George Zimmerman Brother: Family Intentionally Downplayed Latino Background to Avoid Race Issue

Didn't work that way though did it?

The killing of Trayvon Martin in Florida last year quickly sparked racial controversy because it was, as most people saw it, a white man who killed an unarmed Black teen.

But what people apparently did not know or realize is that the man who fired the fatal gunshot, George Zimmerman, is part Latino.

Yet that portrayal seemed by design, at least as far as Zimmerman's relatives were concerned, since they wanted to avoid injecting race into the case.

The defendant's brother, Robert Zimmerman Jr., told Fox News Latino the family chose not to publicly identify with their Hispanic roots since the fatal shooting in order to emphasize self-defense – not race – as the central issue in the case.

 "Our family very deliberately left the injection of another racial element off the table," said Robert Zimmerman Jr., explaining the family decision was made by a concerted push by the brothers' Peruvian mother. "Any color or race is capable of racism so claiming to be 'not white' and therefore 'not culpable' is a moot point."