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Live Coverage of the Zimmerman Trial

Aired July 12, 2013 - 12:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

MARK O'MARA, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Likely because it's self-defense. This was a 50/50 I wouldn't -- wouldn't vote self-defense. This was a civil trial. Highly unlikely that it's self-defense, but I have a reasonable doubt as to whether or not it's self-defense. Not guilty.

The state has proven to me, to you, beyond and to the exclusion of every reasonable doubt that he acted in self-defense properly. I have no doubt, no reasonable doubt, that the state has convinced me he didn't act in self-defense the way he should have, then he's guilty.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: CNN legal analyst Paul Callan, what's reasonable to me or you or the next person may not be reasonable to another person.

PAUL CALLAN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Absolutely. And, you know, Mark O'Mara tries to make it look like reasonable doubt is Mt. Everest and that it's a mountain which can't be climbed. He makes it so hard with all of these points saying to the jury, you'll find reasonable doubt here, here and here.

And we know from trying cases that jurors get by reasonable doubt very, very easily. They step back and they look at the big picture, what happened here? Why did it happen? Did it have to happen?

And one of the things that I'm -- you know, I think he's -- he's like a skilled carpenter and, you know, he's building the structure of reasonable doubt. He's not doing the rhetorical flourishes. It's not a grand speech about innocence. It's more of a carpenter at work and he's hoping the jury will latch on to something.

What I thought it missed in some respects was an adequate explanation as to why Trayvon Martin had to die. I didn't see a real -- because I suspect these jurors are going to be saying, you know, did he really have to kill this 17-year-old adolescent? I mean couldn't he have just pointed the gun at him and said, hey, back off? It didn't get into the nitty gritty that I think --

LEMON: But you don't think that -- you don't think the --

CALLAN: The jurors are going to be really looking at that.

LEMON: You don't think the animation and the props, you know, with the concrete and the things that shows the size of Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman, the cutouts, you don't think that that had any effect on the jury at all, Paul?

CALLAN: Oh, I -- oh, I think it had a big effect. And I think, frankly, prosecutors got a very weak case here. You know, most people probably -- most lawyers looking at it think defense is winning. But when I talk to people about the case, especially when I talk to women about the case, they, you know, and mothers, they all come back to this, you know, really, did he have to kill him? I mean couldn't -- couldn't he have pointed the gun at him and said back off and -- I would have like to have seen him dealing with that issue because if I'm defending this case, that's the thing I'm going to worry about, one of those mothers back there saying, yes, he was acting in self- defense, but it was disproportionate force. He brought a gun to a fist fight. Did he really have to kill him? And that's the thing you've got to grapple with as a defense attorney if you're summing up in this case.

LEMON: OK. It looks like the judge is coming back in. Court is going to be back in session now. Back on the record. We'll be back. Let's listen.

JUDGE DEBRA NELSON: Defense ready?

O'MARA: Thank you, your honor. Yes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE), your honor.

NELSON: Please be seated.

Mr. Guy, you may proceed.

JOHN GUY, PROSECUTOR: Thanks (ph).

May it please the court, counsel, good afternoon.

The human heart, it has a great many functions, but is not the most important purpose what it causes us to do? It moves us, it motivates us, it inspires us, it leads us, and it guides us. Our hearts. In big things, like what we choose to do for a living, and in little things, like what we do every day at any moment of the day.

So if we really want to know what happened out there behind those homes on that dark, rainy night, should we not look into the heart of the grown man and the heart of that child. What will that tell us about what really happened out there.

That's what was in George Zimmerman's heart and the defense attorney can make fun of the way I say it, but it's not my voice that matters. It's yours. And we're about to hear from you. What does that say to you? Was he just casually referring to a perfect stranger by saying f- ing punks? That doesn't evidence to you anything? That's normal language? Or is that not what was in that defendant's heart when he approached Trayvon Martin? What does that tell you?

It's funny, he put on a time line that was 10 feet long and the only thing he skipped was those two words at the bottom of the screen. That was the only thing. You think there was a reason for that? I think the reason he didn't want you to think about that again, how powerful that is, what that defendant was really feeling just moments before he pulled the trigger. Think that was a coincidence?

What was in Trayvon Martin's heart? Was it not fear that Miss Jeantel told you about? The witness who didn't want to be here. The witness who didn't want to be involved. But the witness, the human being that was on the phone with the real victim in this case, Trayvon Martin, right up until the time of his death. Was that child not in fear when he was running from that defendant? Isn't that every child's worst nightmare to be followed on the way home in the dark by a stranger? Isn't that every child's worse fear? That was Trayvon Martin's last emotion.

There's an old saying, a great one though, as a man speaks, so is he. The words on the screen were the last thing these people said before Trayvon Martin was murdered. Before this defendant had a motivation to lie, to justify his actions, what were his words? What was in his heart?

If ever, if ever there was a window into a man's soul, it was the words from that defendant's mouth on that phone call. And if ever there was a question about who initiated the contact between that grown man and that child, it was again those defendant's words when he told Sean Noffke (ph), just have the officer call me on my cell phone and I'll tell him where I am.

George Zimmerman was not going back to the car or the clubhouse or the mailboxes. And if there was ever any doubt about what happened, really happened, was it not completely removed by what the defendant said afterwards. All of the lies he told. All of them. What does that tell you?

There's only two people on this earth who know what really happened, and one of them can't testify and the other one lied. Not about little things like his age or whether or not he went to the hospital, but about the things that really, truly matter. And not one lie. Over and over and over again. What does that tell you about what really happened out there? Why did he have to lie if he had done nothing wrong?

The bottom line is, the bottom line, think about this, if that defendant had done only what he was supposed to do, see and call, none of us would be here. None of us. But that's not who he was. That's not where he was that night in his heart after months of these people getting away. Not tonight. Not this one. Not that guy. That's why he got out of the car. If he really wanted the police to get Trayvon Martin, what would he have done? He would have stayed in his car and driven to the back gate where he had told them so many times they always go through the back gate and he would have waited for the police. But that's not what he had in his heart. Trayvon Martin may not have the defendant's blood on his hands, but George Zimmerman will forever have Trayvon Martin's blood on his forever.

I'm going to give you one more old saying. Maybe the most important one you're going to hear. And that is, to the living, we owe respect. But to the dead, we owe the truth. On behalf of the state of Florida, I submit to you that Trayvon Benjamin Martin is entitled to the truth, and it didn't come from the defendant's mouth. It didn't. He told so many lies. That's why we're here. By the end of the night, that is what was in Trayvon Martin's heart.

The defense attorney said, what evidence is there that the defendant followed Trayvon Martin after he said OK? He challenged the state. Well, I've got an answer. What happened after 19:13:43 when that defendant hung up with Sean Noffke? And 19:15:44 when Rachel Jeantel heard the thump and the end of Trayvon Martin's life?

The defense attorney gave us a nice demonstration of what happens in four minutes. Well, what was that defendant doing for those two minutes?

Watch the walk through again. Watch it. He tells you exactly where he hung up. He's walking back in the direction of the T and he says, I got off the phone and I continued to my car. Maybe, maybe 10 seconds before he got to the T.

It was two minutes. Two minutes. He wasn't going back to his car. Four minutes is not the amount of time that Trayvon Martin had to run home. Four minutes is the amount of time that Trayvon Martin had left on this earth.

I don't have any audio clips for you or video clips or charts or big long 10-foot long timelines. I'm asking you to use your common sense. Use your heart. Use what you know is real. Use what you know you've heard and the law in this case.

For the defendant, it's kind of like they're little animation, the cartoon that they put up. Everything they want you to think in this case starts from the T just like their little animation starts from the T.

Don't do that. That's not fair. That's not fair. It would be like reading the end of the book, the last chapter only and you'd be asking yourself, why are we here? How did we get here? Who are these people? You can't do that in real life and you shouldn't do it here.

Let me suggest to you, you start at the beginning. Let's start at the 7-Eleven where that child had every right to be where he was. That child had every right to do what he was doing, walking home. That child had every right to be afraid of a strange man following him first in his car and then on foot.

And did that child not have the right to defend himself from that strange man? Did Trayvon Martin not also have that right?

I don't have all the fireworks, all the animation, but come back with me. Walk back to me with that scene where it happened that night.

Come back with me and bring with you your God-given common sense, the common sense that tells you it's the person talking like the defendant who had hate in his heart not the boy walking home talking to the girl in Miami -- wow -- the common sense that tells you if Trayvon Martin had been mounted on the defendant as the defendant claims when the defendant went to get his gun, he never could have got it.

I don't have to pull out that mannequin again and sit on it. You remember. If you have to, do it in the jury room. If he was up on his waist, his waist is covered by Trayvon Martin's legs. He couldn't have got the gun. He couldn't have.

They wanted a reason. It's a physical impossibility. He couldn't have grabbed it. The only way that defendant gets to his gun, the only way Trayvon Martin was getting off of him or he had backed up so far on his legs that he couldn't hit him. He couldn't touch him.

The defendant didn't shoot Trayvon Martin because he had to. He shot him because he wanted to. That's the bottom line.

The common sense that tells you if Trayvon Martin had already run off like he claimed in his interviews, why would he go through the end of the T to get an address, if he had already run off?

Does that make any sense? Of course not. It's self-serving. It's justification. It's false.

The yelling? Listen, listen to that tape again. Listen to when the screaming stops at the instant of the gunshot, silence, nothing.

If that defendant thought he missed Trayvon Martin, thought Trayvon Martin was still alive so much so that he had to get on his back, flip him over, spread his arms out, why would he stop yelling for help. Why, if he was in fear?

Does that make any sense? Of course not.

If he was yelling that loud and that long, would he have sounded the way he sounded on the recordings that you have? He wouldn't have been hoarse? He wouldn't have had a strained voice if that was him yelling? Really?

That's why common sense is so important. This isn't a complicated case. It's a common sense case.

And it's not a case about self-defense. It's a case about self- denial, George Zimmerman's.

The common sense that tells you, if he was the Neighborhood Watch coordinator, not anyone, the coordinator, who had lived there for four years, he'd know the name of Twin Trees Lane.

The common sense that tells you, if he was so afraid of the real suspicious guy with his hands in his waistband, he'd have never have got out of the car.

But that's not what happened.

The common sense that tells you, if he really was soft, didn't know how to fight, in his own words, he wouldn't have been able to get wrist control of Trayvon Martin. Those were his words. He wouldn't have been able to move his hand off his mouth or off his gun? If Trayvon Martin was putting on such a blow. that little plastic, flimsy, kids-watch on his wrist, it wouldn't have come off? It didn't.

The common sense that tells you, if Trayvon Martin was the one on the hunt, would he still have been on his cell phone? Would the ear buds still have been in his ears if he was getting ready to attack somebody? Really?

And the most important one of all, the common sense that tells you in your every day life, really, if he hadn't committed a crime, why did he lie so many times? Why did he lie?

Let me remind you, Sean Noffke told me to get an address. That didn't happen. Listen to the tapes, listen to the walkthrough, and listen to the non-emergency call. Sean Noffke never said that.

I told the police I was going to meet them at my car. That's not what he told them. Why? Why lie about that? It's so important, that's why. Because he wasn't going back to the car. He was going back to Trayvon Martin, just like he said on that tape when he slipped up.

Just like he lied about when he was confronted. It wasn't 10 seconds afterwards. It was two minutes.

Trayvon Martin covered his mouth and nose. Really? They want you to believe the blood was washed off by incompetent medical examiners. But yet he told the police -- not just the police, his best friend, remember his best friend in the world -- that Trayvon Martin was squeezing his nose.

Do you really think if that were true, there wouldn't be George Zimmerman's blood on these sticks that they pried under his fingernails? Do you really think that true? That was a lie.

Concrete? You're kidding me. It's heavy. It's hard. If his head had been slammed into something like this, slammed, bashed over and over, he wouldn't look like he did in those photographs. Think about it. That would be it?

Dozens of times, he said, dozens of times punches in the face. That would be it? Was he injured? Yes. Was he injured seriously? Not close. Not close.

I mean, they can call their expert and show them all the pictures of the lumps on his head. Were any of those serious? Didn't Trayvon Martin have a right to defend himself too?

Remember Lindsay Folgate? He didn't have so much as a headache the next morning, not nausea, not vomiting, not a headache. And he didn't come to see me for treatment. He came for a note for work. It wasn't that bad. It wasn't bad at all.

Would Trayvon Martin's hand look like that if he had been pummeling him?

He said Trayvon Martin saw his gun. First of all, it was inside his waistband. Inside.

Second of all, Trayvon Martin's legs were covering it. He couldn't have got to it. Trayvon Martin couldn't have seen it.

Do you think for a second -- seriously, do you think for a second that if Trayvon Martin had seen that gun ever there would be a gunshot at 90 degrees in the center of his chest? Do you think that?

I mean, Mr. Stay-Puft, Mr. Softy, was going to be able to get a shot directly through the center of his chest with Trayvon Martin knowing that gun was there, fighting for his life?