The Department of Justice said Sunday that it intends to review the shooting death of unarmed teenager Trayvon Martin to “determine whether the evidence reveals a prosecutable violation of any of the limited federal criminal civil rights statutes” within its jurisdiction.
An all-female jury cleared George Zimmerman on Saturday night of all charges in the last year’s shooting of the 17-year-old Martin. A Justice Department official said Attorney General Eric Holder intends to address the case when he speaks Tuesday at the NAACP convention in Orlando, Fla.
Below, the Justice Department’s statement:
As the Department first acknowledged last year, we have an open investigation into the death of Trayvon Martin. The Department of Justice’s Criminal Section of the Civil Rights Division, the United States Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Florida, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation continue to evaluate the evidence generated during the federal investigation, as well as the evidence and testimony from the state trial. Experienced federal prosecutors will determine whether the evidence reveals a prosecutable violation of any of the limited federal criminal civil rights statutes within our jurisdiction, and whether federal prosecution is appropriate in accordance with the Department’s policy governing successive federal prosecution following a state trial.
