A day after Juror B37 went on CNN to tell her personal account of the George Zimmerman murder trial four of the other jurors have issued a statement distancing themselves from statements made by B37 on "Anderson Cooper 360," reports the Orlando Sentinel.
The four jurors signed the statement with only their juror numbers as they wish to maintain their privacy for the time being. The statement was released about an hour after the second part of the CNN interview with Juror B37 was aired.
"We, the undersigned jurors, understand there is a great deal of interest in this case. But we ask you to remember that we are not public officials and we did not invite this type of attention into our lives. We also wish to point out that the opinions of Juror B37, expressed on the Anderson Cooper show were her own, and not in any way representative of the jurors listed below. Serving on this jury has been a highly emotional and physically draining experience for each of us. The death of a teenager weighed heavily on our hearts but in the end we did what the law required us to do."
In the second segment of her interview Juror B37 continued to explain that she felt that Zimmerman had good intentions in trying to keep the neighborhood safe but that he got a little overzealous in his actions and never should have gotten out of his car. In response to a question asking if she thought Zimmerman was acting within his rights when he shot Trayvon Martin the juror did not mince words.
"He was justified in shooting Trayvon Martin," Juror B37 told CNN.
Juror B37 told Anderson Cooper about the process that the jury went through in order to reach a verdict and how she thought they might end up with a hung jury because one of the jurors was hard to convince.
"She wanted to find him guilty of something, but couldn't because of the way the law is written," Juror B37 said. "He wasn't responsible for negligible things that he had done leading up to that point. I don't want people to think that we didn't think about this, and we didn't care about Trayvon Martin, because we did. We're very sad that it happened to him."
Later in the interview the Juror would reiterate that she didn't think that race had anything to do with the events leading to Martin's death. Juror B37 also told CNN that she thought Martin was responsible for what eventually happened to him.
"I believe he played a huge role in his death," Juror B37 said. "He could have...When George confronted him, and he could have walked away and gone home. He didn't have to do whatever he did and come back and be in a fight."
The juror also said that she hopes that Zimmerman is able to move on now that he is a free man.
"I hope he gets some peace," Juror B37 said. "I hope his family can live a normal life after a while. I don't know how he's ever gonna do that, but I hope he can. He'll never forget, but I hope he can."
