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George Zimmerman Trial Tag

Once again, it was simply not a very good day at all for the prosecution. The primary State witnesses today were Rachel Jeantel, Jenna Lauer, and Selma Mora. The first had her credibility substantively destroyed, the second was powerfully--almost humiliatingly--co-opted by the defense, and the third provided testimony entirely consistent with the defense's theory of lawful self-defense. There was also some (I expect temporary) hubbub that O'Mara may have inadvertently opened the door to allow the State to introduce evidence of specific prior bad acts by George Zimmerman, and I address that in detail, as well, below. [caption id="attachment_56868" align="alignnone" width="560"]Screen Shot 2013-06-27 at 1.46.41 PM Rachel Jeantel, State witness[/caption] With that said, let's get to it:

Rachel Jeantel, Star "Ear"-Witness of the State

Much of the day was consumed in West's continuing cross-examination of Rachel Jeantel, the State's star "ear-witness." She was purportedly on the phone with Martin up to the final moments of his confrontation with Zimmerman, and has over time come to claim an increasing amount of knowledge of the details of that confrontation. It has become common knowledge that Jeantel has perpetrated a number of lies on this case, both under oath and otherwise, and West made certain to touch on each of these, albeit with a relatively light hand. She lied about her age--she was 18-years-old not 16-years-old at the time, she lied about why she did not attend Martin's funeral or wake, she lied about her name to Martin's mother and others, and so on. For many of these lies she offered a relatively innocuous excuse--she didn't go the funeral because she doesn't like to see dead bodies, for example. But the sheer number and variety of them cast Jeantel as someone who was perfectly comfortable creating a fabrication if it served her convenience or purposes. What most damaged her credibility, however, was not West's exposure of these numerous falsehoods. Instead, West took a far more clever approach to his cross-examination of Jeantel. Many legal (and non-legal) pundits had wondered how West would walk the fine line of impeaching Jeantel's testimony without overreaching and causing the jury to become empathetic to the poor young woman in a difficult situation not of her making.

Hey folks, We're trying something different for today's mid-day update. Rather than write a bunch of text, I've imbedded below some of the more key tweets I've made over the course of the morning. (This has the benefit of giving me a few minutes to each some lunch.) Hopefully, the tweets below will give you a sense for how West's cross-examination of Rachel Jeantel has gone so far this morning. We'll have a detailed analysis, of course, in this evening's end-of-day wrap-up post. Enjoy, and be sure to check back in to our live coverage page at 1:14PM (EST), here: Zimmerman Trial LIVE VIDEO – Day 4 – State’s Witnesses https://twitter.com/LawSelfDefense/status/350240679101861888 https://twitter.com/LawSelfDefense/status/350241151351144448 https://twitter.com/LawSelfDefense/status/350241932192129025 https://twitter.com/LawSelfDefense/status/350244762567196672 https://twitter.com/LawSelfDefense/status/350255988445687809

Today we will again be covering the Zimmerman Trial live, all day, with streaming video. Continuing commentary will be posted in the Twitter feed of selected contributors below the first video feed, and breaking news will be added at the bottom of this post. During...

At the start of day two things of note occurred. First, the Court ruled that Zimmerman's prior calls to police would be admissible as evidence. (Accordingly, later in the day Ramona Rumph returned to Court to testify as to their authenticity.) https://twitter.com/LawSelfDefense/status/349875159211061248 Second,...

Today we will again be covering the Zimmerman Trial live, all day, with streaming video. Continuing commentary will be posted in the Twitter feed of selected contributors below the first video feed, and breaking news will be added at the bottom of this post. We're...

Today can only be characterized as an utter debacle for the prosecution in Florida v. Zimmerman. Besides the testimony of a couple of highly professional law enforcement witnesses, the testimony of the the other State witnesses ranged from signing George Zimmerman's praises, to acknowledging the...

Today we will again be covering the Zimmerman Trial live, all day, with streaming video. Continuing commentary will be posted in the Twitter feed of selected contributors below the first video feed, and breaking news will be added at the bottom of this post. Also,...

Today marked the first day of the trial proper of Florida v. Zimmerman, and accordingly was the first opportunity for each side to present their “theory of the case” to the jury.   This day covered both the party's opening statements, as well as the first...

Today we will again be covering the Zimmerman Trial live, all day. Continuing commentary will be posted in the Twitter feed of selected contributors below the first video feed, and breaking news will be added at the bottom of this post. Also, at day's end...

In-depth profiles of the 6 jurors and 4 alternates, how they answered questions during voir dire, and what we know about them....

The race issue in the George Zimmerman shooting of Trayvon Martin has been pushed early and often. We've covered the false accusations that Zimmerman called Trayvon Martin a "coon" on the initial 911 call, and that Zimmerman suggested that Martin was suspicious because black (that was an...

The jurors are now selected in State of Florida v. George Zimmerman and opening statements are scheduled for Monday. Today was a 'wrap up' day, to resolve as any lingering issues that Judge Nelson hadn't yet decided, and do general housekeeping in preparation for the trial. Since...

The final jury was selected the Zimmerman trial today, consisting of 6 women jurors and 4 alternate jurors.  For those following along with the juror ID numbers, the jurors selected are:  B29, B76, B37, B51, E6, E40. Tomorrow we will have an in-depth analysis for each...