Those on the right seem to be bashing Juror B-29 and her lawyer, David Chico. I disagree. If you take out the hatchet editing job, what you are left with is: She followed the law, the charges weren't proved she voted to acquit. That's her duty and she fulfilled it. Her personal moral views of his conduct and not wanting to be viewed as a traitor by those she later learned felt differently are important only to her. What's important to everyone is that she still believes her verdict was the right call.

As I've pointed out before, she has a lawyer who flew with her to NY for the interview. He obviously reviewed the verdict with her and explained the jury instructions. However she is now describing to Roberts what she understood them to be at the time, she had them explained to her satisfaction during deliberations and still believes the jury made the right decision.

The jury's understanding is correct that Zimmerman's actions leading up to the shooting, from the time he left his house up until the time of the shooting, don't factor into manslaughter.

While a series of acts can be considered for establishing intent for Murder 2 which requires ill-will, hatred, etc, there is no series of acts language in the manslaughter statute (more on that here.) Intent for manslaughter is solely whether he intended to shoot Martin, which he never denied. It's at this point the jury considers self-defense for manslaughter and determines whether the shooting was justified. The instructions say:

In deciding whether George Zimmerman was justified in the use of deadly force, you must judge him by the circumstances by which he was surrounded at the time the force was used.

If the shooting was in self-defense (or the state failed to disprove self-defense) no crime was committed. Which makes it all the more curious ABC didn't include any questions about self-defense in the portions of the interview it aired.

As to people criticizing Juror B-29 for saying she had the instructions "read" to her: The judge orally read the instructions in full to the jury before they retired to deliberate. The jury instructions went back to the jury room. Were there one copy or six? Did they pass them around or did the foreman re-read them aloud? Who cares? B-29 said they reviewed them for 9 hours. B-37 said the same. Neither one has said she misunderstood the instructions.

Obviously, Roberts' interview of B-29 lasted far longer than the 10 or so edited minutes they aired. Robin Roberts is a respected reporter. Do you really think she didn't ask B-29 what she thought of George's self-defense argument, or how the jurors as a whole felt about self-defense? I don't. I think Roberts asked, but since the answer didn't fit with the salacious headline ABC was going for, they left it out.

As to those questioning where she got the funds to fly with her lawyer to NY: The news doesn't pay for interviews but they pay for airfare and hotel.

Yes, her lawyer was a prosecutor in Orange County in 2005 when the office charged Zimmerman with the bar incident. Michael Isikoff reported this over a year ago for NBC (video here), which I wrote up here, discussing a different issue.

I doubt he was the chief case prosecutor when it was in felony court. He was only admitted to practice in 2004. He became a trainee with the office in March, 2005 and was made a prosecutor in April, 2005. I don't know of any prosecutor's office in a populated urban area that puts newly minted prosecutors, fresh out of law school, on felony cases. They start with misdemeanors and get moved to felony court when they've got some experience. David Chico may have worked on the case after the felony prosecutor moved it to misdemeanor court for diversion and ultimately dismissal, but I doubt he was a decision maker. He was gone from the office by mid-2006 (he began representing defendants at least by August, 2006 according to dockets available online at the clerk's office.)

08/07/2006 NOTICE OF APPEARANCE FILED DAVID M. CHICO Case No. 2004-CF-004473-A-O

The Nolle Prosequi motion is signed by Wayne Wooten, a different state's attorney. Also, here's the interview the FDLE conducted in the course of this case of a friend of Zimmerman's who was present during the incident which directly contradicts the agent's version.

Zimmerman's felony complaint was filed in July 2005. It was transferred to the misdemeanor division in August, 2005. Subpoenas for the misdemeanor trial went out on 10/14/05. The trial was called off when they made a deal. He was approved for pretrial diversion in 12/2005. The nolle prosequi was filed on 7/28/06.

The court dockets for Zimmerman's 2005 case are available here. You have to type in Zimmerman's name and then click on both criminal felony and criminal misdemeanor to come up with the dockets for both cases.

Chico was also a commentator for the Spanish edition of the Orlando Sentinel (El Sentinel) during the trial. His commentary favored the defense (although he thought the all-woman jury would favor the prosecution.) He said the evidence of Zimmerman's injuries supported self-defense and the law on self-defense went in Zimmerman's favor. He said the state would stay away from Martin's character not wanting to open the door to negative information, and the defense didn't need to go there because it had the injuries and a good claim of self-defense.

El Sentinel disclosed he was involved in the 2005 prosecution in the second linked article.

Chico, as a prosecutor, incidentally attended Zimmerman's first brush with the law, when in 2006 he faced charges for assaulting a police officer.

This was his reasoning for believing the text messages on Martin's phone were not important (via google translator, alternative versions used in places):

The lawyer believes that this evidence is not so relevant to Zimmerman, because "even before it was known of these texts and the presumed fight by Martin, [Zimmerman] had one hundred percent of the account of the facts in his favor, the laws are very strong for self-defense in Florida, and the defendant was clearly beaten, and I do not believe any juror will ignore that. "

Chico's law firm website has a section "What is Juror B-29 Saying About the George Zimmerman case?" Yesterday, it featured two articles. While the first doesn't paint his client in a particularly flattering light, it does favor Zimmerman and the verdict. The article is by by the Brenner Brief, which appears to be a Christian conservative group. It says:

This case, which Juror B29 is correct about, should have never gone to trial. But once the race-baiters got involved, it went to trial. When President Obama insert himself into it, it became solely about race. And given Juror B29′s move, it’s hard not to wonder if she is trying to get on the “right” side of the race war, just in case the Al Sharpton’s and Eric Holder’s of the world come after her.

And given the fact that she is a minority, this will only help her. She can boldly proclaim that she thought Zimmerman was guilty of murder, even thought she clearly contradicts herself, and that she was the lone hold out. That she was the lone voice of reason in a jury of white women who wanted to convict this man. The only blessing is that she followed the law. Other than that, this looks like self-protection.

...Just in case the progressives come after her, she can say she tried to do the right thing. And given the ferocity of this case and the absurd and overt racist overtones, they probably will. But Juror B29 has covered her tracks.

The second article called "Prosecutorial Abuse On Steroids", is harshly critical of the Zimmerman prosecution and Angela Corey and particularly the media:

The lead-up to Corey’s second-degree murder indictment against George Zimmerman came after what was an almost unprecedented campaign of vilification against him involving coordinated efforts by prominent blacks such as Al Sharpton, the U.S. Department of Justice (led by Attorney General Eric Holder), and the news media. In light of the infamous Duke Lacrosse Case, according to a number of journalists who covered the proceedings, what went down was shocking.

Early on, the media from CNN to the New York Times to NBC News (and especially its sister network, MSNBC) falsely claimed the Hispanic Zimmerman was “white,” that he killed Martin for “racial reasons.” There was no proof, but it didn’t matter as journalists simply declared what they wanted to opine.

Chico is active in his community and represents many Hispanic clients, but he does not appear to jump on board every claim of discrimination. In 2010, there was a local dust-up about a Puerto Rican businessman named Hector Negron who claimed he was discriminated against at a local diner. Local activist groups called for a federal hate crimes investigation into Joanie's Diner. The Orlando Sentinel ran 3 articles on it, one is reproduced here.

Chico came to the aid of the diner, which he also frequented, and said the allegation wasn't credible. (Here's a picture of Chico and another lawyer meeting with the waitress and owner of the diner. He's identified in the article as being on the left.)

David Chico is a Kissimmee lawyer, Puerto Rican and weekly customer at Joanie’s.

“I just don’t believe the allegations,” he said. “I’ve been coming here for a long time. It just sounds like BS to me, based on the people I know here. It seems to purport with common sense and how things happen in life.”

He said that in a day when Kissimmee residents are starting to get used to the changing population dynamics, such accusations of discrimination are detrimental.

“I would just hate for these allegations to grow in a way that, for me, kind of sets back progress instead of advancing it,” he said. “I just don’t know how this is helpful at all.”

There were calls to revoke Joanie's Diner's business license. The matter was investigated and went nowhere, even though Negron supposedly passed a polygraph which asked "Did you lie about the waitress telling you that the table was reserved for white people?” Also in the police report:

The police report detailing Negron’s complaint against (Officer)Hanna stated that Negron paused before he left to say that he wasn’t sorry for Officer Thomas Bartholomew, the department’s only officer killed in the line of duty and who is memorialized on the lobby wall. He told the officer to whom he had filed his complaint that he places a star on his calendar every time an officer is killed or injured because they “must have done something during their career to deserve what happened to them.”

The point being, I think Juror B-29 and her lawyer went on ABC to explain her view, which was that the case was correctly decided and race was not a factor. Nonetheless, she wanted to express that she's sorry the law didn't allow for other options, and apologize to Martin's mother with whom she empathizes, particularly since she also is a mother. Morally, she thinks Zimmerman was wrong to kill Martin. Legally, she thinks he was not.

Jurors who follow the law and reach an unpopular decision should be praised, not condemned. That her motivation in going public may have been to seek redemption and forgiveness, rather than to support Zimmerman's actions, is not of major importance. He wasn't being tried in the public square.

Juror B29 and B37 both said race wasn't a factor in the case. Chico seems to agree with that. All three say the jurors followed the law. Juror B-29 says she was the loudest voice among the jurors. She wasn't intimidated.

At some point, people need to accept that in this case, the system worked. Charges were brought, a jury was fairly selected, a public trial was held, the state brought its best evidence, and it failed to persuade the jury. To the jury's credit, they left their personal feelings outside the jury room and decided the case by evaluating the evidence produced in court and the law as instructed by the Judge.

The function of a criminal trial, as I've said too many times to count, is merely to test the state's evidence: Have they proven the charges beyond a reasonable doubt. Those looking for more need to look elsewhere, outside the criminal justice system, which was never designed to cure every conceivable social ill.

[Note on Comments: While this is an open thread on Zimmerman, I'm not interested in wading through offensive comments about race whatever your beliefs (it had nothing to do with the charges, the trial or the verdict) or debating the sanctification of Trayvon Martin. So please leave unrelated race issues, protests and Martin's character out of the discussion, including rebuttals with specifics of negative references that could come up in a civil suit, or your comment won't stay up very long.]