Florida shooting row: Bounty offered to catch culprit

A group linked to the militant Black Panthers organisation has offered a bounty for the capture of George Zimmerman, the neighbourhood watch captain who killed an unarmed black teenager in Florida.

Churches across America held services for Trayvon Martin, the 17 year-old whose death last month led to outrage around the country after Mr Zimmerman, 28, was able to plead self-defence to escape prosecution.

At a protest in Sanford, near Orlando, where the killing took place, Mikhail Muhammad, the leader of the New Black Panthers, announced a reward for his apprehension. Asked whether he was inciting violence, Muhammad said: "An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth."

The rally was one of dozens held to protest at Trayvon's death, as demands for Zimmerman's arrest grew. He is in hiding and is said to be in fear for his life while a series of investigations are held into the decision of Sanford police not to press charges against him.

The New Black Panthers, inspired by the Black Panthers revolutionaries of the 1960s, has been named as a hate group by the US Commission on Civil Rights.