George Zimmerman Divorce

George Zimmerman is back in the news.  And this time he won’t be able to use the Florida “stand your ground” defense in a family law courtroom.  If you want to hear the latest just turn on the news to learn about the recent divorce filing by his wife, and the recent police reports of him allegedly punching her Dad, smashing an iPad, and brandishing a gun.

It is interesting to speculate what the outcome of the Zimmerman murder trial would have been if the jury knew he was about to go through a divorce.  What the jurors may have seen instead was his wife attending the trial every day, apparently standing by her husband.  That message could very well have swayed at least one of the jurors on the panel if they knew how close she was to filing for divorce.

However, the jurors never had any of that information so we will never know how that could have changed the outcome.  This of course won’t stop media outlets from guessing as to how things could have gone.

What we can look into though is what might happen with George Zimmerman’s divorce.  This is still on-going and may not be decided for quite some time based on the different items in contention.  One item in question is the money George Zimmerman collected in online donations through his web-site.  The donations were for his murder defense fund.  Last reports show they could have raised as much as $550K in donations.  We are unsure however how much of that money was already spent on his defense trial, and therefore how much is remaining.  And its unclear if this money will be considered community property based on Florida divorce laws.  If it is community property she may be entitled to half of whatever is remaining.  And the truth may then come out about what George spent any of it on.  Rest assured if he spent any of the money on things other than his lawyers people may start demanding their money back.

Another item up for contention is their dog.  While web-sits are saying the rottweiler is “his” dog that may be up for question in a Family Law court in Florida.  Perhaps she paid for part of the dog, and spent time caring and feeding it.  Thankfully for them this is not a child and hopefully in Florida family ruling around pets are much simpler.  For example with a dog you normally won’t see couples fight over which summer camp they’ll be attending.  We will not get into the speculation around why George Zimmerman had a rottweiler versus all other available breeds including Maltese, Poodle, and Labrador.  Perhaps it had to do with his sense of self-worth, and his level of self confidence.

We read through more online reports and some of the comments sections of web-sites.  What folks may want to remember is Florida (like California) is a no-fault divorce state. So regardless of George Zimmerman’s recent trial, and how people feel about his money and dogs, a Florida court has specific laws it should take into account when it comes to deciding the outcome.  The presiding judge should not use the recent Zimmerman trial or it’s outcome to impact how things should be divided up among George Zimmerman and his soon to be ex-wife.

So while it is interesting to speculate around this, what people seem to truly enjoy is seeing someone who escaped justice the first time around, now facing it a second time.