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Juror B37 speaks on Zimmerman acquittal

By GABRIELLE LEVY, UPI.com
George Zimmerman. File/UPI/Joe Burbank/Pool
George Zimmerman. File/UPI/Joe Burbank/Pool | License Photo

One of the six women jurors in the George Zimmerman murder trial has spoken out about the trial, revealing the initial divide in their decision.

The juror, revealed only as Juror B37, said she believed Zimmerman was innocent from the start.

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"I think George Zimmerman is a man whose heart was in the right place, but just got displaced by the vandalism in the neighborhoods, and wanting to catch these people so badly that he went above and beyond what he really should have done.

"But I think his heart was in the right place," she said. "It just went terribly wrong.

She said the initial vote was evenly split -- three votes in favor of Zimmerman's guilt and three votes against -- but ultimately could not justify acquittal under the law.

"There was a couple of them in there that wanted to find him guilty of something and after hours and hours and hours of deliberating over the law, and reading it over and over and over again, we decided there's just no way, other place to go," she said.

As for slain teen Trayvon Martin, Juror B37 said she thought his behavior sounded suspicious, not that he was profiled by Zimmerman.

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"Anybody would think anybody walking down the road, stopping and turning and looking -- if that's exactly what happened -- is suspicious.

"I think all of us thought race did not play a role," the juror said . "We never had that discussion."

The juror initially said she had struck a book deal with literary agent Sharlene Martin to share her experience on the trial, but later changed her mind.

"Now that I am returned to my family and to society in general, I have realized that the best direction for me to go is away from writing any sort of book and return instead to my life as it was before I was called to sit on this jury," she said.

"I realize it was necessary for our jury to be sequestered in order to [protect] our verdict from unfair outside influence, but that isolation shielded me from the depth of pain that exists among the general public over every aspect of this case."

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