Robert Zimmerman blasts ‘liberal media’, calls racially incendiary tweets an ‘error in judgment’
NEWS -- Twelve hours before he was set to appear on cable television to explain a weekend Twitter rant many have called racist, Robert Zimmermann Jr. tweeted an apology...
Mark O’Mara, who represents George Zimmerman in the case that’s expected to go to trial in June, on Wednesday, began making the media rounds this week, commenting in several stories, seeking to separate the defense from Robert Zimmerman and his Twitter comments.
“First of all it doesn’t represent George or the defense,” O’Mara told theGrio by telephone. “And I keep my distance from him because I don’t want to be connected.”
And while O’Mara said he would prefer that no one in the case beside him talk to the media about the case, Robert Zimmerman has only increased his media profile, include previous stints on Morgan’s show, and a recent appearance on HBO’s “Real Time with Bill Maher.” O’Mara stressed that the incendiary comments on Twitter over the weekend are not helpful to the defense — something Robert Zimmerman acknowledged to Morgan.
“We’ve tried to identify that this case should not be a race-related event because nothing about it was racial,” O’Mara said. “The idea that comparing somebody who shot a kid in the face with Trayvon, who passed away, because they’re both black and both have fingers just seems really insensitive.”
O’Mara said he would “like to think [Robert Zimmerman’s] heart was in the right place, that he was trying to get a point across” defending his brother, but that “you should not do it in that way, particularly because the racial focus on this case is so intense.”
The attorney added that he has had little direct contact with Robert, exchanging texts with him “two or three times” in the past month. And he said he has kept the contacts intentionally minimal.
“I’m the spokesperson” for George Zimmerman, O’Mara said. “I don’t want George talking, I don’t want my staff running out there talking because I want to know that if anything is said wrong, I’m the one saying it. If Robert is starting to be vocal he can do it on behalf of the family, but not on the part of the defense.”
O’Mara’s spokesman said later that to the attorney’s knowledge, George Zimmerman is not in contact with his brother.
In challenging Robert Zimmerman Jr., Morgan suggested that his tweets could “reveal a possible mindset amongst the Zimmerman family that young black teenagers are risky because they are young black teenagers, which many people say is the reason George Zimmerman profiled Trayvon Martin.” Zimmerman is claiming self-defense in the case, and denies he profiled Martin.
Zimmerman countered that beyond their race, Elkins and Martin are analogous as teenagers — “one who committed a crime and one who would have gotten away with a crime” had George Zimmerman not acted. And he blamed the “risky narrative” on people who have coined the phrase “we are all Trayvon Martin,” saying it is they, and the “liberal media,” and not him, who promote that claim. Elkins has been indicted on seven counts including “malice murder” by a Georgia grand jury, while a second suspect, a 15-year-old, was indicted on seven counts including murder, in the killing of Antonio Santiago and the attempted robbery of the child’s mother.
“The liberal media and MSNBC are not walking up and down the street [in Brunswick, Georgia] asking people if they’re going to walk their babies” in the light of the Santiago killing, he said. (TheGrio and MSNBC are divisions of NBC Universal. George Zimmerman has sued NBCUniversal for defamation and the company has strongly denied his allegations.)
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