UPDATE: A very long, but worthwhile analysis. Bob Owens has a summary if you don’t want to read through all of it. Maybe this isn’t as it appears at first.
51 thoughts on “Shelly Zimmerman Arrested & Charged with Perjury”
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The right of the citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the State …
UPDATE: A very long, but worthwhile analysis. Bob Owens has a summary if you don’t want to read through all of it. Maybe this isn’t as it appears at first.
Comments are closed.
This keeps getting more messed up by the day.
Mark my words, they will use this to get a plea from him. Expect him to plead to manslaughter.
When the government really, really wants to get someone at all costs they go after the family. E.g. Michael Milken’s brother and father (the latter entirely uninvolved as far as I know), so he pleaded guilty to 3 technical violations that are normally handled administratively … and then he was portrayed as this generation’s Dillenger at the sentencing (his real crime was enabling the removal of too many members of the establishment from their comfy positions on the boards and in the leadership of under-preforming companies). (Or closer to home, that’s one interpretation of the 2nd phase of Ruby Ridge.)
We’ve taken the measure of the prosecutor; the linked items raise questions about the judge as well. It sure looks like this MO is what’s happening and the Rule of Law is no longer in operation. And that the most cynical and pessimistic of us were right.
Yes. The Prosecutor is taking a hostage to squeeze Zimmerman and try to avoid being embarrassed in a trial.
Since they are hitting him for not disclosing the money in the Paypal account that was setup for his legal defense, how much of that money came in AFTER he was arrested?
I have the feeling the prosecutor is pulling strings/distorting what actually is going on.
I think the comments on CNN rival that of 13 year olds on Facebook.
Its not like I trust Angela Corey to file a truthful affidavit these days.
it does not affect his credibility – yet. He didn’t testify about the funds. It hurts his wife, but it looks like piling on by the prosecutor and will not sit well with the general public. Moreover, if you listen to the line of questioning, she didn’t say, we are broke and have no money. She was very specific in her answers. Slimy? Maybe. Perjury? Not yet.
Honestly, I don’t think it hurts her as much as the media is making out, either. Yes, when asked if she had an estimate of how much had been donated, she could have said that “there was $X in the account 4 days ago,” but a) that would not have addressed the real question – overall donations – since she didn’t know what might have been taken out before that, and b) she was likely following her husband’s attorney’s advice and not speculating or volunteering information she wasn’t specifically asked. Plus, she did provide information about the person who would know, and offered to contact him. The court declined to follow-up on that information.
I just don’t see any deliberate effort to hide anything in that, the way the judge, prosecution, and media are trying to claim.
She definitely perjured herself.
Do you have a jury to back up that statement? Because, if you don’t, and she’s found Not Guilty, you have legally committed libel.
You are just a commenter at a popular website, so you will not likely face a lawsuit; the primary reason I’m familiar with slander and libel law is that I took a class in Journalism when I was in college, and one of the topics of the class was the AP Stylebook’s section on slander and libel. It’s about half of the book, in a book where the other half consists of rules like “put only one space after a period” and “when you have a list like ‘Tom, Jerry and the Dog’, do not put a comma before the ‘and'”, and “Here’s how to spell ‘Latter-day Saints'”, and “Never say ‘found Not Guilty’ in a story–always say ‘found Innocent’–because it would be Very Bad if someone accidentally left out the ‘not'”.
That is, the people who teach and advise reporters take slander and libel law very seriously. This is the reason that reporters like to sprinkle the word “alleged” in everything they say…and so you get to hear absurd things like “Whats-his-name allegedly took a hatchet to his children, and allegedly doused his house in gasoline and committed suicide, allegedly by setting the house on fire”, even when it’s clear that the man doused his house in fire, hatcheted his children, and then burned his house to the ground and committed suicide.
Admittedly, reporters don’t always take this seriously, but they should. And so should you.
The “click to edit” feature doesn’t seem to be working. I only meant to bold the first the in the comment above.
so I guess its ok to tell little white lies in court…If they lied about that what else are they lying about
Strangely enough, like in her husband’s indictment, the prosecutor’s affidavit didn’t bother to identify the exact words that she said that were a lie (for her husband, it didn’t identify who started the physical combat). Worse, and I can’t see a judge being thrilled by this, without any indication the affidavit edited one of her transcripts with the prosecutor to omit a critical exculpatory section where she says who does know how much has been collected on the website and offers to call him right then. See my pointer to a Legal Insurrection blog posting on that below.
Neither the perjury charge nor the bail revocation make any sense when you figure in that. They never attempted to hide they were collecting donations from the public, money was coming in every minute so giving an estimate when she wasn’t the one in charge of the site would have left her open for an easier perjury charge, and their viewing it as money to be held in trust and disbursed for what it was solicited for was entirely honest. Otherwise she’d have been charged with some sort of conversion crime to put pressure on her husband.
heck yeah it hurts his creditability very muchcan he be believed in court. The one thing you gotta know about the law is it takes a lie to cover a lie once you lie in court you have no choice but to lie through it all,because everything has to be consistant.
I am also wondering who set up the legal defense fund? Did Zimmerman know and can they prove she knew it was there.
I still plan on sending him more money when the time is right. I feel he has gotten improper national exposure that hurts us all. Trayvon Martin has a better PR firm.(Sharpton, Jackson had them on speed dial) If the charges are dropped, the riots that follow will lie directly at the feet of the Main Stream Media.
And did she actually have control of it? Money is not “yours” until you can actually spend it.
listen nobody wants a riot ppl want justice…stop acting like ppl of color always want to insight a riot thats is not the casethey just wanted answers and an arrest.A person life is gone a mother and a father lost their child..and this person could was told to not to go near wait for police…it is not a crime to walk through a neighborhood.do ppl get suspious of others yes but do they go after them i would say no…lets put this in to perspective…You can donate money to whomever you choose to it is up to you.when an injustice all anybody wants to see is justice after zimmermans arrest their was no riot ppl wanted actions an they received it i dont care black or white a life is loss…everyone should want to see that…obviously when one side has never really experiance real injustice then one would never no why one so manyare fighting to right a wrong….you should think if this was ur child would u not want answers to as to why you out lived your 17yr old child whats wrong ppl…come on get a clue..nothing that this child could have done so wrong to lose his life…
Everyone wants justice, but you have to be willing to accept that justice might mean George Zimmerman is acquitted, because the state’s evidence, at this point, doesn’t seem to support a Second Degree murder conviction.
Well I guess a fat guy like you would understand injustice …
Oh snap! You called him fat! Well that just invalidates his entire argument.
they made large transactions over the phone day before the bond hearing and during bound hearing and aftr bond hearing. Zimmerman assisted shelly over the phone so he should be gettong in more trouble. If he did cop a deal on the murder with the perjury charge he time is still lenghty.
If I’m reading all this correctly, they’re charging her with a crime because she didn’t volunteer information. Wouldn’t that be covered under the Fifth Amendment? Or is their argument that she swore to tell the whole truth and then didn’t?
Echoing SPQR, I’m not interested in reading another tendentious Angela Corey affidavit, but I gather it’s worse than that. She said she didn’t know, said who did know and offered to contact that party (a brother in law of George, I think, so it would have been her brother). The court didn’t take her up on her offer.
Giving a figure she knew would be incorrect, since the Paypal legal fund was taking in lots of money every day, would have been worse, right?
Yes, it could have. IANAL but I’m quite sure that speculating on the witness stand is a very bad idea.
This also seems like a silly issue to throw someone in jail over, and combined with Corey’s documented propensity to lash out at people, my guess is that as others have suggested, this is a thug tactic to put pressure on Zimmerman in hopes that he’ll make more mistakes.
Is that kind of thing really par for the course in criminal prosecutions?
Not quite par for the course, but it’s certainly not unheard of – and it is just as despicable as it sounds.
speculating on the witness stand is a very bad idea.
Almost certainly true. I.e. if she said “X dollars as of n days ago, my brother said something like on average Y dollars are coming in every day, but with this bail hearing it’s increasing, blah, blah” … well, that would have been a poor answer for the purposes of setting bail, could have gotten her tripped up on cross examination, and she could have misremembered a figure and then it would be clear cut perjury.
Far safer to say “I don’t have that figure but my brother has, would you like me to call him right now?” which I think I remember is what happened.
And, yeah, it’s entirely standard to go after the family in these most extreme highest profile cases, the ones that are screaming national and international news. E.g. Michael Milken as I mentioned above, who in the ’80s in the area of business and the economy was, say, a cross between Dillenger and Emmanuel Goldstein.
she swore under oath so she has to tell the truth, and whats makes her easily involved with this is becsuse they are married.
The lynch mob continues. How many people lie under oath, including Presidents and Attorneys General? How many get indicted for perjury? To see justice done, it is important to know what actually happened in the confrontation. The prosecutor in a all-out attempt to win is impeding that effort and needs to be removed.
Zimmerman statement are not consistant with all evidence or witiness’s. He approached a kid in his nieghborhood with he had the right to be zimmerman didnt because he didnt know name of street and didnt know any residence that live around there witch is another lie he told be cause one of the witness’s state george was always good with them. Trayvon has right to self defense against a man with a loaded gun. Sitting on trayvons back is also a element in the crime that is a factor in causing his death, because he was still alive at that point. Sitting on his back brings the argument beyond self defense his actions were eccessive.
Oops trayvon parents dont get locked up for perjury or anything else, but trayvon was supposed to be the thug/goon who deserves bullets in his body by folks like zimmerman but it seems the slime balls and dishonest party is the zimmermans-if you have nothing to hide then why lie about anything even about standing your ground and shooting someone point blank in the chest
1 The charges against Shelly Zimmerman are about her testimony during the bond hearing, a hearing that occurred three months after the shooting. That case has nothing to do with the shooting. She wasn’t even there.
2 The evidence in the shooting so far supports George Zimmerman’s version of events. He doesn’t have to say anything at this point. The evidence in the case pretty much speaks for itself.
3 However, judging by your spelling, punctuation, and grammar, as well as the attitude of your post, I would guess that things like the law and the evidence are probably a mystery to you, and don’t matter.
1. Shelly Zimmerman is a liar.
2. George Zimmerman is a liar.
3. You have not researched this case at all.
You have not researched this case at all.
You resemble that remark.
“if you have nothing to hide then why lie about anything”
Exactly… so let’s revisit Trayvon’s mother’s comments concerning her little angel.
And let’s revisit the media while we are at it!
“Maybe this isn’t as it appears at first.”
This seems to be a recurring theme throughout this continuing fiasco.
Yeah; Legal Insurrection, one of the top law prof blogs (and pro-RKBA), has pointed out “Perjury charge against Shellie Zimmerman raises more questions of prosecutorial overreaching (Update: Prosecution misleadingly edited transcript)“.
I guess “anything goes” in a case like this….
In fact, family credit union accounts showed that she had transferred more than USD 74,000 from her husband’s account to her own during the five days before the hearing, an investigator with the state attorney’s office wrote in an affidavit supporting her arrest.Using coded language, the Zimmermans discussed the transfers in several phone calls recorded at the jail in the days preceding the bond hearing, the affidavit said. They also talked about moving money to Zimmerman’s sister’s account and about taking money from a safety deposit box, the affidavit said.”I think I’m gonna go to the bank today and get more cash too,” Shellie Zimmerman said in one recorded call.
I guess this means they both knew they had money. Meaningtheyknowingly lied on the stand. Which h means
This would be the affidavit that was written by the same prosecutor that “forgot” to mention that George Zimmerman had injuries to his head? That prosecutor obviously has an agenda.
Also, the information in that affidavit is not a transcript, because the symbol ‘$’ is never used in a transcript.
And in the same vein as Divemedic’s comment: This would be the same affidavit that skips the part where she tells the court who it is that does know how much money is in the paypal account, and offers to contact him right then and there so she can answer the question? The part where the court and prosecutor turn that offer down?
This arrest has done more to undermine the prosecution’s credibility than Zimmerman’s.
And worse, per my link above, when editing out that part did so without indicating the transcript had been modified. Rather like NBC editing George Zimmerman’s 911 call to make him look racist.
you know what else underminds Zimmerman creditability is his own reenactment video justncompare it to the police call made by zimmerman the night nof the shooting. He is running chaasing after trayvon, but on the reenactment he dosnt state anything about running. After you compare the two reenactment vs the police call what do you think?
Shelly Zimmerman lied to a judge, and George Zimmerman sat like a “potted palm” and let her incriminate herself. She deserved to have charges brought against her.
I’d be interested to read your evidence. What was the perjurious statement?
It was the duty of George’s lawyer to be prepared with all that info (he’s now commented on how it came down; it comes down to his being retained the day charges were filed and George was arrested, and having little time with George before the bail hearing 9 days later). It was very much George’s duty to keep his mouth shut during the hearing except when explicitly directed by his lawyer. His lawyer could have anticipated such problems and arranged for George’s writing hand to be free so that he could write notes to him, that’s how this is normally handled, but I gather that didn’t happen.
As implied by Motor-T and demonstrated by the various links I and others have included in the posting and comments, no one, including the prosecutor, has identified any specific perjurious statements by Shellie Zimmerman, which is the first burden to be met by anyone accusing her of the crime. It should be noted as many others have that the existence of the donation site was never secret (how would that be possible?), it all comes down specifics about it, ones the court (prosecutor and judge) weren’t very interested in at the bail hearing (read the court released transcript linked to in the Legal Insurrection post I link to above).
They simply denied acsess to any funds and they did have money plain and simple. integerty is what the judge is looking for.
“””George Zimmerman sat like a “potted palm†and let her incriminate herself.”””
I take it that you never heard of the Fifth Amendment or the accompanying Miranda rights? You know, those things that say that you cannot be forced to incriminate yourself, and that “you have the right to to remain silent, and anything you say may be used against you in a court of law“?
What was George supposed to do in a court system? Cry, “I object!”?
I have only a limited amount of experience in court settings–I’ve seen a couple of court sessions, I’ve been to a couple of “traffic courts”, and I have never been to a bond hearing. Even so, I cannot imagine a court setting where someone can act like anything but a “potted plant”, except for leaning to your lawyer to say something when a witness or someone else says something potentially “off”. Perhaps Zimmerman did this, in which case, your “potted plant” description would be utterly wrong.
And, unless you were at the hearing itself, or have reliable witnesses that saw everything that happened in that courtroom, we have no reason to accept you as a credible witness, “expert” or otherwise, concerning these charges.
And between the links that Sebastian updated with, and the link to “Legal Insurrection” above, we have solid expert testimony that, given what we know now (that is, absent of any surprise evidence), we can reasonably believe that the Prosecutor is blowing hot air.
This has been a very weird case. We hear that Zimmerman is a racist…and then we hear the entire 911 call. We see that Martin is a twelve-year-old boy…and then we see his 17-year-old pictures. We are told that he has no injuries…and then we see video, and see medical records, describing his records in detail. We hear than Zimmerman was charged with 2nd Degree Murder (well, he still is)…and then we see the deposition making the “case” that he’s guilty.
And now we see Shellie being charged with perjury…and then see that the portion of her testimony that is the basis of the charge, leaves out the part where she offers to have someone get the right numbers.
While every twist immediately causes me to question Zimmerman’s credibility, it always ends with me questioning the credibility of someone else. First the Press. Now the Prosecutor.
As I learned more about this case, I was hoping somewhat that Zimmerman was going to be found “Not Guilty”. Now I’m hoping, in addition to this, that the Prosecutor is going down, and going down hard.