'The Wire' creator David Simon "ashamed" at Trayvon Martin verdict
The Wire creator David Simon has said that he is "ashamed" to be an American after George Zimmerman was acquitted of murdering Trayvon Martin.
The unarmed 17-year-old was shot dead in Florida last February in a case that caused outrage and highlighted race issues in America.
The jury accepted Zimmerman's claim of self-defense and delivered their verdict last night (July 13), leading to many high-profile public figures expressing their anger at the outcome.
Referring to America's 'stand your ground' law, which permits the use of force in the event of an "unlawful threat", Simon wrote on his website: "You can stand your ground if you're white, and you can use a gun to do it.
"But if you stand your ground with your fists and you're black, you're dead. In the state of Florida, the season on African-Americans now runs year round. Come one, come all. And bring a handgun. The legislators are fine with this blood on their hands.
"The governor, too. One man accosted another and when it became a fist fight, one man - and one man only - had a firearm. The rest is racial rationalisation and dishonorable commentary.
"If I were a person of color in Florida, I would pick up a brick and start walking toward that courthouse in Sanford.
"Those that do not, those that hold the pain and betrayal inside and somehow manage to resist violence - these citizens are testament to a stoic tolerance that is more than the rest of us deserve. I confess, their patience and patriotism is well beyond my own."
Simon added: "Behold, the lewd, pornographic embrace of two great American pathologies: Race and guns, both of which have conspired not only to take the life of a teenager, but to make that killing entirely permissible.
"I can't look an African-American parent in the eye for thinking about what they must tell their sons about what can happen to them on the streets of their country.
"Tonight, anyone who truly understands what justice is and what it requires of a society is ashamed to call himself an American."