A video has been released showing George Zimmerman giving his account of what happened in the moments before he shot Trayvon Martin.

The video is a police interview released by his lawyers this week.

Zimmerman told police the unarmed 17-year-old spotted his gun during the struggle and told him "you're gonna die tonight."

"I felt him take one hand off my mouth and it down my chest," said Zimmerman. "And I just pinched his arm and I grabbed my gun and aimed it at him and fired one shot. He kind of sat back and said, 'You got me, or you got it,' or something like that. And I thought he was saying that he heard the shot and that he was giving up."

After the shot was fired, Zimmerman said he "ended up on top," but he could not recall whether he pushed Martin off of him.

"Either way, I ended up on top of him straddling him," said Zimmerman. "He was face down."

The interview, posted on the legal team's website, was videotaped the day after the shooting. The release of Zimmerman's statements to police came soon after Sanford, Florida officials announced that the police chief whose department initially failed to arrest Zimmerman was fired on Wednesday.

Zimmerman, who is back in police custody after a new ruling, has since been charged with second-degree murder and faces 25 years to life imprisonment if convicted.