Trayvon's Mom Gets 8 Months of Donated Vacation Days
That's on top of the roughly $100,000 Martin's family has raised to launch an advocacy group.
| Posted Monday, May 14, 2012, at 1:08 PM
Photo by Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images.
Trayvon Martin's mother will get eight months of paid vacation time from her Miami-Dade County job thanks to donations from her colleagues.
The Miami Herald reports that 192 county employees took advantage of a county resolution allowing them to donate some of their own paid vacation days and sick leave to Sybrina Fulton and Martin's aunt, Yolanda Knight Evans, who received nearly nine weeks of vacation time. Fulton works at the county housing authority; Evans works at the water and sewer utility.
As the paper points out, the donations are the latest in what amounts to something of a charity arms race on both sides of the case. Martin's family has raised nearly $100,000 to help launch a criminal justice advocacy foundation in Trayvon's name, a group that will employ Martin's parents at salaries equivalent to their current wages (although it appears Fulton won't be paid until her vacation time runs out). George Zimmerman, the man who says he shot Martin in self-defense, meanwhile, has received more than $200,000 from supporters to help pay his legal and living expenses.
