Originally Posted by signupdamnit

I doubt a physical confrontation have happened if Zimmerman didn't have a gun. Firstly I doubt Zimmerman would have followed him in the way he did. Second, I suspect the physical confrontation started or escalated the moment when it became clear Zimmerman had a weapon. There is no witness either way to testify against this other than Zimmerman.

If you think about it Zimmerman carrying the gun was probably what made the confrontation escalate into something serious in the first place. Zimmerman's injuries did not require hospitalization. Multiple people were already on the phone with the police before he fired the gun. Zimmerman had called them earlier in fact and they were on their way. I think they arrived less than a minute or two after the gun was fired.

I'm not a big anti-gun activist but it seems clear that untrained people with guns = more lethal confrontations. Now a bar fight or a street pushing match can turn into a case where someone shoots the other person dead whereas before it would have been a relatively minor fight.