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Lawrence O'Donnell spoke on his Thursday show about the recent killing of Jordan Davis, a 17-year-old black student who was shot dead by an older white man in Florida last Friday.
Michael Dunn, 45, allegedly shot and killed Davis after arguing with him about the loud music he was playing in his car. He is now invoking Florida's notorious "Stand Your Ground" law, claiming that he thought he saw a shotgun in Davis' car. Police found no gun in the car, and Dunn was charged with second-degree murder. The case drew immediate comparisons to the killing of Trayvon Martin, the unarmed black teenager who was shot dead by George Zimmerman in 2012.
"Another angry white man in Florida has stood his ground in the face of an imagined threat, and another black 17-year-old high school junior who did nothing wrong is dead," O'Donnell said at the beginning of the segment.
He added that he first heard the story from a flight attendant who was a regular viewer of his show. She is planning to attend Davis' funeral.
He described how Dunn, who admitted to having "a couple" drinks, found Davis and some friends in a car with loud music playing:
"Michael Dunn decided he had the authority to tell the kids to turn down the volume. The kids did what most kids would do and what I certainly would have done under the circumstances: nothing. They didn't turn down the volume for the suddenly self-appointed volume cop of Jacksonville, Florida. So, Michael Dunn ... took out his handgun and started shooting. He fired eight bullets at the four kids in the car. Like most amateur cops, he completely missed his target with six of those bullets. The other two hit Jordan who was sitting in the middle of the back seat. Michael Dunn didn't behave in a very cop-like way after that. He immediately fled the scene. The kids quickly piled out of their car realizing they weren't injured, and looked back to see Jordan slumped alone in the back seat."
O'Donnell then mourned the boy who, as he put it, his parents were "eagerly watching become a man."
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