The emails to Lee on that first day of national attention started off forceful but polite.

"When are you going to make an arrest for this crime of murder of a 17-year-old who was armed with Skittles and a can of iced tea?" Mark Anderson wrote from Chicago.

Lee responded with a form letter he used repeatedly, saying his department was conducting a thorough investigation.

The chief was aware that interest in the case was growing by the minute so he sent an email to Sanford's mayor and city manager soon afterward, stating that some of the evidence corroborated Zimmerman's claim of self-defense. He had assured Martin's family that a thorough investigation was being conducted and that the State Attorney's Office supported the decision not to arrest Zimmerman immediately, he wrote in the email to his bosses.

The case would later be reassigned to a state attorney in Jacksonville after the local prosecutor recused himself.

By that evening, the emails from around the nation were getting heated and vulgar.