Zimmerman Seeks Another Chance at Freedom on Bond

The lawyer for George Zimmerman argued on Monday that his client should be granted bond for a second time as he awaits trial on murder charges in the shooting death of Trayvon Martin.

In the defense motion filed with the Seminole County Circuit Court, the lawyer, Mark O’Mara, said that Mr. Zimmerman, 28, is not a flight risk and takes full responsibility for his role in not previously alerting the judge about the tens of thousands of dollars in donations made to an online fund that he had set up before his first bond hearing in April.

Bail was revoked for Mr. Zimmerman on June 1 after prosecutors told the court that he and his wife, Shellie Zimmerman, 25, misled the court about their finances and spoke to each other in code about the estimated $125,000 in donations. The couple’s conversations were captured on tape because they spoke when Mr. Zimmerman was at the Seminole County Jail.

Mr. Zimmerman, who claims he shot Mr. Martin in self-defense last February when the 17-year-old teenager walked through his condo development in Sanford, Fla., instructed his wife during the telephone calls on how to move the money around into different credit union accounts. He also did not dispute his wife’s testimony when she said she did not know how much money was in the fund and said they had limited means for bail because she was a full-time nursing student and he was unemployed. Ms. Zimmerman was later arrested on perjury charges.

“Mr. Zimmerman’s failure to advise the court of the existence of the donated funds at the initial bail hearing was wrong and Mr. Zimmerman accepts responsibility for his part in allowing the court to be misled as to his true financial circumstances,” Mr. O’Mara wrote in the motion. Last week, Mr. O’Mara made public transcripts, audiotapes and a video of Mr. Zimmerman’s account of what happened that night when he shot Mr. Martin.

The second bond hearing is scheduled for Friday.

Source: N.Y. Times