plus the queen of soul aretha franklin pays her own tribute. also the political ad that's so dirty. they pulled the plug and mitt romney said this. >> i repudiate that effort. i think it's the wrong course for a pac or a campaign. >> why obama versus romney is bound to get ugly. also the man who says it's an evil genius campaign. and only in america. saying good-bye to donna summer. this is "piers morgan tonight." we start with breaking news in the trayvon martin case. evidence directly connected to the shooting. never before seen is being released. photographs and video and documents and tapes. what do they reveal and mean for the murder charge against george zimmerman? joining me is benjamin krump, attorney for the trayvon family. dramatic developments tonight with the release of a lot of evidence. i want to go through some of this with you in order if i may. first of all, the revelation that there were traces of thc, a by-product of marijuana, inside of trayvon martin's body. what do you make of that? is it significant? is it relevant? >> there's no significance that there was trace amounts of marijuana in trayvon martin's system. piers, what's really relevant is the fact there was no toxicology report done on george zimmerman and we don't know what else was in his system with the prescribed medicines he was on to have him get out of his car, and profile, pursue, and confront trayvon martin and kill trayvon martin in cold blood, even though he was unarmed. so the trace amounts of marijuana is irrelevant. >> the second point is this photograph. quite fascinating. it seems to have been taken in the back of the car after george zimmerman is taken to the police station from the scene of the incident. it's a very grainy photograph, but it quite clearly appears to show that george zimmerman's nose looks like it's been broken. what do you think of that, particularly video from the station doesn't seem to show that? should we be taking this at face value? >> well, again, you have to put it in context, piers. george zimmerman pursued and confronted trayvon martin after he profiled him and initiated an altercation. we believe trayvon martin went to his grave not knowing who this strange man was that was confronting him. and trayvon martin was fighting for his life. he was fighting a man with a .9 millimeter gun and he was in a fight for his life. tragically, he lost the fight. and he tried to defend himself. it was self-defense for trayvon martin. if george zimmerman suffered a superficial injury, trayvon martin suffered a fatal injury. george zimmerman did not have to go to the hospital that night for his injuries. trayvon martin certainly was taken away in an ambulance. george zimmerman did not leave in an ambulance. >> it appears that there was a small abrasion on one of trayvon's fingers, i think his left hand a quarter of an inch. not a massive mark by any means, but again, consistent with some kind of scuffle. on behalf of the family, are you basically accepting now from everything you have seen and the stuff that has come out today, there clearly was a physical fight between them? >> well, piers, the family has always said if there was an altercation that it was started by george zimmerman. we have heard objective evidence. we have heard the 911 tape that he said "these a-holes always get away." we heard him breathing hard. so anything that happened, it was started by george zimmerman. and if george zimmerman would have just done what neighborhood watch supposed to do, none of this would have happened. he was neighborhood watch, not a neighborhood cop. if he would have just stood down. >> you bring me to possibly one of the more significant parts of the evidence that emerged today, which hasn't been seen before, which is that police believe the encounter between george zimmerman and trayvon martin was "ultimately avoidable if zimmerman had remained in his vehicle and awaited the arrival of law enforcement." clearly, they are saying, if he stayed in the car, as we suggested to him, then none of this would have happened. how significant is that in relation to any defense george zimmerman might have on stand your ground? >> if george zimmerman stays in that car, if he does what every neighborhood watchman yule tells and instructs and instructs him to do, none of this happens. as i have said many times before. if george zimmerman would have stood down, there would be no reason for him to stand his grou ground. and that's the case. it's real simple. this is completely avoidable. if he was in fear, he could have just drove away. but he profiled trayvon martin. he pursued him. he confronted him. and he shot and killed trayvon martin. trayvon martin, and we have heard these tapes now, he's crying, screaming, saying help, no. and yet we still hear that riveting gunshot. we have to keep it in full context. this unarmed teenager was simply walking home and had george zimmerman not got out of his car, they never would have met. >> benjamin crump, thank you for your time. >> thank you, piers. >> i want to get reaction from george zimmerman's attorney mark o'mara. i know you can't talk about for legal reasons about specification, but on a general level, what's your reaction to all this coming out now? >> well, we knew it was coming. it's several pieces of the puzzle that we now have to put together. i would only ask until everyone wait until we have all the pieces to put it all together. >> do you accept as one undeniable fact that if george zimmerman had stayed in his car then none of this would have happened? >> yes, as simply if trayvon martin hadn't been in the complex, none of this could have happened. but you're going back to circumstances that we look at now, and i don't think it's reality though. >> george zimmerman's ability through you to defend himself under florida's stand your ground law rests entirely on proving, i guess, that he was attacked by trayvon martin. is that really where we are with this case? >> i think that a lot of people believe that. i think the analysis of the law is a little bit different than that. but that's what's going to be so fact intensive from what the evidence shows us. >> am i right in thinking there's still a chance, perhaps even quite a good chance, that this may never come to a full trial? >> well, the only way that would happen is if there's some resolution beforehand, and that could include pretrial motions that might end in dismissal of the charges. but it's too early to decide what motions or the possibility of success to be. >> that would come down to you having some kind of motion with the judge based on the stand your ground hearing, if you like. >> and that's been talked about since day one. it's certainly a possibility the more facts we see, the more it's a possibility. i hate to hazard a guess until i see all the evidence. >> obviously, this evidence that's been put out there today, all it does is put it back into the headlines again. were you enjoying the fact that the story, if you like from a media perspective, had calmed down so that the legal process could work its way? and is this unhelpful in that sense because for your client, all it does is put it right back at the top of the news agenda again. >> since day one, i had this monotra of we need to calm things down and let the process work. this needs to be decided in a courtroom. certainly, the media has their right and their purpose in all of this, but when it comes out peace meal, we try to offer significance to that and we can't do that because we have to look at the whole picture. so whether it's an autopsy report or a medical record or some video or even a picture, it's what becomes the peoples' foc focus, but it's only one small sliver and they make the decision on the sliver and that prejudging the facts carries through to the next fact. it's just not appropriate. >> mark o'mara, thank you for joining me again. >> sure thing. >> i want to bring in cnn's legal analyst mark nejame. i have spoken to both the lawyers here. one wasn't able to talk much about the detail. one hadn't seen much, although he expressed an opinion. you have now seen a lot of the stuff that's come out. what's your overview of its significance? >> well, there's a lot to die jessi digest in a short period of time. there's significant levels of marijuana in trayvon martin's system. what does this mean? we have to figure it out and extrapolate the marijuana level. thc can be in your system for up to 30 days. it could suggest there was a lot being ingested. we don't know if it was current use or past use. normally it wouldn't concern me shs but it does relate back to the 911 call where it says that it looks like someone was on drugs. we don't know any of that. >> the report, just to jump in, the report doesn't say significant. it says traces. >> it has .75 nanograms per millimeter on one portion, and 1.5 on another. the 1.5 doesn't bother me greatly. in some states, it's borderline whether you can drive or not. i'm not saying it was five times. we haven't got a toxicology report. we just have the medical examiner's report. the broken nose is significant. from the start, i have been saying it appeared from the information coming in that we had mutual combat going. we need more to extrapolate. i don't know if the marijuana is relevant or not relevant, but i do know that the fact that there's been cuts and that there was from the report that came out earlier as it relates to zimmerman with the broken nose, it shows that a fight was going on. >> it raises as many questions as it answers in many ways. mark nejame, thank you as always. when we come back. the queen of soul on the death of her good friend, donna summer. 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[ male announcer ] remember when you were a kid? you liked getting dirty and building things. there were no limits -- you could move mountains. the john deere 1 series subcompact tractor -- the way grownups move mountains. and with autoconnect implements, it's the easiest tractor to use yet. what will you create? discover the 1 series at johndeere.com/1series. great financing available the sad death of donna summer, she was the queen of disco and the voice of an era sign p silenced at the age of 63. joining us tonight is arena franklin. i don't think many people knew that donna summer had had cancer or was fighting this battle. was it a shock to you? >> i never heard that in all of this time. i never had an idea she was sick. >> i went to a dinner party last summer. and donna was there, barbara streisand was there. it was a delightful evening. i sat next to her. i would never have known that she was remotely unwell or anything. so you do wonder how quickly this took a grip of her. >> my god, you just don't know. and many times you really don't know what's happening with people. so it's always a good thing to just maintain the positive and try to treat people the way you would like to be treated because you never really know what's happening with people sometimes. >> what was she like, donna summer, from your experience? >> i thought she was a very gracious and a very nice person. always beautifully gowned and well spoken. and i liked her. >> i found her very engaging. i also -- she sang at the end of the evening. she sang "amazing grace." it just reminded me what an incredible voice she had. wonderfully powerful, a really moving moment to experience at close hand. how does she rank as a singer? >> a very good singer. we won't forget all those many hits she put out there. you know, "bad girl" and "last dance" and all the hits, we won't forget those. >> you were the queen of soul, but she was the queen of disco. really incredibly important to that it era, the disco era. >> absolutely. she and her producer really put those hits out there. they had a lot of repetitions per minute. that was the disco cliche of the day. but truly, that will be her legacy. she was the disco queen. >> did you have a favorite song by donna? >> i liked a lot of them. as i said, "last dance." "hard for the money", i really liked that. my granddaughter loved that too. >> what do you think donna would have liked her legacy to be. you're a fellow great singing artist. from a singing point of view, what do you think she'd want her legacy to be? >> exactly what it was, a reigning queen of disco. >> it's a sad day isn't it? >> it is a sad day. my god, i just couldn't quite believe that. i saw that flash across the screen on the ticker on the bottom of one of the news shows here in detroit. so sorry i have to call on this occasion, but my heart goes out to her family and to her friends and fans. it's really a sad day. >> yeah. i think i totally go along with that. it's been a real shock to people. as i said at the start, many people had no idea she was even sick. it was never made public. i think somebody who always looked very well and healthy, and having reached this stage so quickly, it's very sad. >> i found her to be a very gracious and kind person. >> i did too. aretha, thank you so much for joining me. >> thank you. >> donna summer's publicist said she died from cancer, and possibly from dust particles from the 9/11 attacks. joining us is dr. sanjay gupta. it's a fascinating twist to this very sad occasion. she believed and told friends that she first contracted lung cancer from particles related to the 9/11 attack. what do you make of this? >> reporter: well, she's not the only one. this has been a subject of intense study. as you probably know, people have been looking at this just this last year, which was the ten-year mark after 9/11. there were several scientific studies that came out. the most significant involved the fire department of new york. we spent a year with these guys investigating. what they concluded, and it's a long study, but simplifying what they concluded is there was a 19% increase in all types of cancers among firefighters who had been exposed to toxic dust at ground zero. they did not specifically parse out lung cancer, but all different types of cancers overall, there was an increase at least in that study. >> it is fascinating. how long would these particles, these toxins, be in the atmosphere for somebody like donna summer, who presumably wasn't a first responder, i don't even think she was in the city on the day. she'd had a premonition and told that story in public about leaving for the hamptons and came back afterwards. so how long would the risk of exposure exist to somebody from this kind of inhalation? >>. >> reporter: there's a really good question. a couple things that play here. first of all, if you analyze what happened on 9/11, it was a very different situation than other attacks or other sort of toxic exposures because it was a plume of dust, which was a very unusual amount of chemicals. that went high into the atmosphere for some time and dissipat dissipated slowly over time. that's relevant because it wasn't just a day or so of potential concern as far as exposure. it could have been a longer period of time and more widely dispersed. but the second point, i think, you're making an important one is that if you had an exposure and that lead to cancer, how long would it be between the expow sure and the cancer developing? that's called a latency period in medicine. and with lung cancer in particular, they say it's usually more like 20 years. not a couple three years, not even ten years, but 20 years. which makes the likelihood of someone who developed lung cancer, you know, immediately in the aftermath of 9/11 having anything to do with breathing in that dust. >> we'll never know will we? >> we're unlikely to know in her case. if you looked at the data overall, i think most people would say it's unlikely that 9/11 had anything to do with donna summer's lung kacancer. within a ten-year period, it would still likely be too soon based on what we know. but let me tell you something. the various chemicals that came together on that day, mercury, bro mean, hydrocarbons, all of it super heated by the fire, the jet fuel. the researchers told me when we were doing this investigation that that was an unprecedented thing. no sort of collection of chemicals burned at that super temperature had ever been seen before in the world and not been studied before as was done. so i bring that up only to say that we may never truly know. but it's also hard to relate this to anything else that's happened. in medicine, you want to say it doesn't follow patterns that we know. so it was a truly unique circumstance. >> i think to be fair to donna summer, and the fears that she had, quite clearly in the case of first responders, there's clear evidence that would suggest it's possible thi but it may remain a mystery. certainly an intriguing part of this sad story. thank you, sanjay. coming up why a billionaire pulled the plug on an attack ad on president obama. cancel golf today. 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[ male announcer ] the security of a 2012 iihs top safety pick. the volkswagen passat. that's the power of german engineering. right now lease the 2012 passat for $209 a month. whose non-stop day starts with back pain... and a choice. take advil now and maybe up to four in a day. or choose aleve and two pills for a day free of pain. way to go, coach. ♪ i repudiate that effort. i think it's the wrong course for a pac or a campaign. i hope that our campaigns can respectively be about the future and about issues and about a vision for america. >> mitt romney firmly rejecting a conservative super pac ad. is it an inevitable sign of things to come in the campaign? joining us is daval patrick. it's a pretty nasty stuff, this is. what is your view of how this has come out, front page of "the new york times" saying it was ever going to be made into ads shs the backtracking and mitt romney's reaction. what do you make of it all? >> it's gotten an awful lot of attention. it's sad, but frankly not surprising. the republican party announced years before the campaign began that their priority was tearing down this president. and you compare that, and i think the american people will, with the president who for four years has been asking americans to turn to each other, not on each other because we have big challenges in front of us. it's going to take all of us working together to solve them. >> but the interesting thing, i guess, is that in this publication, it's a multi-page document that's been prepared for the view to get obama out campaign. if you study the detail, what is expressed there is a regret that john mccain didn't press this button in 2008. and you get a feeling it's been sitting there waiting to be repressed. whether it now gets turned into ads or not, it's out there. the image is out there. the claims are out there. jeremiah wright is back in the headlines. people will be pouring over it, just as we are now. so in a way, that could have been one of the tactics all along. normally, he couldn't get them on air. >> it's possible. you know, we have seen other