“Two FBI agents showed up here with a picture of Zimmerman asked me if I recognized him,” said gun dealer Khaled Akkawi, who was listed as a witness in the case. “They were pretty much asking along the lines of if he had made racial comments or anything. My employees told me it couldn’t be further from the truth.”
Ah. The truth. Here’s a question: on what legal basis did the FBI get involved in the Zimmerman case?
Meanwhile, the fallout from Zimmerman’s “hidden” cash stash continues. According to a separate article at miamiherald.com, Shelly Martin’s in a world of trouble.
George Zimmerman’s wife, Shellie, was arrested Tuesday after being charged with one count of perjury for allegedly lying under oath at his bond hearing about whether she and her husband had access to any money.
She quickly posted $1,000 bond and was released.
At Zimmerman’s April 20 bond hearing, Shellie Zimmerman, 25, was asked whether the couple had any money.
“Uhmm, not, not that I’m aware of,” she responded.
But prosecutors say bank records show Shellie Zimmerman had stashed cash in a safe deposit box and transferred nearly $75,000 from her husband’s bank account into hers. When her husband was granted bond and released from jail, the money was returned to George Zimmerman’s account, according to a probable-cause affidavit prosecutors filed.
Shellie Zimmerman was charged with committing perjury during an official proceeding, a third-degree felony punishable by up to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine.
Just in case the jury pool isn’t polluted enough, or the public’s ire no longer sufficiently intense, prosecutors plan to release six (of 151 possible) recordings of Zimmerman’s jailhouse phone calls they’re gonna use as evidence in his wife’s perjury case. Implicating Mr. Zimmerman but good, methinks.
George’s less-than-forthcoming testimony about his financial circumstances at the time of his arraignment will not help his murder case. Nor will it torpedo it.
At the end of the legal day, whether or not Zimmerman goes to jail for killing Trayvon Martin will most likely depend on whether or not the judge allows the jury to consider lesser charges. A murder two conviction isn’t likely, not even with Martin’s financial foot shoot. Manslaughter? Uh-huh.
We shall see.