ORLANDO, Fla. – After months of defending George Zimmerman and reacting to state-gathered records, his attorneys late this week began their hunt for evidence about the teenager he killed.

Their first target is Trayvon Martin’s school records, something expected to reveal damaging information about the Miami Gardens 17-year-old.

On Thursday, Zimmerman’s attorneys issued several subpoenas, asking for disciplinary records, attendance records and test scores dating back to middle school.

Zimmerman defense attorney Mark O’Mara also indicated in a blog post Friday that he will likely soon ask for what Martin wrote and posted on social media sites.

Local lawyers say the school records are unlikely to be admissible in court. O’Mara, they said, is simply casting a wide net, while also hoping to influence public perception of Martin.

“I believe it’s O’Mara doing what any good defense attorney does, and that’s called fishing,” said Bill Sheaffer, WFTV-TV legal analyst. “You throw a thousand stones in the sea and hope that one hits a fish.”

While Sheaffer described the record subpoenas as a fishing expedition, Martin family attorney Ben Crump described it as a “witch hunt to try to assault (Martin’s) character.”

“None of those things that are being subpoenaed is relevant to why Zimmerman profiled and pursued Trayvon and shot him in the heart,” Crump told the Orlando Sentinel.

Much of Martin’s disciplinary history has already been made public.

The 17-year-old, who was staying with his father’s girlfriend in Sanford, was on suspension from school at the time of the shooting because of an empty marijuana baggie. Though he was never arrested, he’d been in trouble before.

 

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