No turn in the hearing was more unusual than when Zimmerman took the stand himself to make his first public statement on the case, giving the first glimpse into his frame of mind.
Mr. O’Mara conceded that allowing Zimmerman to take the stand at the bond hearing “was very risky,” but said Zimmerman wanted specifically to address several questions raised by Sybrina Fulton, Trayvon's mom, in an interview last week, where she asked why he shot an unarmed teenager.
Zimmerman said he thought Trayvon was an adult, "a little bit younger than I am," and that he didn’t know if Trayvon was armed or not. Zimmerman ended by saying, “I’m sorry for the loss of your son.”
O’Mara noted that Zimmerman “didn’t want to defend himself, didn’t want to talk about the facts, but he had heard a request from the family, and that’s precisely what he wanted to address.”
After the hearing, an attorney for Trayvon's family called the apology "disingenuous."
