When "Neighborhood Watch" Gets Out of Hand

[Riot]

Originally Posted by Rupert Pupkin

The reason they say it costs 10% is because that is how much a bail company will charge you. If your bail is $150,000, if you can come up with $15,000, a bail company will pay the rest. The problem is that you don't get your $15,000 back. The bail company keeps it. That is what they charge you. If you have $150,000, you are better off putting the whole thing up yourself because you get the whole thing back. You save $15,000.

Ah, I see! I didn't know it worked like that ... thanks.

I doubt there will be any serious punishment from the judge. My guess is that the only punishment may be having the bail amount raised higher.

I think his defense lawyer is doing a great job - seriously. Got permission for Zimmerman to wear a suit in court, instead of prison garb; got permission for Zimmerman to make a public apology to the family ... he's doing a good job.

Even if the judge doesn't punish Zimmerman, geesh, it goes to his honesty. And the judge refused a press coverage info freeze. So I guess they think they can still find a jury there? We'll see.

[Rupert Pupkin]

Originally Posted by Riot

Ah, I see! I didn't know it worked like that ... thanks.



I think his defense lawyer is doing a great job - seriously. Got permission for Zimmerman to wear a suit in court, instead of prison garb; got permission for Zimmerman to make a public apology to the family ... he's doing a good job.

Even if the judge doesn't punish Zimmerman, geesh, it goes to his honesty. And the judge refused a press coverage info freeze. So I guess they think they can still find a jury there? We'll see.

Practically every defendant will try to "play poor" at the bail hearing because the lower your net worth, the lower your bail will be. I doubt there has ever been a defendant who overstated his net worth. They all understate it.

And if a defendant had some money that he thought nobody knew about, I highly doubt he would disclose it.

As Brian said, omitting $150,000 in cash is hardly a minor omission. But as I said in my previous post, we don't know the last time Zimmerman had checked his website, so we don't know if he knew how much was in there. I would have to think that someone knew how much was in there, whether it be his wife, his parents or whoever.

I guess the question is who knew what, when? O'Mara may have asked Zimmerman if he had any money when they first met. I assume Zimmerman told him he did not, and Zimmerman may have had very little money at the time. The bail hearing was around 12 days after they first met. How much of the $150,000 was raised during that 12 days? I don't know if O'Mara then asked Zimmerman the same question again before the bail hearing. O"Mara may have had no idea that Zimmerman raised $100,000 or whatever the amount was during that 12 day period.

I'm sure somebody knew how much money was in there (on the day of the bail hearing), but we don't know who knew. The one thing we know for sure is that Zimmerman knew there was at least some money in there, even if he thought it was far less than $150,000.

I'm obviously not a criminal defense lawyer, so I don't know if it is a big deal for a defendant to lowball his net worth, whether it is a major lowball or a minor lowball. It might be one of those things where you don't have anything to lose by lowballing. It might be one of those things where the worst thing that can happen to you if you get caught is that they raise your bail. I guess the judge probably has the authority to revoke the bail entirely, but I don't know if that is common or not. I certainly wouldn't expect that in this case because the prosecutor did not ask for the bail to be revoked.

[Rupert Pupkin]

According to O"Mara, practically all the money is still in the Paypal account. They have closed the account and are waiting for Paypal to send them the money by check. I guess it takes at least a few days for them to send you a check.

I think this gives Zimmerman a little bit of wiggle room. He can say that he hadn't gotten the money yet, so he didn't feel that he had to disclose money that he wasn't going to receive until a later date.

[Danzig]

lowballing= lying. never a good idea to lie to the judge.

[Rileyoriley]

3 NBC employees lose jobs after edits of 911 recording in Trayvon Martin shooting
Published: Friday, May 04, 2012, 4:02 PM

NEW YORK (AP) — Three employees of NBC or an NBC-owned television station have now lost their jobs because of editing changes to a call made to police by George Zimmerman on the night he shot Trayvon Martin.

Lilia Luciano, an NBC News correspondent based in Miami, is no longer working at the network, spokeswoman Amy Lynn said. Her departure came as a result of an investigation into her March 20 "Today" show report on the Martin case.

Each of the reports on either "Today" or NBC's Miami station WTVJ involve editing of Zimmerman's phone call to a dispatcher that emphasizes his identification of Martin as a black male. Zimmerman, a neighborhood watch volunteer in Sanford, Fla., is charged with second-degree murder in the death of 17-year-old Martin, a case that has increased racial tensions.

In the report involving Luciano, audio of the police phone call was edited to insert a reference to Martin's race that had been made later in the conversation.

Last month, a NBC News producer was fired in connection with a March 27 "Today" show report where a tape of the call was edited to suggest that Zimmerman volunteered to police that "this guy looks like he's up to no good. He's black."

The broadcast portion of the audio had deleted a part of the conversation where the police dispatcher asked Zimmerman about whether a suspicious male he was reporting was "black, white or Hispanic." Zimmerman answered, "he looks black."

Lynn said Friday that NBC News' investigation into the reports has ended.

In an investigation about a separate incident, reporter Jeff Burnside of WTVJ lost his job because of a March 19 report on the dispatcher's call that similarly edited out the dispatcher's question that prompted Zimmerman's characterization of Martin as black, said Matt Glassman, spokesman for the NBC-owned station.

The WTVJ report did not air on any other NBC stations, he said.

Last week, WTVJ aired an apology to its viewers for the report on some of its newscasts, and posted it on the station's website. The statement said that "an error in editorial judgment was made in which a question from the operator was deleted which could have created the impression that Mr. Zimmerman's statement may have been singling out Trayvon Martin because of his race.

"We take this incident very seriously and apologize to our viewers," WTVJ said. "After conducting an extensive investigation, we are putting a more stringent editorial process in place to ensure this does not happen again."

NBC News did not immediately respond to questions about whether the "Today" show has addressed the misleading reports on the air, or whether there are any plans to do so.

Brent Bozell, founder of the conservative media watchdog the Media Research Center, said NBC still has not come clean.

"The truth has been withheld from NBC's own viewers now for more than one month," he said. "Do the network executives at NBC think that this is acceptable?"

Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.