Add to this lax gun laws,entrenched segregation,deep economic inequalities and a statute that endorses vigilantism,and a murder of this kind is inevitable. Indeed what makes Martin's case noteworthy is not that it happened but that it has sparked such widespread indignation beyond his immediate community. It is not at all uncommon for young black men to leave the world in a shower of bullets followed by deafening silence.

Eight kids under the age of 19 are killed by guns in America every day. While researching the stories of those who fell one November day in 2006 I ran across the story of Brandon Moore. Brandon was 16 when he was shot in the back in the middle of the afternoon by an off-duty cop moonlighting as a security guard in Detroit. The guard had previously shot a man dead during a neighbourhood fracas,shot his wife (though not fatally) in a domestic dispute and had been involved in a fatal hit-and-run car accident while under the influence of alcohol. Brandon's death was dismissed in the city's two main newspapers in less than 200 words. It was ruled to be justifiable homicide. A year later the guard was still in the police force.

"We're deemed not reportable,"said Clementina Chery,who runs the Boston-based Louis D Brown Peace Institute,which assists families in the immediate aftermath of shootings and works in schools to educate people about gun violence."Black children are dispensable. Violence is expected to happen in these communities."