Now NPR Joins the 911 Call Fantasists

On this morning’s hourly news broadcast (10 am EDT / 7 a.m. PDT), National Public Radio joined those who have distorted key portions of George Zimmerman’s 911 call in order to assign him culpability and/or racist motives in the shooting of Trayvon Martin.

The distortion in this case was the claim that “Zimmerman pursued Martin after police, responding to Zimmerman’s 911 call, told him not to.”

Here is the relevant exchange between Zimmerman and the Sanford Police Department:

DISPATCH: Are you following him?

ZIMMERMAN: Yeah.

DISPATCH: We don’t need you to do that.

ZIMMERMAN: OK.

Note that police did not tell Zimmerman not to follow Martin, only that they did not need Zimmerman to follow him. That statement came not long after the dispatcher asked Zimmerman, “Let me know if he does anything, OK?”

NPR joins PBS, NBC, CNN, the New York Times and others in encouraging the public to rush to judgment against Zimmerman, poisoning the jury pool and–ironically–ruining any chance for Martin to obtain justice.