The murder trial of George Zimmerman just got a bit more complicated after an attorney revealed in open court that the girlfriend of teenager Trayvon Martin, known as Witness 8, is believed to have lied about her whereabouts following his death. The girlfriend has supplied a key account that portrayed Zimmerman as the aggressor from a brief telephone call with Martin. However, Mark O’Mara revealed in court that she is believed to have lied in stating under oath that she did not go to Martin’s funeral because she was hospitalized. While that does not change the account of the telephone call, it would be a lie under oath that could be prosecuted and would chip away at her credibility, particularly with another witness saying that Martin was seen on top of Zimmerman shortly before the shooting.
News accounts report that defense attorney Don West in court said that the girlfriend “lied” and that “[s]he, in fact, did not go to the hospital as she stated under oath.” West is quoted as saying that “[prosecutor] Mr. [John] Guy represented there would not be hospital records confirming her sworn statement, because, in fact, she lied.”
A lie in a sworn statement is a crime and we have previously discussed how prosecutors are often inconsistent in who they choose to charge — sometimes giving a pass to false accusers in high profile cases like the one involving the Duke Lacrosse case.
The lie, if proven, will add to the difficulty in the case. I have previously expressed my view that the prosecutors have yielded to public pressure in over-charging the case. Prosecutors will be in a tough position if a key witness made up her hospitalization under oath.
Source: Orlando Sentinel
I can never grow tired of reading comments from Lottakatz. Good stuff indeed.
I see a classic example of an oxymoron with the guy in the photo donning a cheesy smile wearing a businessman’s suit.
nick, Thanks for the response. The Trayvon Martin case is not an emotional issue for me, well, not much of one at least. I can’t get emotional about one killing without remembering all the others that preceded it and the hundreds that followed it. Those memories can result in a bit of a melt down. Kids are being killed in cities across the country and the perpetrators are rarely brought to justice, especially if they are killed by cops.
My interest in this case was piqued by a number of things: Sharpton and Jackson leading demonstrations for charges, the DA saying “move on, nothing to see here” (cops serving as judge and jury without a complete investigation? The stink came hundreds of miles north.) and the new DA charging murder 2.
With the state of Florida requiring most of the discovery information being made public, it was interesting to see the SPD reports, the defendant’s initial writeup of the event where he tracked down a “suspect” (to what? there were no open cases), the videos of his descriptions of the event in multiple interviews, the video of his walk-thru of what he did, Sling’s comparison of his non-emergency call and his walk-thru, the autopsy report, the forensics reports, the witness interviews, and so on. Even the hearings are televised and are available on you-tube.
I’ve been trying to provide more information so that the opinions here can be influenced by discovery materials, not supposition.
I was disappointed that JT thought the DeeDee lied assertion was more important than the fact that the defense has waived the self-defense hearing. They gave up on the SYG defense some time ago and decided to go with regular self-defense, but waived the hearing. At a previous hearing, the defense suggested that they would like to “roll” the self-defense hearing into the trial. How does that work? There hasn’t been a motion so we don’t know exactly what is being proposed or what the judge thinks of it.
Much of the discovery is available here:http://trayvon.axiomamnesia.com/people/witnesses/witness-8-files-trayvon-martin-george-zimmerman-case/ This page has audio of DeeDees interview. From this page you can link to others to hear the defendant’s interviews and those of the other witnesses and read the reports of the SPD and the EMTs.
bettykath, I know this is an emotional issue for you. I give you many kudos for putting aside that understandable emotion and saying what is right. I don’t know if Michael Graham is a standup guy or not. But, we’ll see. People shoot from the hip sometimes. Very seldom do they hit the correct target. I’ve been accused of not having “much respect for women”. A complete an utter falsehood, and now I and other good people are “racist”; another lie. Some of the people here like to throw out these allegations w/ little or no evidence. You and I have debated vigorously. However, we respect each other. My respect for you just went up a few pegs.
Michael, no one here is a racist/hater. You would know this if you had read the comments. If you had read them, you would see that I posted the question/answer many hours before you showed up and that none of the comments are of a racist/hater nature. Those suggesting that DeeDee lied weren’t aware of the question/answer on which O’Mara hung his hat. They also aren’t aware that O’Mara has been making similar comments that have little relationship to the truth.
The dogs are baiting and/or excepted from the rational.
Michael Graham, We love the Constitution. To even imply that those of us here saying a fair trial is required are racist says EVERYTHING about you, and NOTHING about us.
In case any of the racist / haters in this thread may want to review the facts before they use this to prove they are indeed “racist / haters,” this is an exact quote of what was said under oath…
BDLR:_ OK, did you end up going to the hospital or somewhere?
Dee Dee:_ Mmmm…Yeah, I had high blood pressure.
As the rest of you can see (mad barking dogs have trouble with that stuff) the question was “hospital OR SOMEWHERE.” This is a non story, and the judge ruled that hospital or not was “moot”… issue closed.
And now, back to comments from rabid dogs and Hoodie Haters!
Zimmerman still trying to get away with murder?
Do you think that when lawyers are acting as advocates that they are under oath? If so, then DOJ attorney David C. Rybicki committed perjury for filing in federal court in DDC 11-01032 Rybicki pled “JABS is not limited to inclusion of records that are created incident to arrest for a ‘criminal charge’ (see document 16-1 p.10). I filed an objection with the FR citation, yet Rybicki came back and asserted “Nothing in that Federal Register Notice states, as Plaintiffs erroneously claim, that the JABS must be used only to process individuals arrested for criminal offenses.” (see document 31, p 3). See http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-2006-09-07/pdf/E6-14828.pdf#page=1 CATEGORIES OF INDIVIDUALS COVERED BY THE SYSTEM: Alleged criminal offenders who have been detained, arrested, booked, or incarcerated.
I filed a complaint w DOJ Office of Professional Regulation and they emailed to me “it is the longstanding policy of the Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) to decline to investigate litigation claims that have been raised, could have been raised, or still may be raised in litigation.”
A fair trial in a stand your ground state means a short non jury trial before a judge to determine if the facts support dismissing the case because he was standing his ground. Florida has screwed all of this up by: 1) not requiring the State to turn over evidence to the defense on day one; 2) not having a required hearing on stand your ground a) after charges are filed; and b) fefore a warrant for arrest can be issued. 3) a second hearing on stand your ground, with dismissal of charge if he was standing his ground, after warrant has been issued, and after discovery has been delivered to defense satisfaction at defendants request, within ten days of such request.
Florida is a “stand your ground” state in name only. Florida does not comport with due process of law requiremens of a fair trial because FL does not require the State to divulge all evidence in their possession ( evidence within their reach) to defendant forthwith. Where is the Deep Dee Dee Doo Doo evidence? If this key witness lied then let us see the lies. Allow defendant to take her deposition today. If warrant for arrest was issued based in part on this lie then dismiss case.
Stand your ground needs to be codified in FL statutes. Right now its status is a jjoke. Where is the NRA when we need them?
Another thing FL can do is outlaw the sale of Skittles.
Yes, he should have a fair trial, like anyone else.
Porkchop, I second your motion but we’re probably pariahs for saying a very basic fact, there has not been a trial yet. F@ck it..we’re right.
Porkchop: I think there should be a trial before he is condemned. AFTER the darn State of FL turns over the evidence they are with holding. I think that the evidence that has been published shows that he will be acquitted. I think his lawyer is careful and good. I think Z was justified in shooting the guy. This new revelation about the Dee Dee Deep Doo Doo adult who lied under oath is a whopper.
rafflaw:
Maybe it will turn out that he is a murderer, but not until a jury says he is. I’m not aware that all of the evidence has been placed before the public. Last I heard that’s why we have trials and lawyers. We used to occasionally honor that whole innocent-until-proven-guilty thing. It seems to be less and less frequent.
Does anybody else think maybe there should be a trial before this guy is condemned?
Where is King DorkDog when you need supreme doggedness?
BarkinDog you called that Judge wimp dog just to get my goat.
Is Crump the heavy set guy who is the parents’ lawyer? Must be. So, if the Dee Dee Doo Doo adult lied after she talked with him, did he suborn perjury?
It seems like there needs to be an outside investigation of the state investigators and the private investigators for the parents. And in FL one has to be wary of gators.
If Crump has filed a civil suit then perhaps there is grounds for a counter claim for false statements against the good name of the Gated Community–not false statements in the pleading but false statements suborned for trial and since released to the world via Donald Crump. So, perhaps the parents and The Donald can be sued.
If the dead Hoodie had gone into another kind of gated community and attacked some guy, the inmates would have killed him. He thought he had chosen a “safe” gated community– a Skittle kind of town.
In the old West a hoodie would not take a run at a cowboy with a gun on his holster at the waist. That is a solution for FL. All the old farts over age 40 get to carry a six shooter on each hip. Someone in the Legislature needs to make it a “draw if they blink” state. The Stand Your Ground defense lets em get right up on you and then if ya plug em ya gotta go through all this malarky going on the the Z case.
If I was Z’s lawyer I would not waive the defense but raise the motion after the close of the state’s case. Let’s see, who is the state’s case? They can call Dee Dee Deep Doo Doo and then the witness who saw dead Hoodie pounding Z’s head in the ground. Then are they gonna call Z? They gonna call some cop to say what Z said? Are they gonna put the parents on the stand to say that he left outta the house to get some Skittles?
This judge is probably too wimp dog to rule in Z;s favor if he has a pre trial hearing on the Stand Your Ground defense. Then Z has exposed himself to another round of testimony which they can use in front of the jury later to cross examine him with. The news will be all about how the Judge denied t Stand Your Ground Defense and the jury pool will be poisoned. Better to save the defense until after the close of the State’s lame case. That prosecutor better be wearing a hoodie.
Barkin Dog still hasn’t looked at the discovery dumps. Gotta love it when the ignorant spout ( mmmm wonder what word will get by the moderation?)
“Other news sources state that the adult girl was 18, that she was first found by Trayvon Martins family lawyer and talked with him first.”
True statement: Attorney Crump, attorney for Trayvon’s family in anticipation of a civil suit, found DeeDee.
“She lied about her age to the cops, saying she was 16. Thus this adult (18 Up and Out since the 26th Amendment to the Constitution) is not a kid and her name can be revealed.”
It’s not clear how her age was revealed. The newspapers may have made an estimate (guess). DeeDee NEVER spoke to the cops. There is a recorded interview that she did with attorney Crump and another that she did with ADA de la Rionda. In neither interview do they ask for her age. There is no police report of an interview.
All witnesses except those who have given interviews have had their names redacted in all documents and recordings per court order. If I were listed as a witness in a homicide case I’d want my identity protected, too.
“Why did she lie about her age?” What is your evidence?
“And the hospital crap?” Previously addressed.
“If she lied about those two things the rest is a lie. Liar, liar, your pants are on fire. There are no witnesses to the so called crime unless it is the one who says that dead hoodie guy was on top of Z and pounding his head in the ground.”
John is the guy who made that statement the night of the killing. He has since withdrawn that statement. He lied in his initial statement and makes it clear in a subsequent statement that he didn’t see what he says he saw.
“…. Why he [Crump] was there instead of telling the cops where she was and who she was. Put his motive on the case to the jury….”
The DA had already said no charges were to be filed against the killer. Crump was gathering evidence for a civil wrongful death suit.
Barkindog: “If the State puts on the liar then ya got the big issue before the jury about the liar and the fact that she spoke with fat guy lawyer fro mommy and daddy. If the state puts on liar adult female age 18 plus, I would put on the lawyer for the family and make him say what he has revealed thathe has said to the liar.”
******
Then by your logic Barkindog putting Zimmerman on the stand should allow the prosecution to put Z’s lawyer on the stand to find out if he or his team helped Z and his wife hide that 200k which constituted perjury. Srsly, that’s a lot of fraud for just plain folks to get into without professional help. It all goes to credibility doesn’t it? If Z lied about the money then everything else he said is also a lie is it not, as you state about the girl’s testimony? Just say’n.
That a major lack of logic is at work in my above statement is just getting with the program, which seems to have a lot of BS and hyperbole built in. This latest over-hyped revelation in the case is foolish IMO. But that’s just me and I was a cradle Catholic, we believed in venal and mortal sins- age and funeral no-show is venal; 200k hidden away to get low bail is mortal. Actually, the whole move by Z’s atty to demonize the witness on such slight grounds kinda reeks of desperation.
My understanding is that they can still use the “Stand Your Ground” defense at some point down the road. I don’t recall the source. – Anonymously yours.
A self-defense hearing is to be held at least 45 days before trial in order to provide time for an appeal if necessary. The defense has suggested that they “roll it” into the trial. I’m not sure how that would go since there apparently is no precedent.
So her name is Dee Dee? And she stepped in Doo Doo? And some prosecutor is calling her as a witness?