welcome back to new day. we begin with the key prosecution witness in the george zimmerman trial. rachel gentel describing the phone call she had with trayvon martin as he came face to face with george zimmerman. she s due back on the stand for cross-examination today. we go to sanford, florida for the latest. what are we expecting, george? reporter: she came across as raw as very real. she seemed uncoached and her every word and action could have a big impact on the outcome of the case. given the answers she provideded to the court the question now is will this jury believe her? she s the last person to have spoken to trayvon martin on his cell phone the night he was fatally shot and killed. a key witness to the prosecution whose testimony took various turns throughout the day. at first rachel gentel became
jeantel. her credibility so crucial to the prosecution s case. twhorsds if the jury believes those words that trayvon martin wants george zimmerman off of him at the beginning of his confrontation i believe it s a win for the prosecution. especially in florida because jose you told bus the law if you start the fight it will be a long night. right? that s what they say in florida in terms of proving it was self-defense. on day four what do you have to do with defense counsel with rachel jeantel to balance it out. up have to destroy her credibility. it has to be done like a surgeon. they can t go after her too aggressively because this is a young, unsophisticated girl. don west will look like a bully. he went win any friend on that jury with the knock, knock joke so i think he has to walk on egg shells and make sure he destroys her specifically and completely on the evidence and her statements and not on any attitude. all right. vinnie politan, jose baez, thank
audio recording, the witness made with the attorney who represents trayvon martin s family. she admitted to defense attorneys she made the recording hastily and didn t really want to do it. you didn t take it seriously? nope. reporter: at the end of court yesterday she seemed a bit annoyed when she learned from attorney don west she would have to return today and the questioning, kate, could take another couple of hours. another couple of hours. she definitely did look annoyed at times. thank you so much, george. i want to bring in cnn legal analyst sunny hostin. she s been following this trial very closely and also a former federal prosecutor. good morning, sony.
good morning. a lot to talk about and what happened yesterday. i want to get your big takeaway from day three especially rachel gentel. i thought she was certainly credible. i thought she was believable. there was no question she was be emotional. she was raw. i don t know she appeared she was coached. i thought bottom line is she did help the prosecution. she is not the only witness, those to contradict george zimmerman s version of events, but when you look at it she s the fourth witness. so even if the jury doesn t believe one or two pieces of what she has to say, everything she is saying has been corroborated by other witnesses, and so when you look at it one context, i think that she really did pretty well for the prosecution. i did want to get your take there because it s been described her people describing she was a tough witness. she is young.
emotional when questioned about why she lied saying she was in the hospital and couldn t go to her friend s funeral. didn t want to see the body. you didn t want to see the body? no. reporter: she told prosecutors martin used racial slurs like the n-word to describe the man following him. now [ bleep ] he s following me. you said the man looked creep y creepy. creepy. reporter: she said she told martin to run. he said why your following me for? and i heard a person respond what your doing here? then i heard trayvon say get off, get off. reporter: the toechb her testimonying changed when cross-examined by zimmerman s defense team. at times afearing have an attitude when questioned by