Trayvon Benjamin Martin was 17 when he was shot and killed on the evening of February 26, 2012, in Sanford, Florida. He had been visiting his father and the father’s fiancée in a gated townhouse community and was walking back from a convenience store with a bag of Skittles and a can of iced tea when he was noticed by neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman. Zimmerman, 28, called police to report Martin and, despite a dispatcher’s instruction not to follow, pursued him. A confrontation followed and Zimmerman shot Martin in the chest, killing him.

Zimmerman said he shot Martin in self-defense, claiming Martin had attacked him. The Sanford Police Department initially did not charge Zimmerman, citing Florida’s Stand Your Ground law, which allows use of deadly force when a person believes they face imminent danger. After widespread public outcry, Zimmerman was charged in April 2012 with second-degree murder and manslaughter; his high-profile 2013 trial ended in acquittal. The case galvanized national debate over racial profiling, gun laws and justice and helped spur the emergence of the Black Lives Matter movement.