This is a tough one, I've bounced around emotionally since the report first came out. Initially, I was outraged. A skinny young man, looks like he's 12 in the picture they used, is killed while visiting a gated community that he does not normally reside in. Seems like an open and shut case of vigilantism by an overzealous property owner.
Now we have two witnesses (fact) that are unaffiliated with either party (fact) and did indeed see the young man beating the shit out of Zimmerman. I'm sorry if you aren't 100% up to date on the actual facts of the case because you watch the MSM, but thems the facts so far and they aren't debatable. Now add the more accurate photos that show this young man was 6'3", muscular and a football player, quite capable of being an aggressor. From there, the debate steams ahead.
I've read back from about page 43 and I sure hear a great deal of conjecture from those that want to see this creep hang, as I did in the beginning.
It really comes down to what happened immediately before the confrontation. As a property owner, he absolutely had the right to follow and question someone he didn't recognize and find out if they had a right to be inside his gated community. Even though some have laughably stated otherwise, you do not lose your right to claim self defense because you took the INEXCUSABLE step of speaking to another human being as they are walking in the neighborhood... absurd and ridiculous on it's face. If he assaulted or placed his hands on the young man in any way, then you have an argument. Maybe he did, do you even know... of course you don't.
If the young man did attack Zimmerman and was doing so to the point Zim felt his life was in danger, then the final determination will be, did Trayvon attack him just for talking to him or did Zimmerman assault/attack him first. It could go either way, Zim might be the asshole, looking for trouble and physically assaulted him, then had to use his firearm to get himself out of trouble. Or, this kid may have been a billy bad ass, didn't like this property owner talking to him and decided to fuck him up and got drilled for it. I have no idea, and neither do you.
For the record, I listened to the audio and it CLEARLY sounds like Zim says "fucking punks" not coons... frankly, I can't even remotely hear it that way. It's going to be interesting to see where it goes from here.
Since so many are guessing at what happened, my conjecture would be that Zim did initiate the confrontation with some kind of physical contact, most likely negating his right to use self defense as an excuse. But that's just a gut feeling and I have zero evidence to support it. If that's what happened, he's in deep shit.