Prosecution audio experts, who point to Trayvon Martin as screaming on a 911 call minutes before he was shot, will not be allowed to testify at George Zimmerman’s trial.
Judge Debra Nelson made her decision Saturday after hearing arguments over the last several days on whether or not to allow testimony from the prosecution experts. The prosecution experts ruled out Zimmerman as the screamer and said it was Martin. The defense experts, on the other hand, said that there was not enough audio to determine who was screaming.
In deciding whether or not to allow the voice-recognition technology used by prosecution audio experts, Nelson had to determine whether it was too unusual or whether it has been accepted by the scientific community.
“There is no evidence to establish that their scientific techniques have been tested and found reliable,” she said.
The trial will likely be shortened by a week because of this. Before the judge’s decision, attorneys thought the trial would last two to four weeks.
The screams were vital pieces of evidence because they could have determined who the aggressor was. Zimmeran’ father believes the screams were coming from his son while Martin’s family are sure the teenager was the one who was screaming.
Tom Owen was hired last year by the Orlando Sentinel to compare a voice sample of Zimmerman’s to the screams captured on the 911 call. He didn’t think that Zimmerman’s voice matched the screams.
“The screams don’t match at all,” he said. “That’s what tells me the screams aren’t George Zimmerman.”
At the beginning of June, Zimmerman’s attorneys asked for certain inflammatory terms , such as “wannabe cop and “vigilante” to be banned at his trial.
“Some of these terms are disparaging, inappropriate, and if used in trial would serve only to unfairly prejudice the jury by eliciting unfounded connotations and unfair emotional responses,” defense attorney Mark O’Mara wrote in a motion to the court.
Judge Nelson hasn’t yet ruled on the “inflammatory terms” motion.
Do you agree with Judge Nelson’s decision to ban audio testimony at Zimmerman’s trial?