ROBERT ZIMMERMAN, GEORGE ZIMMERMAN'S FATHER: After nearly a minute of being beaten, George was trying to get his head off the concrete, trying to move with Trayvon on him, into the grass. In doing so, his firearm was shown.CNN Newsroom - March 29, 2012 Other reports, also from family, puts the "George pulled the pistol" in a slightly different light.Trayvon Martin said something to the effect of "You're going to die now or you're going to die tonight," something to that effect. He continued to beat George and at some point, George pulled his pistol and did what he did.
"Zimmerman" in this transcript excerpt is Robert Zimmerman, Jr., George Zimmerman's brother.
ZIMMERMAN: Well, and -- you know, I take a -- I take a pause to that whole, you know, conjecture, again, of pulled out a gun and shot him. That's absolutely not fact.Piers Morgan - March 29, 2012(CROSSTALK)
MORGAN: That's not what happened, then?
ZIMMERMAN: No, it is not what happened.
MORGAN: But he did pull out a gun and shoot him, right?
ZIMMERMAN: Well, he stopped someone from disarming him and shooting him. He didn't pull out a gun and shoot him. George showed tremendous restraint --
MORGAN: But he had the gun on him, right?
ZIMMERMAN: He had a permit to carry that gun --
MORGAN: Where was the gun?
ZIMMERMAN: The gun, I believe, was in his -- inside -- tucked inside his pant waist --
MORGAN: Right.
ZIMMERMAN: In a waist holster.
MORGAN: So he has pulled it out and he has fired it?
ZIMMERMAN: Well, he has taken control of his firearm, he prevented his firearm from being taken from him and used against him. And that's called saving your life.
MORGAN: Right. So you believe, as a family -- is this what George told you the next day? That Trayvon was trying to grab his gun to use against him?
ZIMMERMAN: My father also is on record yesterday night saying that. And again, what Trayvon said was, either to the effect of, I believe, this is going to be easy, you die tonight or you have a piece, you die tonight. And then attempted to disarm him. So when you say, "have a bag of Skittles and an iced tea," nobody just stood there with a bag of Skittles and iced tea. You return force with force when somebody assaults you.
George was out of breath, he was barely conscious, his last thing he remembers doing was moving his head from the concrete to the grass, so that if he was banged one more time he wouldn't be -- you know, wearing diapers for the rest of his life and being spoon fed by his brother, and there would have been George dead had he not acted decisively and instantaneously in that moment when he was being disarmed by --
MORGAN: I mean, there were people watching this saying, well, the family would say this, they're protecting their brother. He may well have invented this whole story. Once he realized what he'd done. He may have just thought, the only way I can get out of this is to use this "Stand Your Ground" law, and under Florida law, and just invent this whole story. He may have inflicted the injuries to himself. We don't know, do we? Nobody actually knows.