One of these days people will learn that everything doesn’t need to be shared on social media. Molly West, the daughter of George Zimmerman’s attorney Don West, probably wishes that she came up with a better choice of hashtags last week when she decided to post a photo on Instagram.
The picture shows West and his two daughters holding ice cream cones. Molly West, 23, posted the picture to her Instagram account under the handle “mollywestttt” along with the caption “We beat stupidity celebration cones.” The hashtags she used were “#zimmerman”, “#defense”, and “#dadkilledit”.
The photo was taken Monday after the first day of trial when West attracted controversy for making a poorly-received knock-knock joke during his opening statement for Zimmerman’s second-degree murder trial. Zimmerman, 29, shot and killed 17 year-old Trayvon Martin in February 2012. A Miami Herald reporter wrote that the photo wasn’t uploaded to Molly West’s account until Thursday. By Friday, it went viral. A couple of hours later, her account was shut down.
Shawn Vincent, spokesman for the Zimmerman legal team, said the photo was intended to be private, and said West and his daughters have had a tradition of going out for ice cream following his first day of trial since the women were children.
Don West released a apologizing for his daughter’s behaviour:
Most days since this case began I stop for ice cream after court on the way home. It’s a guilty pleasure and is well known by my family. I’ve been doing this as long as I can remember during trials. Earlier in the week I stopped for ice cream and two of my daughters were with me having attended the court proceedings. One of my daughters works out of town and we don’t see each other very often. I stopped for ice cream and we decided to take a picture of us in the car with the cones as a memory. I held my other daughter’s cell phone as I had the longest arm. I never anticipated that the picture would be released via social media. It was not taken for any such purpose or in any way as a comment on anything having to do with the case. To me it was a private moment with my family. My daughter accepts responsibility for her immature and insensitive comment and apologizes for it.
West added in a follow-up that his daughter is embarrassed and devastated by the fervor her picture caused. “She is a kind and generous person, not mean spirited or judgmental.”
http://www.clutchmagonline.com/2013/07/zimmermans-attorney-apologizes-for-daughters-instagram/