Just after mid-night on Sunday, George Zimmerman, wearing jeans and a brown jacket, walked briskly out of the Seminole County Jail.
Zimmerman, 28, who carried a brown paper bag under his arm followed another man into a waiting BMW, was whisked away to an undisclosed location.
Last Friday, Circuit Judge Kenneth Lester had set a $150,000 bond for Zimmerman charged with second degree murder in the shooting death of Trayvon Martin, a 17-year-old unarmed black teen on February 26. There are other requirements that Zimmerman would have to meet, including wearing a GPS monitor, not consume acohol or carry a firearm, and a 7:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. curfew.
At Zimmerman’s bond hearing, Mark O’Mara had asked the judge whether he could live out-of state. Judge Lester said that his living arrangements will have to be worked out with prosecutors. But Zimmerman did surrender his passport.
No one expects that Zimmerman will return to his old neighborhood in Sanford where he shot and killed Martin in a gated community as he walked back from a nearby convenience store.
Zimmerman, who claimed self-defense, was not arrested until six weeks later, but not before nationwide protests and marches broke out calling for justice for Martin, and after Gov. Rick Scott appointed a special prosecutor, Angela Corey to review the case.
Zimmerman has said that he was attacked by Martin first and has used Florida’s “stand your ground” law as the rationale for the killing, although a 911 call he made to a dispatcher on the night of the shooting makes clear that the neighborhood watch volunteer initially followed the teen.
In court, last Friday, Zimmerman took the stand to apologize to Martin’s parents, Tracy Martin and Sybrina Fulton. But their lawyer, Benjamin Crump called the apology self-serving and disingenuous.
In Sanford, tensions appear to have calmed down since Zimmerman’s arrest, although law enforcement officers have stepped up patrols.
While Martin’s parents expressed disappointment over Zimmerman’s release on bond, emotions are not expected to run high again in Sanford now that the justice system appears to be working.
