No restraining order against Zimmerman

A judge Monday denied a private investigator’s request for a restraining order against George Zimmerman, who is accused of calling the investigator 55 times and sending him 67 text messages, 36 voicemails and 27 emails between Dec. 16, 2017, and Christmas Day.

Zimmerman was not in court when Seminole County Judge Jerri Collins said Dennis Warren failed to meet the burden of proof for protection against repeat violence, the injunction his attorney sought. The injunction request is a separate process from the misdemeanor stalking charge Zimmerman faces.

Warren, a former Orange County Corrections officer told Collins that the barrage of messages made him fear for his family’s safety.

Warren said he contacted Zimmerman once in September to pass along contact information for Michael Gasparro, an executive producer working with the rapper Jay Z on a documentary series about the life of Trayvon Martin, the unarmed teenager Zimmerman shot and killed in 2012. A jury later acquitted Zimmerman of a second-degree murder charge in the case.

“The production company wanted me to ask him if he wanted to participate, there was a possible financial opportunity for him,” Warren said. “I think they wanted to pay him, they paid a few people, my understanding. I wasn’t involved in the payment process.”

In December, Gasparro told Warren he was getting a barrage of text messages from Zimmerman, some of them threatening.

Warren’s attorney said he won’t appeal and instead will wait for the criminal case against Zimmerman to play out.