The Martin-Zimmerman Wildcard

When viewed in hindsight, mistakes made in botched investigations seem rather obviously dumb. But the handling of the phone call between Martin and his girlfriend that took place in the moments before the shooting is particularly bizarre. Several weeks after the shooting, when the firestorm of protest was in full swing, Martin-family attorney Benjamin Crump announced that he had an affidavit from Martin's girlfriend detailing Trayvon's actions before the shooting, and insisted he would not hand it over to the police, but only to federal investigators. The Sanford Police responded that they had asked for anyone with information to come forward, but the young lady never came forth. The whole thing sounded fishy, and led me to wonder if the phone call even took place at all.

Now if indeed such a phone call had occurred, this would have been immediately obvious to the Sanford Police, who were in possession of Martin's phone. Why would they have needed someone to "come forward" when they could have just called the person up or tracked them down through phone records (a warrant for such an investigation would surely have been a snap to secure)? This would seem to constitute particularly incompetent police work. But we do know that even though they had the deceased teen's phone, they did not follow up on his identity and instead waited for Mr. Martin to call to report his son missing the next morning.

At any rate, because there was no immediate contact with the young lady, there have now been many weeks to prepare her testimony. The trial then will likely come down to her word* against Zimmerman's. And while Zimmerman gave several statements in the incident's immediate aftermath from which the prosecution can pick apart any inconsistencies, since the young lady was not interviewed early on in the investigation, her testimony will likely be well tuned. Thus, despite what appears to be a very weak case against him at this point, I believe Zimmerman's goose may be cooked once he gets to trial.

* Of course I'm assuming this aspect of the case is anything like it's being portrayed. In the Duke Lacross hoax, we were also told that the other stripper would corroborate the accuser's story, but that of course never panned out. It would not shock me if this entire aspect of the case ends up falling apart, but at this point I have to assume that the phone records do indeed show a phone call between Trayvon and this girl at the suggested time.