murder charge, to be a part of the jury instructions, an option for the jury, saying the facts did not support it. about the prosecution s push for it was only the latest surprise in a legal showdown with many twists and turns. trace galber is live with a look back at the trial0s more memorable moments. high, trace. the knock-knock joke you mentioned did kind of fall flat but the defense was able to recover by pointing out inconsistency sunday in the star witness, rachel jeantel, the friend of trayvon martin who was on the phone with him. she was often defiant, sometimes hard to injured but when she talked about trayvon martin being followed, she was crystal clear. listen. he told me of-under course you don t foe if was telling you the truth. [inaudible]
most of this has happened out of the eyes of the jury. when the jury comes back, both parties, my esteemed colleague mr. west who i agree with counsel saying that he is a very good attorney. he is board certified in this area, and judge nelson, when they come back, they put on, quote/unquote, their game faces, and the jury is likely to never know. if the jury is able to pick up some tension throughout the trial, i believe that the jury s intelligent enough to know that that is part and parcel to this very, very important case that is being presented in front of them. here s what i m wondering, lisa. i would argue that don west got off to a bad start with judge nelson with that knock-knock joke that he made in his opening statement. here is a reminder. knock-knock. who is there? george zimmerman. george zimmerman who? all right. good, you re on the jury. nothing?
he has had some bad moments, the knock-knock joke. but i watched almost every minute of this trial, and i think he has really honed in on some details and shown high levels of intelligence and aggressiveness for his client. but the bottom line is right. when the judge is talking, you have to stop. when the judge issues a ruling, you have to live with it. you don t get to keep arguing. and you certainly don t get to object to things that the judge is saying. judge alex, here is the moment that lisa was referring to on tuesday. don west complained about the long hours and the lack of time the defense team has had to go over evidence that it says the prosecution withheld. judge nelson walked out of the courtroom. i ll see you in the morning. i m not physically able to keep up this pace much longer. it s 10:00 at night. we started this morning. we ve had full days, every day. weekends, depositions at night. judge alex, i d love to hear your perspective about what you see in that dy
you re on the jury. nothing? that s funny. i think it s fair to say that that probably was not the best start in a legal case, tom. but generally speaking and let s remove that knock knock joke from it all, how do you think the defense has done and how much farther do they need to go in order to cross the finish line and get him acquitted? they ve done an excellent job. these are very, very good lawyers. they have talent, they have experience, they have insight. i think they ve done an excellent job. they ve called every type of witness they thought they needed to call to cover their bases. their experts, i thought particularly dr. di maio did an excellent job. i think they re very close to an acquittal. i agree manslaughter might be a problem for them, which is why
own independent choice. to argue with her about that is ridiculous because she is not asking incriminating questions. she is asking for a record on appeal. that s all she is doing. so a lot of this argument back and forth it does nothing for him. let me ask someone who is never fiery and always subdued, lisa. how did i know that was going to be me. what do you think about all these exchanges? all this bickering, what are they, cable news pundits? it s something to really watch in the courtroom. and i m torn, because i really like a fiery advocate for his client. but i also really like a woman in a power position. so i can t possibly call this one. right. i can call it. i can call it. ken, you re there in florida. does this affect the defense closing at all? no. listen, george zimmerman hires a lawyer to fight for him. he doesn t want his lawyer doing the waltz with the judge or playing nice in the sandbox. so although i wasn t very happy with mr. west with his knock-k