Trayvon Case Investigation

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Waterboy said:
... $200,000 would be plenty of money to get to Peru where he has relatives.
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He could have fled the country instead of turning himself in to the police. He did not do that.

Also, the court has his passport.
 
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Waterboy said:
VacationGuy234 said:
By claiming that you are just a poor indignant family that spent all their money seeking justice when, in fact, there are millions of dollars in donations. I'm not saying they don't deserve the donations. All is fair in love, law and war!
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Indignant, or indigent? Neither one has much to do with a civil suit, though.
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Forgive my spelling as there is no spell check on my phone, yes, the jury decides damages in civil suits so it makes a difference.
 
TXgolfer said:
Not if it was a "defense fund". Depends on how the account was set up.

Not sure there was a lie. Again it's best to wait for all of the facts
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Not a defense fund. Website said to cover his expenses because he couldn't work. Money was said up to go directly to him. Wasn't in a trust for defense.
 
VacationGuy234 said:
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Forgive my spelling as there is no spell check on my phone, yes, the jury decides damages in civil suits so it makes a difference.
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Which one did you mean? Jury decides damages based on loss. Loss of life. How do you put a money amount on that? Kid was only 17. That is a lot of future to loose. Doesn't matter what his family's financial situation is. They don't legal expenses. That is what the prosecutors are for.
 
Foxrac said:
George Zimmerman isn't allowed to travel outside of USA and he had to surrendered his passport.
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True. But if the judge had known that he had over 200,000 he could easily put his hands on, he might not have let him out on bail, or made the bail a whole lot higher.
 
Reba said:
He could have fled the country instead of turning himself in to the police. He did not do that.

Also, the court has his passport.
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yes he could have fled the country but he would not last long. fleeing a country requires money and family members living oversea willing to aid and abet a fugitive and murderer in a country with possible extradition treaty.

he had no money. now with $200,000+.... it's a serious concern. he must have hoped that Prosecutor Corey would not charge him with murder in 2nd degree and now he is.
 
Jiro said:
yes he could have fled the country but he would not last long. fleeing a country requires money and family members living oversea willing to aid and abet a fugitive and murderer in a country with possible extradition treaty.

he had no money. now with $200,000+.... it's a serious concern. he must have hoped that Prosecutor Corey would not charge him with murder in 2nd degree and now he is.
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His mother has family in Peru.
 
Judge delays decision on Zimmerman contributions - CNN.com
Prosecutors asked that Zimmerman's bond be increased after learning of $204,000 in donations made to him.
(CNN) -- George Zimmerman, the neighborhood watch volunteer accused of wrongly killing Trayvon Martin, will not immediately have to turn over donations made to his website, a Florida judge said Friday.

Zimmerman collected about $204,000 in donations through the website, but did not disclose the contributions during his bond hearing last week, according to his attorney, Mark O'Mara. Prosecutors had asked for a bond of $1 million, but Judge Kenneth Lester Jr. made it $150,000 after Zimmerman's family testified they did not have the resources necessary to meet the higher level.

Assistant State Attorney Bernie de la Rionda on Friday asked Lester to increase the bond in light of the donations. But the judge said he would delay ruling on the request, in part because he does not know if he has authority to say how the money can be used.

Lester and O'Mara both said they are concerned about releasing the names of donors to Zimmerman, who has faced threats since the case began making national headlines in March.

Zimmerman, 28, was released Monday on $150,000 bail, 10% of which was put up to secure his release while he awaits trial on a second-degree murder charge in Martin's February 26 death.

About $5,000 from the website contribution was used in making bond, O'Mara said. The rest came from a loan secured by a family home.

Although Zimmerman spent some of the contributions on living expenses, about $150,000 remains, O'Mara said Friday. O'Mara said he has put the money into a trust he controls until a final decision is made about its use.

Lester asked for additional information about the accounts but did not indicate when he would rule.

"I'm not going to make a snap decision," the judge said.

Also during Friday's hearing, Lester declined to consider a gag order requested by prosecutors, saying it was premature and that none of the attorneys in the case had said anything to concern him so far. CNN was among the media organizations opposing the motion.

O'Mara said he learned about the money this week as he and Zimmerman were trying to shut down Zimmerman's website, Facebook page and Twitter account to avoid concerns about possible impersonators and other problems.

"He asked me what to do with his PayPal accounts, and I asked him what he was talking about," O'Mara told CNN's Anderson Cooper on Thursday. "He said those were the accounts that had the money from the website he had. And there was about ... $204,000 that had come in to date."

O'Mara had said earlier this month that he believed Zimmerman had no money.

Asked whether knowledge of the money might have made a difference to Lester, who presided at Zimmerman's bond hearing, O'Mara said, "It might have."

O'Mara could not explain why Zimmerman didn't disclose the funds, but said he didn't think his client had meant to deceive anyone.

"I consider it an oversight because I don't see anything else that suggests that Mr. Zimmerman has been insincere or dishonest," he told CNN's Erin Burnett on Friday. "The moment I asked him about it, he acknowledged it and forwarded the money."

Martin family attorney Benjamin Crump said Zimmerman's failure to reveal that he had the money shows that he is being dishonest.

"If his testimony at the bond hearing is any indication of what is to come, then the lying has already begun," Crump said.

"This is going to say a lot about whether Trayvon Martin can get a fair trial," he told Burnett. "If he (Lester) doesn't revoke his bond, the court should severely sanction him so George Zimmerman understands you cannot lie to the court."

Separately, the attorney said the Martin family has raised less than $100,000 in fund-raising efforts to date, and that the money collected will go toward the Trayvon Martin Foundation.

Crump said his firm will not collect a fee in any of the criminal proceedings.

"If we collect any money, it will be from a civil lawsuit and not from any donor money," he said.

Zimmerman was arrested April 11 after a lengthy delay punctuated by protests and rallies nationwide calling for charges against him.

Critics accuse Zimmerman of racially profiling and unjustly killing Martin, a 17-year-old African-American. Zimmerman told police he shot Martin in self-defense, according to police reports.

Although details of the shooting remain murky, it is known that Martin ventured out from the Sanford, Florida, home of his father's fiancee and went to a nearby convenience store, where he bought a bag of candy and an iced tea. On his way back, he had a confrontation with Zimmerman, who shot him.

Zimmerman had called 911 to complain about a suspicious person in the neighborhood, according to authorities.

In the call, Zimmerman said he was following Martin after the teen started to run, prompting the dispatcher to tell him, "We don't need you to do that." Zimmerman pursued Martin anyway but then said he lost sight of him.

According to an Orlando Sentinel story later confirmed by Sanford police, Zimmerman told authorities that after he briefly lost track of Martin, the teen approached him. After the two exchanged words, Zimmerman said, he reached for his cell phone, and then Martin punched him in the nose. Zimmerman said Martin pinned him to the ground and began slamming his head onto the sidewalk, leading to the shooting.

Police have said Zimmerman was not immediately charged because there was no evidence to disprove his account that he'd acted in self-defense. A police report indicated he was bleeding from the nose and the back of his head.

O'Mara on Friday revealed a new website, Home, and another site, not yet live, that will host a defense fund. The only thing on the site Friday afternoon was a statement about the donations.

Regardless of what happens to the contributions, O'Mara intends to open a legal defense fund for his client, he said.

"I've had dozens, hundreds actually, of people wanting to donate," he said Thursday.

O'Mara, who said he charges $400 per hour for family law cases, estimated Zimmerman's defense costs could reach $1 million.

"You can really go through a lot of money on a case like this, with the intensity of it," he said.
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Waterboy said:
When the paypal funds were sent to his account, it became his money. No technically about it. The donations were made directly to him.

He lied to the court about his financial status. He claimed no income and no assets. Can't be indigent and have $204,000 in an account. And his indigent claim was used to argue for lower bail. Looks like he put his attorney in a bad spot, too. I don't think his attorney was too happy about having to go into court and admit to the judge that his client had lied about being indigent. $200,000 would be plenty of money to get to Peru where he has relatives.
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The lawyer has only himself to blame as he did not do a good job in getting all the facts from his client .
 
whatdidyousay! said:
The lawyer has only himself to blame as he did not do a good job in getting all the facts from his client .
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You have a point. He should have questioned Zimerman a little closer, probably. But Zimmerman still signed a sworn statement that he was indigent. His lawyer believed him.
 
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Waterboy said:
VacationGuy234 said:
By claiming that you are just a poor indignant family that spent all their money seeking justice when, in fact, there are millions of dollars in donations. I'm not saying they don't deserve the donations. All is fair in love, law and war!
Click to expand...

Indignant, or indigent? Neither one has much to do with a civil suit, though.
Click to expand...

Forgive my spelling as there is no spell check on my phone, yes, the jury decides damages in civil suits so it makes a difference.
 
VacationGuy234 said:
Wirelessly posted



Forgive my spelling as there is no spell check on my phone, yes, the jury decides damages in civil suits so it makes a difference.
Click to expand...

You still haven't said if you meant indigant or indigent. I don't know which word you meant to use.

No, awards are not based on the family's financial status. The awards are based on loss. A family could be really rich and still get a civil award of a million or more bucks based on the loss they suffered at the hands of someone else.

http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Civil+Procedure
But this case hasn't even had a civil suit filed.
 
Waterboy said:
He lied to the court about his financial status. He claimed no income and no assets.
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Waterboy said:
Zimmerman still signed a sworn statement that he was indigent.
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I couldn't find those informations in news report. Looks like you are the only one saying it. Is that your opinion or a fact? If it's a fact, leave a link to convince us.

What's more, I don't think it doesn't matter how poor or rich an alleged murderer is, only a judge decides the amount. There were many murder cases in which alleged murderers were poor and the judges still set the bond $1 million.
 
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