Zimmerman Trial LIVE – Final pre-trial motions and proceedings
Update — Court rules on whether State can use terms like “profiling” “wannabe cop” “vigilante”
Today there are several pretrial motions and proceedings scheduled.
But the big event is the judge’s ruling on the Frye hearing as to whether the State’s audio experts will be allowed to testify as to the screams on a 911 Tape. That ruling may be in a written order or given by the Judge from the bench. We will have a separate post when that ruling is made. [Update — Judge indicates she’s still working on the Frye Order and it will come later today or over the weekend.]
This weekend I will post a separate wrap-up discussing what happened and implications for the case moving forward. Thanks for joining us! Check out our Day 9 end-of-day wrap-up discussing the final jury selection and the insights the voir dire process suggests into each side’s trial strategy. To see all of Legal Insurrection’s recent coverage of State of Florida v. Zimmerman, take a look at our previous posts.
For more on this issue, see below the Twitter feed on this post.
WITH COMMENTARY FROM CHANNEL 9 IN SANFORD
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[For live-stream video without commentary, see NBC live feed at bottom of this post.]
Twitter Feed:
(My tweets can be identified as coming from @lawselfdefense.)
Tweets from @LegInsurrection/zimmerman-trial
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LIVE-STREAM WITHOUT COMMENTARY FROM NBC
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Friday, June 21: Frye-hearing Ruling Anticipated Today
The Frye standard requires that an expert’s methodology be generally accepted, and not new or novel, within relevant scientific community. The court has been conducting a Frye hearing on Witness #11 911 screams over the last several weeks. The relevant portion of that recording can be heard here:
In addition to testimony by the State’s two witnesses, testimony was heard by four defense expert witnesses. We previously covered the testimony of both State and defense experts in detail:
Zimmerman Trial: Frye Hearing Continues with Prof. James L. Wayman.
Defense expert Dr. James L. Wayman
Zimmerman Case: Experts Call State’s Scream Claims “Absurd” “Ridiculous” and “Imaginary Stuff”
Defense expert Dr. George Doddington
Zimmerman Prosecution’s Voice Expert admits: “This is not really good evidence”
Mr. Tom Owens, State’s expert witness
Zimmerman Case: Dr. Hirotaka Nakasone, FBI, and the low-quality 3-second audio file
Defense expert Dr. Hirotaka Nakasone, FBI
This issue is important to the case because the State believes that it is Trayvon Martin screaming in the background of the Witness #11 911 recording, suggesting that Martin was a victim of an act of aggression committed by Zimmerman. If believed, such a finding could profoundly undermine Zimmerman’s claims of having killed Martin in self defense. The State’s experts claim to have at least tentatively identified the recorded scream as that of Martin.
The defense experts, on the other hand, have adamantly contested any claim that it is possible to identify a person from a scream made in extremis, nor to exclude such an identification on the same basis.
Update: Some rulings by the Court on what the prosecution can say in opening statements:
"Profiled" "Vigilante" "Self-appointed neighborhood watch captain" "Wannabe cop" some of the terms… #Zimmerman
— Natalie Tolomeo (@NatalieTolomeo) June 21, 2013
Judge Nelson says YES, state can use all terms in opening statements EXCEPT "racial profiling" #Zimmerman
— Natalie Tolomeo (@NatalieTolomeo) June 21, 2013
Nelson: Profiling (not racial profiling), vigilante ok if state wants to say that. Wannabe cop too. #GeorgeZimemrman #TrayvonMartin
— Jeff Weiner (@JeffWeinerOS) June 21, 2013
Judge: prosecutors may say #Zimmerman profiled #Trayvon but not that he racially profiled him.
— Rene Stutzman (@renestutzman) June 21, 2013
The State also acknowledged that Zimmerman was out of the car when the 911 operator told him that they didn’t need him to follow Trayvon Martin — which debunks a common accusation that if Zimmerman had not gotten out of the car when told not to do so, this would not have happened.
State acknowledges #Zimmerman already out of car when 911 said "don't need you to" follow #trayvon
— Legal Insurrection (@LegInsurrection) June 21, 2013
Judge also is working on the Frye decision, which will be released in writing probably later today:
Judge Nelson's Frye order will apparently be in writing. Hopes to finish it today. #GeorgeZimmerman #TrayvonMartin
— Jeff Weiner (@JeffWeinerOS) June 21, 2013
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Comments
Every ruling by the Court is an invitation to error on the record, conditioning an appeal.
So…..nothing in Trademark’s record of very negative behaviors is to be allowed, but the State will be allowed to name-call the defendant. The judge’s position seems to be to keep out real facts but let in as much unfounded, biased rhetoric from the State as possible.
Allowing usage of the terms “profiled” and “profiling” is no different than allowing “racial profiling” and “racially profiled” because the interpretation/presumption of “profiling” will be that it was “racial profiling” because that is the common usage and interpretation.
I will not be surprised to see this clearly biased judge craft some order that allows the State to present the voice “evidence” from their “expert”, Owens the snakeoil salesman, while placing some easily avoided, meaninngless restriction on it, just to make herself appear “fair”.
What happened to last nights wrap up, Andrew? I read it last night and thought it excellent. Now it has seemed to have disappeared. What’s up?