possibly letting some criminals go for the security of knowing innocent people are unlikely to be punished for crimes they didn't commit?
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Good post. It all rings very true. Like him or hate him, Zimmerman did not have enough solid evidence stacked up against him to prove that he commited the crime. One cannot condemn a person to guilt simplly due to the way the media portrays that person. On the note of a weaker argument, but what I still feel is a valid point, it wouldn't be any better of a precident to set that if somebody comes up to you on the street and starts beating you viciously, that you cannot defend yourself for fear of going to jail. This is, of course, assuming Zimmerman's story was 100% true (which may or may not be the case, but the prosecuters couldn't prove it wasn't).