George Zimmerman, the former neighborhood-watch volunteer who was acquitted in 2013 of murdering an unarmed black teenager, is showing signs of trouble with his most recent arrest on charges of aggravated assault and domestic violence with a weapon, according to the man who wrote a book on the Trayvon Martin case.
It was Zimmerman's second arrest since his July 2013 acquittal in the nationally publicized Martin case.
Based on the police reports filed by Lake Mary, Florida, officers, it appears the officers relied as much on inductive reasoning as on solid evidence and testimony to determine Zimmerman's guilt, according to author Jack Cashill, an Emmy-award winning independent writer and producer.
The incident began when two patrolling officers heard glass shatter in a nearby driveway. They saw a car pull out of the driveway in question, and they pulled the car over because its taillights were not on in the darkness. The woman in the car claimed she was romantically involved with Zimmerman and that he had thrown a wine bottle at her as she was getting into her car. She also said Zimmerman had thrown her cell phone, breaking it.
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When the officers pressed her for more details, she claimed she didn't want to get involved with the investigation, even if it meant not advocating for herself as a domestic-violence victim.
Four days later, another pair of officers traveled to Zimmerman’s house to question him about the incident. For two hours, Zimmerman refused to come to the front door, but eventually he opened it and conversed with the officers. He denied having thrown the bottle at the woman, insisting she threw it against the garage door. He also said the woman's child had broken her cell phone a year prior.
Sgt. Steven Towler, in his report of the incident, concluded the woman was the victim of a domestic violence-related assault, even though she didn't cooperate with the investigation. He also concluded that Zimmerman's account of events held little credibility because Zimmerman had several days to think up a response to the allegations. Therefore, Towler arrested Zimmerman and booked him in the John Polk Correctional Facility, from where he was released 14 hours later.
Cashill, whose book "If I Had a Son: Race, Guns, and the Railroading of George Zimmerman" tells the in-depth story of the Zimmerman-Martin incident, sees Zimmerman as a deeply troubled man with no one to turn to for help.
Cashill holds a Ph.D. in American studies from Purdue. He has also written for Fortune, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, the Weekly Standard and AmericanThinker.com. He is the author or co-author of numerous books, including "First Strike," "Officer's Oath," "Hoodwinked, Sucker Punch, Deconstructing Obama" and "What's the Matter With California?"
Read the inside story, compiled by Cashill, in "If I Had a Son."
Zimmerman "seems to be spiraling out of control," Cashill said.
"He's still under the threat of federal prosecution, so he's not really willing or able to speak to anyone about his circumstances. I mean, he must be the most unloved man in America right now."
Cashill pointed out that Zimmerman got almost nothing but negative media coverage before, during and after his July 2013 murder trial.
"Since then, he's lived under this incredible cloud, and I don't know how he gets through the day," Cashill said. "It's obviously affecting his behavior."
Regarding the ongoing civil suit, which alleges that Zimmerman violated Martin's civil rights, Cashill doesn't believe there is much of a case.
"It strikes me as Eric Holder's way of telling his radical black supporters, and white supporters, too, that, 'We haven't let him off the hook yet,'" he said.
Cashill does not believe there is any evidence that Zimmerman racially profiled Martin on that fateful night in February 2012. He pointed to one anecdote from December 2010 that has not been widely reported in the establishment media.
"The last time [Zimmerman] made the news in Sanford, Florida, [he] was coming to the defense of a homeless black man who had been punched out by the son of a white Sanford Police Department lieutenant," Cashill said. "George Zimmerman's involvement in that case got the police chief fired."
Nevertheless, the New Black Panther Party has not rescinded the $10,000 bounty it placed on Zimmerman's head in 2012. Cashill is appalled that the White House and the attorney general's office have not denounced the organization.
"There's no consequence, no negative consequence for the New Black Panther party," he said.
Zimmerman has run into trouble with the law multiple times since his acquittal in the Martin case. In addition to the two arrests, he has been pulled over three times for traffic violations. His estranged wife also accused him in September 2013 of threatening her in a domestic dispute, but no charges were ever filed because of a lack of evidence.
Zimmerman's tempestuous existence since his acquittal stands in contrast to that of Darren Wilson, the Missouri police officer who shot and killed black teen Michael Brown and was found by a grand jury to have acted in self-defense. Wilson has stayed out of the spotlight since his trial, becoming all but invisible.
Cashill thinks the difference lies in the support networks that each man has. Zimmerman was widely accused of being a "wannabe cop" who should never have confronted Martin in the first place. That was not the case with Wilson.
"In Darren Wilson's case, he was a cop," Cashill said. "He was doing what he had to do. He was doing his duty. He didn't have the option of making believe he didn't see what he was seeing."
Zimmerman was not a policeman, so he didn't have a groundswell of officers supporting him. By contrast, the entire brotherhood of cops had Wilson's back when he was under national scrutiny.
"An attack on one cop is an attack on all cops everywhere, and they take it very personally, because they see themselves in that situation," Cashill said.
Cashill thinks Zimmerman, a Catholic, needs to get back to his faith to turn his life around.
"I think what would be ideal for him is really to find a spiritual retreat for about six months where he could get his head straight," the author said.
Cashill said Zimmerman will not find spiritual balance following his current path.
"He's not going to find [balance] in the kind of pursuits he's pursuing now – women or guns or whatever," Cashill said. "He just needs to be re-grounded and re-moored to turn his life around."
Published by WND Books, Cashill's "'If I Had a Son': Race, Guns, and the Railroading of George Zimmerman" examines the facts and exposes the bias of the news media.
Read the inside story, compiled by Cashill, in "If I Had a Son."