George Zimmerman: I’m Homeless and Have PTSD
George Zimmerman, the man acquitted in the murder of Florida teen Trayvon Martin last year, said that he lives in constant fear, is homeless, and had post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
Zimmerman, 30, gave an interview with Univision that will be shown Sunday night.
“In my mind and between God and me, I know that if I didn’t act, act the way I did, I wouldn’t be here,” he said. “I mean, he wasn’t playing around,” he added, referring to the struggle with Martin that led to the teen’s death.
He maintained that he was acting in self-defense when he shot Martin, who was 17.
Zimmerman said that he doesn’t have a job and basically doesn’t have a home, but said he wants to go back to school as an attorney to “stop the miscarriage of justice,” reported CNN. He also said that he’s millions of dollars in debt.
“I'd like to professionally ... continue my education and hopefully become an attorney,” Zimmerman said. “I think that’s the best way to stop the miscarriage of justice that happened to me from happening to somebody else. I don’t think it should ever happen to anyone ever again, not one person.”
The former neighborhood watch volunteer said that many of his current problems stem from “unfair” media coverage of the incident and trial, reported CNN. He said that he became a scapegoat for “the government, the president, the attorney general.”
“I have a lot of people saying that, you know, they guarantee that they’re going to kill me and I'll never be a free man,” he added. “I realize that they don’t know me. They know who I was portrayed to be.”
The interview comes after Zimmerman was reportedly run out of Miami by an angry mob.
TMZ reported that he and his girlfriend were getting harassed at a local beach, with one person making reference to a $10,000 bounty on his head.