More than 250 students, faculty members and Athens residents showed up to the “Justice for Trayvon” rally earlier this evening to protest the shooting of a Florida teen.
The attendees staged a protest against social injustice in the handling of the death of Trayvon Martin, a 17-year-old black male shot to death in Sanford, Florida on Feb. 26. George Zimmerman, a neighborhood watch volunteer who shot Martin, has not been charged.
The group gathered in front of the West Portico of the Templeton-Blackburn Alumni Memorial Auditorium at 5 p.m. for the rally.
Organizers painted multiple signs and distributed them among the protestors, and later used them in a march through campus.
Seven speakers addressed the crowd on topics of racism and issued a call to action for students.
“(Trayvon Martin) can either be a seed for change or he can be a tragedy we always look back on,” said Pastor Leon Forte from the Grace Christian Center in Athens.
ph835608@ohiou.edu
