Thursday, April 30, 2015

Jodi Arias and her Phantom 14 witnesses

You know that old saying, "First sweep around your own back door"?

Kirk Nurmi having asked in a Motion to be allowed to monitor the Twitter accounts of the jurors gave rise to the obvious research. Good for the goose type of thing.

List his potential witnesses. Now let us see what they have publicly opined. This will help us cross them off the list rather quickly.

The parents wont be on the stand, not after those interviews with Detective Flores. 
No word from her folks.
Check.

We know Patti Womack wont be back and we know why. 
Check

Bobby Juarez was stalked by Jodi Arias so much so he booked it all the way out to Hawaii. Nope.
No Bobby.
Check

My favorite, the very elusive, but often mentioned by JA....MATT
How often did Jodi Arias assert on the stand that 
Matt knew about the abuse, 
she told Matt about the bruises,
Matt saw the bruises and "Called her out on it",
Matt was her outcry person she told about seeing Travis with photos of little boys?
OFTEN.
If any of it were true, absolutely ANY OF IT, we would have heard from Matthew McCartney.



Mr. Martinez eluded to and it did not take an expert to infer those notes in the margin of the magazine...those were intended for Matt.

We learned that Mr. Martinez had the recordings of jailhouse phone conversations JA had with Matt. When he first asked Jodi during cross she claimed only her lawyers talked to Matt about the hearing coming up about the forged letters. Then she quickly revised her answer when he headed to table to pick up his ever ready CD and pull the staple off the envelope to insert it into his trusty Bose player, and admitted that YES, on second thought.....she and Matt spoke from jail about the topic, very near the time of the hearing.

We could go on and on about the colorful character Matt. The bottom line is, even if he did not wish to appear for his buddy, their is a thing called a subpeona. If there were anything he could have testified to that would back up Jodi Arias claims of abuse and or pedophelia, he would have been front and center, the first one called. HER LIFE IS ON THE LINE. He would have been called on. KNOW THAT!
Instead....crickets. There is your answer. Burden shifting be damned, the common sense of the first jury instructed them ...for all the talk of what Matt knew and what Matt saw, why no MATT? Ta Da!
Hell will freeze over before Matthew McCartney darkens the door of the Maricopa County Courthouse. Mr. Martinez has been said to have warned I will have him brought up on perjury charges before his feet hit the floor.
No Matt. 
Check.

The defense filed Motions for the experts to be permitted to sign jail visitor logs with pseudonym names and for those logs to be sealed, for there to be no live feed of the trial, and get this...for witnesses to be able to testify under pseudonym (pen names) names. It seems they have searched high and they have searched low for someone to come to testify for Jodi Arias. Thanks to the excellent, fast, informative tweets from inside the courtroom...these would be hidden named witnesses will not be hiding from the light for more than two seconds before the world knows just who they are and what horse they rode in on. It rather reminds me of Johnny Cockran arguing that a black hat on OJ Simpson is not a disguise. Johhny donned the hat for a demonstration....any onlooking witness would simply have said hey I saw OJ, with a black hat on, but yeah it was OJ alright. So there will be no hiding who testifies for Jodi Arias, if as and when they can find someone to do so.

In a normal situation, one would look for an expert and for lay witness that are relatively beyond reproach. We did not have that in any stretch of the imagination. Reproach was real and present and in your lap at this trial. WOW. WOW. WOW. Where did they get these people?

Alice Laviolette who literally got caught in a lie or two on the stand, TO THE JURY, mind you was so easily discredited. Having sent four self help books to Jodi Arias who she was evaluating, and whose bias was so overt that the jury made fun of her in the questions. Even AFTER the trial, having declared she would not be back, she was interviewed by Ted Rowland, in TEARS, "For Jodi, I am sad, FOR JODI" she said. She will never testify in another criminal case. Ever. I believe that. It was career suicide of biblical proportions.

No Alice. 
Check.

Even so, what Richard Samuels did in this case will be studied by law students well into the future. HOW TO PREPARE AN EXPERT WITNESS 101, WHAT NOT TO DO.......
Do not give self help books.
Do not get on a plane to run to see the client if her lawyer tells you she is suicidal.Call 911.
Do BRING THE BUBBLE SHEET, the client must be the one to answer the questions, NOT YOU.
Do not score something three times and leave a paper trail of three varying results.
Do not argue with a prosecutor in front of jury about the definition of words you do not understand such as "compassion", or heaven forbid "speculate". These have a way of remaining with a juror of why you would have such a poor understanding of these every day terms, especially considering this is YOUR field of education and you are opining as an EXPERT on these matters.
Do not base your opinion on admitted lies the client tells you.

I think the cows will come home before we see Dick Samuels again, so ..
.no Dr. Samuels. 
Check.

I cannot even opine on Bruce Geffner. He is just that ridiculous. In prior court cases Judges opined his testimony was "Entirely without merit", and "He is a classic case of a hired gun". Even though Juan Martinez mopped the floor with him, and he and his misinformation he armed her with was the cause of Jen being so thoroughly taken to school by Dr. Jill Hayes.....she still seemed to really like, trust and respect him....so him we may hear from.

We know from the pre trial hearings during her week or so playing Pro Per , JA was trying to stall on Juan Martinez being able to talk to her new expert. Only God knows what lies this poor fool will be working off of. We know indeed JM told the court recently it is apparent to him that the expert is relying on the forged letters that were already deemed inadmissible TWICE. Nurmi argued to the judge he does not believe they are relying on the letters. It is unclear to me if Nurmi did indeed sit in on and was privy to each and every communication between Jodi and the experts during her role play week with them. He honest to God may not realize what she has given them and shown them. If Juan says in his interview it was obvious they were relying on the forged letters, I believe that to be a fact. He was able to discern from "Dr." Samuels on a lunch break depo that just as he suspected Wilmott was going to try to have him discuss premeditated and heat of passion although the Court had already ruled he may not. He simply had affixed two new terms to the scenarios that meant the exact same thing.
God I love Juan Martinez.
He does not miss a beat. 
Bottom line......there is possibility we may have to suffer through Geffner and some new expert. Either, or both, will be armed with a big ole bag of Jodi Arias lies and bullshit. 
Juan Martinez will have none of it. 
Just as he pulled all of Richard Samuels' and Geffner's sanctions and case file history...he will have researched the new kid. As in all matters, he will have his CDs and Exhibits good to go to impeach them.

I saved my favorite for last. Any good attorney would be looking into absolutely anything Juan Martinez could ask a potential witness who takes the stand for Jodi Arias. Her little sister is just too easy. They cannot help but opine publicly and boy oh boy her family, such as dear Aunt Sue, have made a cottage industry out of it. My favorite is little brother Joey stating publicly that the reason Jodi Arias recorded the sex tape was to send to any future love interest of Travis. 
We wont be hearing from little Joey. Nope. 
No Joey.
Check