Hal Uhrig
A new lawyer for George Zimmerman says his current role is defending his client's reputation while everyone awaits the decision of the special prosecutor in the Trayvon Martin slaying. Zimmerman has hired media savvy Hal Uhrig, former police officer, former Florida assistant attorney general and commentator on local Fox News stations to handle his defense if he is charged in the shooting. At the same time, Joe Oliver, the guy who unconvincingly said he was Zimmerman's friend in several media interviews, has been jettisoned as "media consultant." Uhrig
said in an interview with WPTV that the shooting had nothing to do with the unarmed 17-year-old's being black:
"It's because that 6-foot-3 young man made a terrible decision and a bad judgment when he decided to smack somebody in the face and break their nose, jump on them and smack their head into the ground, and in doing that, put him in reasonable fear for his safety," Uhrig said. "He was absolutely entitled to defend himself and that's why Trayvon Martin is dead, not because of racial profiling."
In a subsequent
interview conducted by NBC's Kerry Sanders and posted at the website of NBC-affiliated theGrio, Uhrig expanded on his views. Once the facts become known, he said, his client's behavior in the shooting will be seen as reasonable:
[Sanders:] In addition to the broken nose and the lacerations that you suggest, if the police followed protocol, and you are a former police officer, in the 7 hour[s 50 minutes] investigation they did, they would have [found] blood splatter[ed] on his shirt.
[Uhrig:] Not necessarily.
[Sanders:] Could be microscopic depending on proximity, so the question is how close was George Zimmerman to...
[Uhrig:] You're going to find, the two of them were closely engaged. It was a basic point blank shot, but there's going to be evidence that the police have, and they don't do their investigation by sharing it with you and I and having a crowd vote on what they think about it as it goes along. They'll do an entire investigation. Now the Florida Department of Law Enforcement -- [a] very well resourced, credible law enforcement agency -- has taken over a lot of the responsibility for that. The special prosecutor is investigating as though it's a brand new start from the beginning. It's going to be very, very thoroughly vetted and investigated and at that point in time a very well respected prosecutor is going to make a determination as to what they take to the grand jury. And whatever comes out is whatever is going to come out. [...]
[Sanders:] And that evidence, the trace evidence, the forensic evidence you believe it covers...
[Uhrig:] I believe everything that you're going to find that comes out from a forensic standpoint or a witness standpoint is going to be consistent with the explanation given by George Zimmerman and the way the law is written in Florida and about 23 other states, if you are in fear for imminent injury, and when you're getting your head slammed in the ground after your nose has been broken that's a pretty good reason to have fear of imminent injury -- then you are entitled to use force including deadly force to protect yourself.
[Sanders:] And you are suggesting that's exactly what happened here?
[Uhrig:] That's exactly what happened. [...]
[Sanders:] I'm listening to what you're saying and I hear you without saying it—that you are prepared because you have an indication that there are going to be charges.
[Uhrig:] I'm not saying any such thing. I'm not confident, but I am very hopeful there will not be any charges. I'm never confident one way or the other. The grand jury is going to do what the grand jury is going to do. If there are charges, we will successfully defend them. If there are not, then justice will be done a little earlier.
Meanwhile, Final Call has an
interview with Tracy Martin, Trayvon's father:
FCN: There is now an onslaught of articles circulating online attempting to smear the character of Trayvon. What was your son really like? Do you think this is a tactic to detour people from focusing on the real issues related to this case?
TM: I love my son and he was a wonderful gift just like any child is a gift to any other father. We know in this world you have those who play checkerboard tactics to pit the good versus the bad. But I as a father will not standby and allow them to smear his character. I will stand tall on his name.
What is the significance of them attempting to smear my son’s image? They want to accuse him of doing certain things when the focus should be on the fact that my son was murdered by Zimmerman. These are political games but our son’s death is serious. What many in the press choose to deal with in terms of that smear campaign is irrelevant to the crime committed by Zimmerman. My question to them is out of all of the accusations they are making against Trayvon’s character was he doing any of that the night he was killed? Was he doing anything wrong the night that Zimmerman murdered him? And the answer is no. We will not be detoured from the fight for justice regardless of what some in the media may say. We’re standing up for Trayvon.
Circumstantial evidence is pointing to the strong possibility that charges will be filed against Zimmerman in the coming days. That includes the fact that the family is getting a legal team together and a website has been set up for a defense fund.
Stories of Interest:
• Zimmerman's evolving story (theGrio)
• A look at what happened the night Trayvon Martin died (Tampa Bay Times)
• Problems for Zimmerman's defense team (MSNBC—Larry O'Donnell)
• Trayvon Martin Cartoonist: Texas Students Petition To Reinstate Stephanie Eisner At Campus Newspaper (The Huffington Post)
• Terry Jones, Quran-burning pastor, reportedly headed to Sanford in support of Zimmerman (theGrio)
• Zimmerman's family says he protested police coddling of white suspect (Orlando Sentinel)
• Sen. Durbin to Hold Hearing on Racial Profiling in America (ACLU Blog)