The Patriot Post® · Zimmerman's Fate and Looming Race Riots

The murder case against George Zimmerman is rapidly unraveling, due in large part to the compelling testimony of key witnesses. Ordinarily, there is nothing unusual about compelling testimony changing the course of a trial, but in this case it is witnesses presented by the prosecution that are bolstering the case for the defendant. Thus, with each passing day it is becoming more apparent that the real reason for bringing this case to trial was to assuage the media-driven concerns of the racial grievance industry, led by chief arsonists Al Sharpton and Jessie Jackson. Shamefully aiding and abetting them is the racially polarized Justice Department led by Attorney General Eric Holder.

We begin with the witnesses. Billed as the state’s “star witness,” 19-year-old Rachel Jeantel, the last person to talk to Trayvon Martin before his death, proved to be a major embarrassment. If there is a racial element to this case, other than the prosecution’s unsubstantiated accusation that Zimmerman “profiled” Martin, Jeantel introduced it during her testimony. She revealed that Trayvon Martin had referred to Zimmerman as a “creepy-ass cracker,” even as she subsequently denied it was a racial term. Another compelling part of her testimony was in regard to a letter she had supposedly written to Martin’s mother describing the chain of events that led to Trayvon’s death. During questioning by defense attorney Don West, Jeantel was forced to admit that, despite signing it, she was incapable of reading the cursive script in which it was written.

West further grilled Jeantel about her inconsistent statements to police, and the discrepancies in her testimony. Jeantel blamed them on questions posed by law enforcement officials, and the lengths of the interviews. As to the omission of details, she claimed she was trying to spare the Martin family from enduring additional grief. In the end, Jeantel admitted she didn’t know who threw the first punch, and that she lied under oath. The former admission makes it virtually impossible for the prosecution to prove that Zimmerman didn’t fire in self-defense. The latter admission challenges Jeantel’s entire credibility.

Yet it was testimony from John Good, who witnessed the fight between Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman, that provided the most damaging, and perhaps fatal blow to the state’s case. Good testified that he saw Trayvon Martin on top of George Zimmerman, raining punches down on him Mixed Martial Arts style. Good further testified that the scream he heard must have come from Zimmerman, because he was on the bottom, and Martin was facing away from Good.

On Monday, detective Doris Singleton, who questioned Zimmerman the night of the shooting, became the latest prosecution witness to undermine the state’s case. She testified that Zimmerman asked her about the crucifix she wore on her neck, and buried his head in his hands after learning that Martin had died. During the exchange Singleton testified that Zimmerman said it was "always wrong to kill.“ "I said to him, ‘If what you’re telling me is true then I don’t think that’s what God meant, you couldn’t save your own life,’” she said. Singleton further testified that Zimmerman was shocked when he learned that Martin was dead.

Audiotape of Singleton’s interview with Zimmerman was played in court. He explained he had joined the neighborhood watch after his home had been broken into. As to the fatal encounter with Martin, Zimmerman said Martin “jumped out” at him from the bushes and said, “What the f— is your problem, homey?” Zimmerman claimed he didn’t have a problem, and said Martin responded by saying, “Now you have a problem,” and punched him in the nose. When Zimmerman fell, Martin allegedly got on top of him, throwing punches. "He put his hands on my nose and said, ‘You’re going to die tonight,’“ said Zimmerman on the tape. Zimmerman then stated that Martin saw his (Zimmerman’s) gun and started to reach for it, which is when Zimmerman  drew it and shot the teenager.

Hirotaka Nakasone, an FBI audio voice analyst, further discredited the state’s case, saying he was unable to determine which to the two men was captured screaming on audio.

The state’s best witness was former lead investigator for the Sanford Police, Christopher Serino, who testified that Zimmerman’s injuries were "lacking” in terms of his story. He was further concerned that Zimmerman didn’t identify himself to Martin. Yet under cross-examination by defense attorney Mark O'Mara regarding Serino’s suggestion to Zimmerman that there might be a videotape of the incident, Serino admitted Zimmerman was buoyed by the possibility. "I believe his words were, ‘thank god. I was hoping somebody would have videotaped it,“ said Serino. O'Mara then asked Serino what that response indicated to him. "Either he was telling the truth or he was a complete pathological liar,” the detective responded. The defense then asked Serino if pathological liar was removed from the equation, did he believe Zimmerman was being truthful. “Yes,” he testified.

Additional witnesses presented by the prosecution have, to date, corroborated Zimmerman’s version of the events in question, save one: Selma Mora testified last Thursday that Zimmerman was on top of Martin in the moments before a gunshot ended the fight, telling the court that a man wearing “patterns between black and red” was on top, meaning Zimmerman. "One of them was on the ground, and the other one was on top in position like a rider,“ the Spanish-speaking Mora testified through a translator. Yet unlike Good, Mora did not see the fight prior to the gunshot.

Again, these are witnesses for the prosecution, whose job is to prove that Zimmerman is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Yet it is more complicated than that. Because the state filed second degree murder charges against Zimmerman (as opposed to manslaughter, where they might have argued he acted without just cause), Florida law requires them to prove Zimmerman "acted according to a 'depraved mind’ without regard for human life.”

So why did the state pursue that charge? Because Trayvon Martin became a cause célèbre for race-hatred promoters like Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson, who called for marches and boycotts against the city of Sanford. Their efforts were aided and abetted by corrupt media, which bent over backwards to insert race into the equation. Those efforts included the New York Times referring to Zimmerman as a “white Hispanic,” NBC purposefully editing an audiotape of his 911 call to make Zimmerman appear racist, CNN claiming Zimmerman used the word “coon” when he actually said “cold,” and innumerable news outlets publishing a picture of Martin at age 13, despite the fact that he was 17 and over six feet tall at the time of the incident.

If a report by “sundance” at conservativetreehouse.com is accurate, the media’s effort to paint Zimmerman as racist was part of a well-coordinated publicity campaign undertaken by Martin family attorneys Benjamin Crump and Natalie Jackson, in conjunction with publicist Ryan Julison, who was instrumental in providing publicity for the Pigford Farmer’s lawsuit and settlement. “Within the prior networking connections to this lawsuit, and within the media consulting/advocacy, is where the outline of the Congressional Black Caucus and substantive race-dependent civil rights leaders such as Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, and the NAACP’s Ben Jealous are connected to Ryan Julison through Benjamin Crump and Natalie Jackson and the Pigford II Lawyer, Greg Francis,” he writes, further noting that their efforts were all about creating a “systematic campaign of optical control.”

Andrew McCarthy reveals the consequences of such a campaign with respect to the DOJ, citing the initiation of a “federal civil rights prosecution that induced state officials in Florida to reconsider the initial decision not to charge Zimmerman.” “It’s easy for a corrupt process to produce criminal charges,” writes McCarthy.

“It is quite something else to prove them. To try to fill the gaping intent hole in its case, the Zimmerman prosecution has transferred the hobgoblin of racism from the headlines into the courtroom. Indeed, it did not even wait for the trial to do that; the prosecutor injected racism directly into the charging documents.”

The Florida prosecutor did that by inserting the term “profiling” into the document which, McCarthy notes, was an effort “to imply, in the absence of any evidence, that Zimmerman is a bigot who assumed Martin was up to no good just because he was black.”

Yet it is PJMedia’s J. Christian Adams, a former attorney at the Justice Department, who reveals a disturbing reality regarding why the DOJ forced Florida’s hand. “Right now, hanging on the door of a federal employee’s office in the Department of Justice (DOJ) Voting Section is a sign expressing racial solidarity with Trayvon Martin,” Adams writes. He further notes that even as the DOJ abetted the mob demanding racial justice in Florida, it did absolutely nothing about New Black Panther leader Mikhail Muhammad, who put a $10,000 bounty on Zimmerman’s head and called for the mobilization of 10,000 black men to capture him.

In terms of making the case a national sensation, all of these efforts have been enormously successful, even as they remain mind-numbingly irresponsible – as well as substantially dangerous. If numerous comments posted on Twitter are any indication, the failure to convict Zimmerman of murder will precipitate large-scale rioting around the nation. In that regard, former Chicago police officer Paul Huebl adds fuel to an already burning fire. “With today’s social media I fully expect organized race rioting to begin in every major city to dwarf the Rodney King and the Martin Luther King riots of past decades,” he writes.

“If you live in a large city be prepared to evacuate or put up a fight to win. You will need firearms, fire suppression equipment along with lots of food and water. Police resources will be slow and outgunned everywhere.”

Philadelphia Tribune columnist Charles D. Ellison takes it one step further, insisting that the “pervasive cynicism currently surrounding the trial could be validated by an acquittal – and there is the risk of a flashpoint as intense as the aftermath of that fateful Los Angeles police brutality verdict in 1992.”

The message here is clear: either Zimmerman is found guilty, irrespective of the evidence, or the country will burn.

Barring a bombshell turn of events, the state will have a difficult, if not impossible, task proving that Zimmerman acted according to a depraved mind without regard for human life. The six female jurors and four alternates hearing the case have been sequestered and will remain so for the duration of the trial. Thus, it remains impossible to know if they are aware of the extra-judicial firestorm this case is engendering, and whether that firestorm will have any effect on their verdict.

Obviously, there is one man who could go a long way toward defusing this entire scenario should he choose to do so. President Barack Obama could rise above the fray and explain to every American that our system of justice means nothing if the threat of violence can corrupt the verdict of a murder trial. The President could make it clear that violent outbursts of any kind are absolutely unacceptable and attempt to defuse an already tense environment. He won’t, however, because race riots are good for the Democratic Party. They fire up the base. It’s what the whole show was for.

Arnold Ahlert is a columnist for FrontPage Magazine.