How Do You Like Them Grapefruits?

It was clear to me that Ken had something prepared and just didn't change anything in response.

And that's when he starts going off script.

That's when he comes over to council table and he grabs the fucking grapefruit.

He's like this little fucking weasel looking guy.

And he's like, sir, do you mind if I take this?

I'm like, all right.

And without saying anything, he just takes a pen and underhandedly stabs a hole into the bottom of this grapefruit.

What?

Just fucking.

I didn't think here's about a second one, but OK.

You need the backup grapefruit.

He does that.

I'm like, I look at Tirza and we're like, what the fuck?

Tirza, you got to explain like the face on the female jurors.

So the juror number one, who was a male, starts hysterically laughing like he cannot hold it together.

He just starts cracking the fuck up.

And we're trying to hold our laughter in because he's so close to the jury when he's doing it, too.

So everybody's like, what is happening?

But juror number six, who was a female juror, like was like in disbelief.

And she like looked down and she was just disgusted.

Like she could not look at the prosecutor in the eye after that at all.

She was like looking down, like shaking.

Like she was like, what the fuck is this guy doing?

Stabbing this fucking grapefruit in front of me.

What did he say when he stabbed him?

Welcome to Another Not Guilty.

I'm David Moore.

Here, along with my fellow public defenders, presenting to you the untold stories of the criminal justice system.

That assumes there's justice in the system, which there ain't.

I prefer calling it the American criminal system.

These stories are about the not-guilties public defenders get on a daily basis.

In an unjust criminal system.

With a deck stacked against us.

Not Guilty.

And welcome back, everybody, to Another Not Guilty.

It's your boy, Davey D here, presenting you with the most awesome not-guilties that these states of unitedness can bring on a daily basis.

Wow!

It's been a while.

How, Lauren?

How are you doing over there?

A little rusty.

A little rusty.

Wow.

Wow.

Don't worry.

We'll get back into the swing of things quickly.

Woo!

Yeah.

It's been a lot.

Yeah.

Stretch it out a little bit.

I know.

How have you been, Lauren?

You've been having a nice summer break?

Yeah.

You know, it's been busy, but it's been nice.

I mean, you know, how are you feeling?

I know you've been eating a lot of fair food or something like that.

That's your thing.

Oh, yes.

All of the deep-fried fair food.

And this year they had spicy pickle pizza, which was a new favorite.

So if the fair is coming to your area, I highly recommend A Day of Gluttony.

We took our daughter to her first concert at the OC Fair.

We saw a cover band of ABBA and a cover band of the Bee Gees.

Wow.

Yeah.

Did you get any fair food?

No.

No.

I got, like, a drink.

I don't like the fair.

What?

I don't like the fair.

I don't...

It seems like a rip-on.

I know it's your thing.

I don't want to, like, say that.

It's only my thing for the food.

I don't know.

Well, that's disappointing.

I don't know how this episode's going to be saved.

Maybe our guests like the fair food.

I'm sure they do.

They're from the small hometown state of Pennsylvania, from the Allegheny County Public Defender's

Office, also where the city of Pittsburgh is.

I mean, Pittsburgh sounds cooler.

But it's from the Allegheny County Public Defender's Office.

We have Ben and Tirza with us today.

Ben and Tirza, how are you both doing?

One of you can answer and then the other.

Sure, yeah.

We're doing good.

Coming off a big win a couple weeks ago.

Can't say that I'm a fair fan, either.

I've got to say, I'm a David.

I mean, if you have never had a deep-fried Snickers, I just feel sad for you.

Yeah, I'm about to save this episode.

Yay!

I love some fair food, and I was just going to say, I love some deep-fried Oreos, so that's

the best.

Oreos, cheesecake, Snickers.

They'll deep-fry anything, and it is delightful.

It's a great country.

Yeah.

That's great.

Well, so Ben and Tirza are from the Allegheny Public Defender's Office.

As Ben said, they're coming fresh off of a big not-guilty win, multiple verdicts.

Art Eninger from the Allegheny County Public Defender's Office, a guest from Season 2.

I can't quite think of the name right now.

Pittsburgh Public Defender reached out to me and said he has these dope-ass coworkers,

these dope-ass public defender colleagues that have an amazing trial to share, to be on it.

So this is a fresh not-guilty.

Like I said, we bring in the freshest not-guilties, right, Lauren?

That's it, apparently.

I'm excited now.

David has set the bar high for you guys.

Does it get any fresher than this?

It's going to be awesome.

Okay, so Ben, Tirza, take it away.

Yeah.

Oh, wait.

How long have you guys been public defenders for, by the way?

You look younger than me, so.

Yeah.

Just a few years, probably.

No, so I've been at the office since August of 2019, so almost exactly six years, yeah.

And I'm just one year behind, so five years.

Oh, okay.

Oh, we are very fresh today.

Very fresh.

We are very fresh.

We got some COVID PDs here.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's when I started.

Okay, all right.

Well, let's hear about this case.

I can't wait to.

I'm so excited to have you both here.

So excited to see Lauren again.

I've been missing you.

So, Ben, Tirza, take it away.

Tell us what your client, introduce your client, and tell us what your client was charged with.

Yeah.

So, met the client.

My client was arrested in November of 2023.

Client's name is Dan.

And he was charged in a criminal complaint with 27 counts of rape and other various counts of sexual assault.

He was accused of, throughout a period of six or seven years, he was alleged to have been sexually assaulting, raping his biological niece.

That he had custody of her and the niece and her brother because their mother, who was the client's sister, passed away in 2017.

Let me, so let me just, so it's 27 counts of various sexual assault.

Is that what you said?

And rape?

Is it?

Yes, that's right.

How does that all break down?

Like six counts of rape, six counts of sexual assault, five counts of something else, or what?

All counts bad.

Yes, all the counts were terrible.

So, I mean, there's, in particular, you know, there, in Pennsylvania, you know, you have rape, what they call IDSI, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, which is basically the same as rape, but it can also be per os or per anus.

So, there was, there was five of those charges, rape slash IDSI, all with a mandatory minimum of 10 to 20 years each.

Some of those had, most of those had maximums of 20 years.

However, there was two charges that had maximum of 40 years.

And then it kind of, you know, descending from that was, you know, just sexual assault, statutory sexual assault, indecent assault, aggravated indecent assault.

When you add it all together, the maximum sentence that he could have received was 286 years.

The guy was 60 years old.

So, wait, one more question.

Yeah.

All right, then I'll hand it over to Lauren.

So, if convicted of any one, like if you got not guilty on 26 counts, but then guilty on one, just any one, what was the least amount of time he could do on just one, 10 years?

Well, it depends on which one he would have been convicted of because, you know, we had everything from a maximum of 20 to 40 years versus at the last count, the 27th count of the information was just a simple assault.

So, like a physical assault on somebody, that would have been a maximum of two years.

Okay.

So, all the way from 40, all the way down to two.

All right.

Wide range of outcomes here, you know, and I guess we'll get into it a little bit more.

And you said he was arrested in 2023, right?

Yeah, November of 2023.

And these allegations span over like what period of time?

So, it was alleged to have begun pretty much right when the kids moved in with him, which would have been February of 2017.

And, you know, the alleged victim said that this occurred, you know, basically every other day from February 2017 until June of 2023.

So, six-year period, 2017 to 2023.

Go ahead, Lauren.

So, this is all, you said kids, but it's all just one victim?

Yes.

It's not her and her brother?

Right.

It's all just, yep.

And how old was she?

So, when she made the, when she said that it started, she was 11.

And when she had moved out of the home and it stopped, she was 17.

So, all of the charges, though, are rape charges.

There's not any child molestation charges or continuous molestation of a child as we would have here in California.

In California.

So, in Pennsylvania, some of the charges would be, so it would say, involuntary deviant sexual intercourse of a child under 16 or under 13.

So, part of the elements of some of the offenses would be for a child.

Okay.

And then I assume that those, like, here have harsher punishments.

Yes.

That's what, that's what.

And the younger the age is, the worse the punishment is.

Correct.

And that's what gives the mandatory minimums.

So, there was a brother and a sister who moved in together.

And only the sister is alleging that this man, who is 60 when you met him, so 54 when it started, was molesting her.

And raping her.

And I just want to be clear.

When we're saying rape, we're saying there was full penetration.

This wasn't, like, a little touching or petting of a child.

This was full.

Right.

So, I mean, the way that, you know, there was.

Yeah.

Go ahead and lay out the police report.

What does they say they came happy?

Give us some more specific details of.

Yeah.

Or even if it mentions the relationship between the children and your 60-year-old client.

Go ahead.

Yeah.

So, I mean, to answer your question, Lauren, her allegations evolved over time.

Not only just inconsistency, but, like, whenever she, by the time she was telling the police, it was, well, from the time I was 11 until the time I was 14, it was strictly oral sexual assaults.

Meaning, her allegation was that a client was forcing her to suck his penis.

And then she said when she turned 14, that's when the actual vaginal and anal intercourse was happening.

That's what she alleged.

And she said that, you know, like I said earlier, it was a continuous every other day thing from 2016 to 2017.

And the other thing was they had moved around a little bit.

They lived, over the course of those six years, they lived in four different houses.

And do they state the relationship?

Why are they living with your 60-year-old client?

Yeah, so, in 2017, the alleged victim and her brother, their mother passed away.

And that was our client's sister, biological sister.

So, in 2017, you know, our client went to Philadelphia to take responsibility of these kids, brought them back to Pittsburgh to live with him so he could raise them until they were 18.

He's the uncle.

That's right.

Biological uncle.

So, that's just what the police report says, right?

Yep.

That he's been sexually abusing this girl.

Do we have a name for her?

Do we have a fake name that we want to go by?

We just do a first name, Chantel.

Chantel.

Okay, so, Chantel.

And what about the brother?

Do we have a name for the brother?

Yeah, his name was Terrence, but they called him Nito.

So, we'll call him Nito, too.

Okay.

All right, so you get this police report.

You see the 27 count.

Ben, you were the lead attorney on this case, right?

I was.

I was the one who was first assigned the case, but, you know, lead is somewhat of a misnomer.

Tarza did so much work on this, a lot more than just, like, the normal second seat.

She did a ton, a ton of work.

All right.

So, you were the initial attorney.

That's right, yeah.

Okay.

So, we should just acknowledge how shitty it is when you get a case with 27 counts.

Oh, my God.

This is just, I mean, to go through all of that, and then you know if you go to trial, the more

counts there are, the less likely you're going to walk your client on everything.

Yeah.

So, to get 27 counts and 27 counts of sexual assault of a child, that must have just felt

wonderful when that case showed up in your box.

Oh, yeah.

You love those, right?

Yeah.

Like, when you've got to flip through five pages just to get through the fucking information.

Yeah.

You love that.

So shitty.

And it's, you know, because then you go and you talk to the client, and it's like, they

don't, he was great.

I know we're going to get into that in a little bit.

I don't want to jump ahead of myself, but he was, like, he was incarcerated initially.

He eventually ended up getting out of jail before trial, but we can, I guess, get into

that later.

Okay.

Yeah, that's, no, that's 27.

I don't think I've ever had a 27 count complaint or indictment before.

I think 34 is my max, and it's just painful.

Okay.

So, Ben, tell us about it when you go meet the client.

What that was like?

Yeah.

So, I went down.

What's your client's name again, by the way?

Our client's name is Dan.

Dan.

Okay.

So, tell us about Dan.

So, Dan, well, first of all, our office is, like, a five-minute walk to the jail.

So, it's actually pretty convenient.

So, one day before the preliminary hearing, I went down to talk with Dan.

Had no idea what kind of guy he was going to be.

And he sat down.

He's, like I said, he's about 60.

He's got big, bushy, gray beard.

Kind of some bulging eyes on him.

Like, he was, if I'm being honest, like, he was kind of intimidating.

But, he was super respectful, inquisitive about the case.

But, he sat me down.

I mean, I swear to God, one of the first things he said to me was, hey, look, man.

I'm a violent motherfucker.

But, I didn't do this shit.

Like, you can look at my priors.

Like, this type of stuff, that's not what I do.

And, he was just like, oh, yeah, of course.

You know, what else?

But, then he kind of walks through, you know, these are how I know these kids.

They're my sister's kids.

We've been living with them.

All I ever did was put them through school.

No, I wasn't nice to them all the time.

But, you know, I'm not their parent.

Or, I'm sorry, I'm not their friend.

I'm their parent.

You know, he was talking about the alleged victims.

Yeah.

Oh, this guy is about as old school as you can get.

You know, he's just explaining how the alleged victim's brother had just graduated.

And, he's like, that kid graduated with honors.

Like, that shit wouldn't have happened without me.

Like, he was messing up in middle school.

Like, I kind of, you know, I was a strict parent.

It worked out.

This, you know, they don't like me.

But, this is what happened.

I didn't do any of this.

Did he, I mean, he said, you said the older brother had just graduated from high school.

Did he mention why he thought maybe Chantel would be making this up then?

Because, that's what he's saying.

He's saying, I didn't do it.

So, she's making it up, right?

Yeah.

Did you say why?

Yeah.

So, I mean, what he explained that Nito had just graduated from high school.

And, that their biological father was still alive and was living in Erie.

And, you know, for Nito's graduation, some family members came down to Pittsburgh.

And, that's when, you know, in the days leading up to it, she was, the alleged victim, Chantel,

was telling our client, like, I'm leaving.

I'm going to Erie.

And, he was, you know, the fuck you are.

Like, you're staying here.

You're finishing school.

I promised that I would make you finish school.

Once you graduate, you can do whatever you want.

This is your client, not their brother.

Yes, yes.

Your client's saying to her, your brother graduated.

You're staying here until you graduate as well.

Precisely.

And, then people come down for the graduation.

And, it's, so that's, you know, mid-June 2018.

And, now, all of a sudden, these allegations come out.

And, I guess, and she goes right to Erie, where she wanted to be the whole time.

Now, we have a lot of law students that listen to this podcast.

When we're talking about Erie and Pennsylvania Erie, is this Erie Railroad?

Yeah.

Like, where the Erie Railroad case comes from, that we learned in civil procedure?

That's the one.

All right.

I can't remember anything else about that case.

Just remember the name.

Just, no.

Or, like, the Monopoly's case.

Pennsylvania, yeah, the Erie Railroad.

Is there an Erie Railroad?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Railroad, railroad.

I can't say railroad.

Railroad?

You can't say it.

Oh, railroad.

Railroad?

Railroad.

There you go.

Railroad.

Okay.

Your complaining witness wanted, wait, was that where her brother was moving?

Or her, you said her biological dad was in Erie?

Yeah, biological dad was in Erie.

And, she wanted to go with bio dad and not finish school.

And, your client said, the hell you're doing that?

Correct.

Why wasn't she with bio dad to begin with?

Go ahead, Teresa.

So, that kind of gets into what I was getting into before.

So, it slipped out during trial, but we did know about it beforehand that at some point

when they were really young, they lived with bio dad, and they had an older half-sister.

And, that older half-sister, they reported to CYF that she was molesting them.

And, so, she was making them have sex.

The sister was molesting them.

Correct.

Not the dad.

Correct.

So, the sister was molesting them and making them have sex with each other.

And, so, after that happened, they got sent back with mom in Pittsburgh.

And, our understanding is that mom did not want them to go back and did not let them.

And, kind of, the dad just fell off after that a little bit.

So, at this point, you have a complaining witness.

He's, your client is saying that she's making this up because she wanted to go be with bio dad.

And, your client was standing in the way of that.

And, you have to substantiate, I don't know if substantiate's the right word, but to help illuminate why she's making a story like this.

You have information that she is a previous victim of molestation and sexual assault by half-sister, her bio dad's first daughter,

who was molesting her and making her engage in intercourse with her brother.

Yes, all three of that, the reports that were given to CYF, Tiers had said a little bit earlier, children, youth, and families,

was that the sister kind of instigated all three of them having sex with each other at various points.

So, that was happening at biological dad's house.

And, you know, at this point, you know that your complaining witness knows that making these types of allegations leads to a result

because they were, in fact, removed from bio dad's home.

Well, and so that's, I agree with that, yes.

See, the authorities were not the ones that removed them, but it did, they, mom picked them up and got them out of there

as soon as she became aware of the allegation, yeah.

So, then, well, after you meet your client, like, how are you starting to get your defense together?

Like, what's the strategy at this point?

Man, you know, I remember being at the jail with my legal pad, and I had taken, it felt like 20 pages worth of notes

because, I mean, you guys probably know how it is.

Like, this is the first time you're seeing them.

They've been in jail for a week or two waiting for their prelim.

And it's like, I've learned in this job that, you know, you've got to let them talk for the first five minutes.

They've got to get it out.

Or else they're not, 100%, or else they're not going to be able to hear you.

Like, almost physically not be able to hear you.

But, you know, he was great.

Once he got, you know, he was violent, great.

What else do you need, sir?

And so, but I remember taking all these notes because he's like, what I was interested in is, okay, well, what's the timeline of this?

And I want to know the addresses where you were and when you were there and who else lived there.

You know, who should we talk to?

Were there people, you know, that would have information about this?

And so, we started going through, you know, okay, well, in 2017, we started living here.

There were this many bedrooms.

The kids had their own bedrooms.

Mine was downstairs.

Just kind of getting the details of everything.

Because at that point, I'm preparing for a preliminary hearing to know the right questions to ask, even knowing that, you know, the DAs are going to object as soon as you ask something that's not directly related to an element of the crime.

But, you know, you want as much information because, and you guys know, like, the more times people have to tell their story to the police, you know, cop number one versus cop number two.

It starts to fall apart.

Exactly.

If they're not telling the truth, it falls apart.

Exactly.

Also, like, I mean, you know, supposedly this happened every other day for a six-year period.

So, who else is living in the home or apartment, wherever they live?

Does she share a room?

Would they have noticed anything?

And it's kind of, I think, for every other day.

I mean, of course, kids, people exaggerate.

But it's kind of hard to, like, shield something like that for such a long time.

Who did she report this to?

Her aunt.

So, one of the aunts that came.

An aunt went to the police?

So, one of the aunts came for Nito's graduation, and she disclosed.

And then they came up with a plan to meet up with BioDad.

And they went back to, immediately went back to Erie.

And then, yes, aunt was the first one who reported to the police.

And she had never reported this to anyone else before.

Well, that's a big, big trial issue.

Okay.

The information you have at this point in the police report is that she'd never reported it before?

So, essentially, yeah.

She had mentioned that she had told her brother on one occasion when they were younger in the police report, is all we had.

Okay.

But at least at this point, what you have in the police report is something consistent with what happened before.

Whereas, she made a report not to authorities to her mom and was taken where she wanted to go to mom's house.

Now, she wants to go to BioDad's house.

So, she doesn't go to the police or a mandated reporter of any kind.

She tells aunt who would be BioDad's sister.

This is on her dad's side?

The DA's had a family tree that they made.

I wish I had that up right now because it is really hard to keep track of that.

Is it?

I believe that's correct.

Yeah.

And so, she got her out right away and back to Erie where Chantel wanted to go.

Right.

Okay.

What about the – was there any sort of forensic evidence, like a start exam, a sexual assault, rape kit done?

Was she taken to the hospital?

Did they do any DNA or anything like that?

None.

Yeah, nothing like that.

Even though, like, so the forensic – and the detective ended up saying this later on, but the, you know, forensic interview would have been the preferred method, but she talked to – I mean, we're talking four or five different officers because she's in Erie, then she's in Philly, and, like, all these things kind of come together.

By the time it was said and done, I mean, she had made different statements to, like, legitimately four or five different police officers.

Well, and also in Pennsylvania, the protocol is to not do a forensic interview after age 14.

So, since she was – right, I'm seeing your faces, and it is wild.

So, anytime we have an accuser above 14, there is usually not a forensic interview, even though everybody agrees that is best practice.

When was she saying the last sexual assault occurred when she reported it at Nito's graduation?

Like, a month or even a couple weeks prior.

Like, it was – it was right up.

So, a start exam really wouldn't have turned up anything unless there was some serious and severe tearing and bruising or something.

Right, but they didn't do it anyway because Tears was right.

She said it was – you know, there was a bunch of things that were inconsistent in her statement, but it was always this happened from the time I got there right up until the day I, like, I ran away.

But the problem was she runs away, and then the police aren't notified until weeks later.

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All right, back to the show.

So, what happens next in the case, then?

You're praying for the prelim.

Like, does the preliminary hearing happen?

Are you interviewing witnesses?

Yeah, the prelim happened.

I don't know if – if it wasn't on the very first listing, it was within a couple weeks of that.

So, it ended up happening pretty quickly.

And so, you know, you get to see this accuser for the first time.

And so, the prelim happens.

At that point, it's tough to really gauge, okay, was what she said here inconsistent with what I've read so far?

Because in Pennsylvania, like, all we – before the preliminary hearing, we're just getting a copy of the criminal complaint, which is, like, derived from all the police reports that have been written.

So, it's like we're getting a summary of all they have.

It's just, like, the official complaint.

And it's usually very bare bones.

And, like, it's intentionally that way.

So, you don't know the questions to ask.

So, it was hard to tell at that time, you know, am I really getting anything out of this?

And because you don't know, like, that's why, going back to when I first met him in the jail, what I'm going to do at the prelim is, okay, you've made all these allegations.

We're going to go through every address.

You're going to tell me the details about every time you told the police so we have you on the record.

And so, that's what we did.

The only, like, kind of strange thing that I would say happened at the prelim was it kind of went off the rails at the end when she was like, oh, and, you know, like, I've been texting him.

And he's trying to – she brought up, like, bank accounts and money, which was, like, something that –

Texting your client?

Yes.

After this had happened.

Because, you know, like I said, she runs away in June.

He's not arrested until November.

They actually ended up – we didn't know this at the time of the prelim, but they, like, had set up, like, wiretaps.

They were trying to, like, get him on a recorded line, like, admitting to some of it.

Like a pretextual call.

Yeah.

And it didn't ever happen.

But they had, like, authorization – but they got authorization for it, so.

But so she was – sorry, talking about money?

Like, she was asking him about money?

She – like, the – and, again, this is all very vague at the prelim.

And, of course, when I tried to follow up to it, the DA was, like, objection relevance.

I didn't get to dive really into it.

But if I recall correctly, she was saying – she was saying, like, you know, he controlled all these aspects of my life.

He never let me leave, and, like, even though I had a job, the money, like, was going into, like, a joint account, and he would only, like, dispense it when he saw fit, which ended up, like, being bullshit.

But that's what –

So she just made up that they had a joint banking account?

Yeah.

And then we never heard about it again because it didn't fucking exist.

So she's just throwing out, like, buzzwords, right?

You know, like, she's dipping into, like, the control – almost like the cycle of violence in a domestic violence relationship.

She's just throwing everything – I mean, at least that would be the defense theory at this point.

Right.

So what happens after the prelim?

Excuse me.

I'm sorry.

So prelim happens.

Eventually, we get all the police reports.

We order a copy of the preliminary hearing transcript, and, you know, we go to a pretrial conference.

We set the case for trial.

And this case got delayed so many times for a multitude of different reasons.

I mean, the first time – I think it was actually supposed – it was scheduled for, like, July of 2024.

And then the detective couldn't make it because they were on vacation.

And then the next time, we asked for a continuance to get the client's medical records, which we'll get into later.

So then it got delayed again, and then it came up for trial.

The lead detective on the case, like, went into premature birth.

And so it ends up just – it gets continued all the way.

Oh, and actually, I forgot.

An important point was that one of the times it was continued was because we're three days before the trial is supposed to happen.

And the DA emails me.

He goes, oh, yeah, by the way, the victim – the alleged victim gave us her phone.

We downloaded all the information, and we're going to use it at trial.

And I'm like, okay, well, can I please have a copy of it first?

And so then, you know, we had to continue it so I could go through.

Because, I mean, they downloaded three years' worth of messages, pictures, Snapchats.

I don't want the discovery of a teenager's phone.

You know, like, that is, like, a nightmare.

There was a lot of wild shit.

It's, like, so much bullshit.

It wasn't their smartest move getting that phone.

Certainly not.

Okay, so we're talking – I mean, you guys are kind of talking about, you know, the trial, and it's been continued.

But, you know, are we ready for trial?

Like, what have you done to get ready for trial?

Do you have a strategy?

Are you kind of just going to question her as she gets up there?

Like, what's going on here?

Well, you know, the client suggested that we talk to different people.

One of the people that – well, a couple that he wanted us to talk to were the parents of his ex-wife.

And he goes, you know, they're good people.

They'll tell you that I didn't do this.

And so we had our investigator, Marty, go talk to these people.

And, you know, they were like, fuck that guy.

Like, we hate him.

It's like saying the worst shit ever.

And so, you know, then that's another time you go down to the jail and we're like, okay, so that's not going to work.

Hey, turns out that Johnny at 303 Baker Street actually hates your guts.

All right.

Yeah, and it was funny because, like, we could have been – I kind of told him that was going to happen.

He was – he seemed to be shocked by it.

I didn't really understand.

What, Johnny?

No way.

What?

No.

So –

That's my boy.

Yeah, man.

So that didn't work out.

And there was really no one else because, like, you guys know, in these types – like, and the DAs love to make this argument.

Like, everything happened behind closed doors, so no one really knows.

You've got to believe them.

And so, like, there wasn't really a ton of people that we could talk to.

Now, the other part was, okay, well, he was – the client was interested in character witnesses.

But when you have a voluntary manslaughter on your rap –

I was going to ask about his record.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You don't really want to open the door to that.

No.

Correct.

Yeah.

And, you know, but he was – usually people get pissed off about that, but he was very understanding.

Like, he had been through this type of thing before – not these allegations.

How old was his rap, though?

I bet you all this stuff was from, like, the 80s or something like that.

That's right.

He – it was – there was a burglary in the late 80s, and then in the early 90s was the voluntary manslaughter.

So –

Yeah.

And then nothing in between then and now.

And then how much time did he serve on the voluntary manslaughter?

Like, three years or two years?

Ten years.

Ten years.

Okay.

I could have gotten three.

That's all right.

Sure you go.

Okay.

So you went through all of Chantel's phone records, the titillating exchanges of teenagers, and was there anything in there that was helpful or harmful to your case?

Yeah.

So it was hard to tell at the time, and, you know, going through it was a beast because there's just so many text messages.

And, of course, like, I think even whenever I get a phone dump, I'm like, you know what?

I'm going to go through all of this, and there's going to be one text message to, like, their best friend being like, man, I can't believe I'm making all this shit up.

Like, I hope no one finds out.

But obviously it never happens like that, right?

Yeah, but you'll have to go through them all just to be sure.

Exactly.

And, man, I did.

The couple weekends before trial, like, I spent, like, I mean, the entire weekend going through the phone.

I remember telling people afterwards, like, I hope no one ever, like, can go through my phone like that because I have just recreated, like, her past three years, and I felt weird doing it.

But, yeah, there was a couple things.

There was, like, interactions with one of her boyfriends.

There was interactions between her and her brother where, you know, we're talking, you know, because, remember, she had, she ends up making a statement like, oh, I told Nito the same day that it ever happened for the first time.

And then it turns out in July of 2023, so just a month after she ran away, Nito and her are Facebook messaging.

He's like, why didn't you say anything to me?

Like, I can't believe you wouldn't.

Like, I'm just hearing about this now.

And so that ended up being really helpful.

Any other pretrial workup you did, you went and tried to get some character witnesses, not so good.

You got a cell phone dump with one interesting message to the brother.

You said something about your client's medical records.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

So go ahead, Tirza.

No, that's okay.

So the Commonwealth ended up getting his medical records.

So this was a big thing.

Why?

Um, okay.

So a year after, um, she made the disclosure, um, she made an allegation to the police, uh, that she knew what his penis looked like, um, because he had an oval-shaped birthmark on the bottom of his penis.

On the base?

Underneath.

She just said the underside.

Underside, yes.

Underneath.

Okay.

So they got a warrant.

This is like that old Michael Jackson trial.

Do you guys remember that?

We were probably, I mean, yeah.

These guys are too young.

They don't know.

David, do you remember?

And he got up and was like, they took pictures of my penis.

Because we had to compare it to the description the kids gave.

Right.

So they got a warrant.

An oval-shaped birthmark, like, underneath his sack?

Or, like, what's the bottom of the penis?

Like, what's the bottom of the penis?

Well, they just, I'll just, yeah, I mean, what it's, what she, her verbatim words,

was there is a oval-shaped birthmark on the underside of his penis.

Right.

So whatever, whatever that means.

Right.

Okay.

So then they, they go get the, they get the warrant and they go down to the jail and they

take the photos.

Very uncomfortable.

And then we get them.

And there is indeed no oval-shaped birthmark on the underside of his penis.

The only thing that we.

Weird thing to lie about.

Very, very odd.

But the other thing she had mentioned when she said that he had the oval-shaped birthmark

was that she knew about his surgery.

So he got a surgery on his testicle and it was removed.

And so she knew he had a right, uh, scar on the right side.

And so that was true.

Um, however, when they got the medical records, it was clear in there that she was, uh, at

his bedside during and after the surgery.

Um, so she would have known about the surgery.

Um, and so you don't have to see that either.

If someone has a whole testicle removed, you would assume that there would be a surgical

scar.

Correct.

They don't just dissolve them out of the skin.

We weren't worried.

That was, we weren't worried about that fact going into trial because that was easy to explain.

Um, we were worried a little bit about the birthmark, um, until we got the photos and there

was no birthmark.

And just real, real quickly.

Sorry.

So his, his testicle itself was not removed.

However, what had happened was there was like a cyst that, that, that, that had swollen

to the size of a grapefruit on his right testicle.

So that is, his, that's going to be a big deal later.

But, um, but, um, but anyway, so just a point of great fruit, great fruit, great fruit.

That's great.

Great fruit size.

That's a big fucking cyst.

Grapefruits are not small.

And you got to remember, like, like Tirza mentioned, she makes her first statement to

the police.

Um, it was at the beginning of August of 2023 and then she waits a year, gives him another

call and goes, Oh, by the way, there's a birthmark on the underside of his penis.

And he had this huge thing on his, on his testicle that was removed.

Like, why would, why would she wait a year to do that?

So, so, so weird.

You gotta love this job.

So now you have to look at photographs of your client's genitalia.

Many times.

Uh, okay.

So, uh, all right.

Where do we go from here then?

Oh, well, go ahead, Tirza.

I was going to say, well, we, we had the medical records, but then we also had her, we, we had

her medical records and this became a pre-trial issue.

Um, so she had an STD, um, and she was claiming that she had gotten it from our client.

Um, however, they had never tested him for that STD.

So they had no proof that he had the STD.

So we thought we did, um, trick, trick, trike, right?

Trichomonas.

That's the one that can be cured.

Yes.

Yeah.

Okay.

So, okay.

Is that, did that pop up originally?

I mean, not the, the allegation of the STD, did that, was that known in the, at the arraignment

when you first got the case or a year later, just like this, the whole cyst surgery and the

oval shape of that medical records.

What's that?

How did you get Chantel's medical records?

The Commonwealth did.

Why?

She had informed them about the STD, I believe.

So they got those.

Um, when did she inform them of that?

Like, when did that come about?

Well, so, I mean, that's something that certainly, like I was mentioning, like before, that's

something I didn't know, um, until after the prelim and, you know, the case had already

been scheduled for trial and then they turned discovery over and there's a mention of it

in the police reports, but we didn't get the medical records until later on.

Like, they did not turn over the medical records to us until later on.

Like, around the trial or?

Yeah.

Okay.

Okay.

Um, and I assume, are you asking for medical records at this point?

What do you, what do you mean?

Do you know, do you know they have, there was a mention of an STD in a police report?

That's a supplemental report that was, happened about a year into the case.

In that moment, do you ask for more information?

Are you asking for records?

Like, what are you, what's your plan of action with that information?

You know, I can't specifically remember.

I'm not sure if they had, um, reached out to me and said, you know, this is something

that we're going to do.

But like, discovery in this case, and in a lot of cases, was like piecemeal.

Here's the original stuff.

And then, you know, it kind of filters in.

Um, so I, that was one of those that did filter in.

And, um, you know, until I had it, like, you, you get that news and it's like, oh shit,

that, that might be a problem.

Um, and it, it wasn't, you know, tears, it was like, you know, we have to file a motion

and eliminate about that.

And I'm like, yeah, you're probably right.

So we, we ended up, uh, doing that.

Your client was never diagnosed or never tested for this STD?

To my knowledge, never diagnosed, um, certainly, certainly never tested.

Um, and the thing was, so, you know, we wanted, the Commonwealth ended up getting a search warrant

for his medical records based on the statement that, um, you know, about the surgery and the,

and the birthmark, but we wanted to get them anyway for the same reason, right?

Because he had, once we, once we did obtain his medical records, um, he goes to the doctor

in August of 2022, driven by his niece.

Um, and he's explained to the doctor, um, okay, like this has gotten to a point, I have this

growth on my testicle that's so big and so painful.

Like I can't even wear underwear anymore.

We need to do something about this.

Um, and obviously we wanted that because, you know, poking the hole in their story.

So the guy who has a grapefruit hanging off of his testicle, that's in so much pain that

he can't even wear underwear anymore.

This is the guy that's raping his niece every other day for six years.

Like, come on.

So that was, we ended up getting those medical records.

He didn't have any Viagra prescriptions or anything, did he?

He, he, he did.

Oh, well, okay.

All right.

He did.

Yeah, he did.

Well, the grapefruit was weighing him down, so.

Big time.

He needed a little help.

Yeah.

Is that, was there any evidence of sexual activity on her cell phone?

Yeah.

Like with the boyfriend?

Right.

And so like, there was nothing, um, like pornographic, but there, you know, she had this, uh, boyfriend

that she worked with.

She had, she had a couple of different jobs over the course of a couple of different years.

You know, she's in high school, so it's like Chipotle.

Um, there was like one at a local, like fish market.

Um, but she had met this guy and they were communicating being Snapchat, uh, voluminously.

And, um, there was at one point where they had made a plan that, you know, this Saturday

we're going to have sex was unclear whether that actually happened.

And then there was also like, oh, I have a surprise for you.

What's that?

And then, uh, a horse emoji and a rooster emoji.

Um, so I was, you know, uh, talking, so I, when I told the DAs like, look, uh, we might

be talking about horse cocks.

They're like, what, what do you mean?

You'll see.

Like it's your evidence.

Go through it.

Right.

Right.

But that's, that's, that's the thing.

Like with the, with the motion in lemonade, like we're asking to keep the STD out.

But at the same time that I filed that, we also filed like a provisional rape shield motion,

because if you let this in, then I'm going to get to question her about all this shit.

I found her phone, all the other sexual partners.

Um, and you know, they ended up, I can't say why they abandoned trying to get the medical

records in.

I think that may have had something to do with it though.

Well, it doesn't look great for her that she has an STD and your client, I would assume

if he was going in for a medical procedure on something with his testicles that they would

have tested to figure out if there was an, another reason why he was developing this medical

condition.

If your client didn't have the STD and your client does, it just doesn't look great.

Right.

Yeah.

Um, all right.

Anything else you want to talk about before we get to the trial?

Any other like pre-trial work, discovery interviews, uh, things that may have popped up?

Yeah.

I think we should talk about him getting out of jail right before the trial.

Hey, before you do that, I want to go back to the Viagra.

Did the, the prosecutor want to discuss anything with your client being on Viagra?

Yeah, they did.

Go ahead, Tarzan.

Oh, well, yeah.

I mean, they, they discussed it during trial.

Um, we didn't, we didn't talk about it really beforehand or anything like that.

Um, but they did use it.

We thought about using it on, for our benefit and then decided that wasn't going to work.

Um, so we weren't sure if they were going to bring it up, but they definitely did.

Did your client have any partners, uh, girlfriends, boyfriends, sexual partners?

Age appropriate partners.

That's the only type he ever had.

All right.

But yes, um, you know, he was during the, you know, from, if we're talking specifically

about the period between 2017 and 2023, yes, he had multiple, I mean, his ex-wife wasn't

the ex-wife at the time, or even if they were, you know, she had talked to police.

There were several instances, um, that they were having sex.

He also was seeing a neighbor and he, he wanted us to interview the neighbor because he was

going to say, you know, she was going to say, well, we tried to be sexual multiple times.

He wanted everyone to say he couldn't get an erection.

And then I was like, but dude, for the last two years, you're getting CLS, Viagra, like

you have both of them.

And he was like, well, it didn't work.

I was selling them.

I'm like, okay, we're not going to have you testify.

Yeah.

So the, using it to our benefit was not a good job's amazing.

That's such a common experience with our clients.

My defense is I didn't commit this crime.

I was committing a different one.

Yep.

Selling.

Yeah.

Okay.

So your client saying he doesn't, he's not able to get an erection.

And even though he has these medications to help him in that regard, he was just selling

them and he wanted you to interview these women.

He was dating, but not having sex with to tell you how unsatisfied they were.

I, I, I, I can't, I don't, I don't want to say this.

I don't want to say this, but I'm going to have to let it because, because women, his

own age don't get him excited.

That's yep.

When we discussed, when Ben and I discussed more for the people, when Ben and I discussed

this possible Avenue, Ben immediately was like, I know the DA is going to get up there and

say exactly that.

And I was like, yeah, you're probably right.

We should probably not do that.

We didn't.

Wait, were you able to speak to Chantel or your investigators before trial?

No.

No.

I mean, we didn't even, I don't, I'm not sure that we ever tried.

Um, but like, there was nothing that would have, uh, entitled us to, but, um, we did,

we did not.

Okay.

Sorry.

I wanted to talk about him getting out of custody.

Yes.

Yes.

Tell us about that.

So, um, this is awesome.

Uh, so his, his bail had been denied, you know, since the inception and with a voluntary,

you know, with the current allegations plus the voluntary and the, and the first degree,

uh, burglary, I was very pessimistic the whole time.

Uh, and I had communicated that to him.

I'm like, look, man, there's no judge that's going to let you out of jail.

That's it.

That's what it is.

Okay.

Now there's a rule of criminal procedure in Pennsylvania that says, if you are held in

pre-trial incarceration for longer than six months, you are entitled to nominal bail.

Um, unless you're unbailable for a different reason.

And I'm unbailable for a different reason would include like, you're a danger of the

community.

Look at your record.

Look at these current charges.

Like a voluntary manslaughter.

Yeah, correct.

Correct.

And so now the, the, so I said it's six months pre-trial incarceration, but any type of delay

that is caused by the defendant doesn't count towards that calculation.

So I mentioned earlier, we had continued the case once to get his medical records.

And so that extended the amount of time, but there came a point in, I think like mid April

of the, of this year that, you know, all the calculation, 180 days, he was entitled to

nominal bail.

And the guy had been great.

Like by this time I had seen him like, you know, 15 times in jail.

So like, we're like, I like the guy.

And I'm like, you know what?

I'll, I'll file this motion.

I got to tell you, it's not going to work, but like, fuck it.

We'll file it anyway.

What can it hurt?

And so I filed like a very bare bones, 180th day passed on this day.

You know, he was arrested on this day, 180th day passed on this, let him out, put him on

house arrest if you want.

And I'm thinking the judge is just going to look and laugh at me, but he's sitting there

and he's like looking very contemplative.

And he goes, well, this is the judge, Mr. Jackson, how can I determine if there's a

way to keep the community, to keep the community safe, if you haven't even given me an address

and I'm thinking like, are you fucking kidding me?

Like, you're going to let this guy out.

And so I was like, well, judge, he had, he has his own house.

He still has it.

He goes, we should file an amended motion.

So I went right back to the office and I filed an amended motion that just had the address

that he was going to.

And later on that week, I think that was a Wednesday when I filed the amended motion.

He files the order.

He's getting out of jail now.

So that that's great.

I couldn't fucking believe it, but house arrest.

Yes, I'm house arrest.

Yeah.

So a stepdaughter of his finds out that he's getting out of jail and tears.

Actually, I want to, I want to let, I want to let tears to jump in now because she actually

went to high school with his stepdaughter.

So we got some information.

Go ahead.

Tears.

Jesus.

How big is Allegheny County?

Not that big.

Or small, I should say.

And it was crazy because I had no idea.

All I see is on it.

I go on Instagram one day and I see her post something about one of our judges and she's

basically like, this judge is letting pedophiles out on the street on her Instagram story.

And then the next story names our client.

And I'm like, oh shit.

I had no idea that this was his stepdaughter.

So I immediately text Ben.

I'm screenshotting everything.

I'm sending it to him.

But she's posting all these crazy things.

She ends up changing the judge's Wikipedia page to say, you know, the Wikipedia says, this

is the judge and he, where he started.

And then it goes on to be like, and he went on to let pedophiles out on the street because

he doesn't read case files.

And then he, she DMs him on Facebook.

And so the judge on Facebook and says all these crazy things.

So then the judge calls everybody in, it was a whole thing.

Um, but she was very upset on the Wikipedia page.

Did she say even the defense attorney was shocked?

He got out.

You know, she didn't.

She showed up.

And you know, like her Instagram stories were tagging the news.

Like it tears have said, the Wikipedia stuff, the judge did call us in for a conference.

You know, he didn't know about the Wikipedia page.

He just knew that she had left the message at the chambers.

She had DMed him at 3am, uh, on Facebook, you know, judge, you're a monster.

You're the reason rape victims don't come forward.

You need to recuse yourself.

This is bullshit.

All that type of stuff.

So I'm sitting there listening and I'm like, well, judge, I mean, and that's not even,

we haven't even talked about the Wikipedia page yet.

And he had no idea.

And you got like this, this particular judge is like usually very mild mannered and he didn't

raise his voice, but the look on his face.

I mean, he was just incensed.

He was just like, what?

And he's like talking to his clerk, pull that up.

And now it had already been changed back.

But I was like, judge, look, there's a screenshot right here.

So I know that we're laughing about this.

Yeah.

But do we have reason to be concerned about the stepdaughter?

No.

As an adverse witness or someone with any knowledge?

Not, not for this case.

No.

I'm just going to leave that.

Not for this case.

Sorry for another time.

You know, it's, you know, it's unfortunate.

I mean, just, it's unfortunate that this is the type of public scrutiny people get when

a judge does, like actually makes a good call for some, for getting someone out of custody

pre-trial incarceration.

Like, you know, he's presumed innocent.

He wasn't convicted of actually doing it.

You know, he hasn't like, like more people should be getting out of jail, but you're just

like this sort of tough on crime, you know, uh, public safety aspect that just any sort

of decision, any one wrong decision and the, and the bench gets hammered all the time.

But like, but no one ever really cares about the other end of it where like people are

languishing in jail, they're languishing in prison.

There's innocent people in jail.

There's innocent people in prison.

And, but no one ever like gets dinged for making the wrong call that keeps innocent people

locked up.

Yeah.

There's not that aspect.

That's not on Wikipedia.

Right.

You know, judge, the judge who let him out is one of the best judges in this county when

it comes to bail.

Like he, he, he's, he's very fair.

Um, and just to put a bow on the getting out of jail thing.

So he puts them on house arrest and he tells them, I was just about to toot your horn for

this.

All right.

Well then I'll, I'll let you, I'll let you take it.

I was, I was gonna slip it in before.

Um, that's what she said.

Yeah.

Knew that was coming.

I can't help it.

This case just bangs.

I knew I was going to say something at some point that would, um, but, uh, even though

the judge let him out of jail, he would not allow like any windows for literally anything.

Um, so Ben had filed all these motions asking for him to be able to go get groceries, for

him to be able to go to doctor's appointments.

And the judge was like, no, yeah, like I let you out of jail, but no, you cannot eat food.

So Ben went grocery shopping for the client, dropped, uh, all of the food off, filed all

these crazy motions just to get him a doctor appointment.

He did all of the work for that.

And it was, it was really great full service, public defender, Ben.

That is justice right there.

What kind of groceries are you buying?

You're making sure he eats healthy.

Be like, your, your cholesterol is up.

All right.

No, I'm sorry.

You're going to eat these greens.

I'm not leaving until you eat all those vegetables.

I need you healthy for trial.

I got to say acid reflux, no more fried chicken.

You know, like what, you know, it's fine.

I'm actually glad you asked that because I was like, look, man, cause the judge was giving

me shit.

He's like, can't you like, can't you just do Instacart?

I'm like, he doesn't have a cell phone.

Um, you know, it's expensive, right?

Like our clients can afford that.

And then he's like, you know, well, can't he just like order it on the phone?

And I was like, I don't think so, but I guess I'll try.

So I called like every fucking grocery store within a five mile radius.

And they're all like, Hey buddy, like download Instacart.

And I'm like, okay, that's great.

But anyway, so when, when it finally, when I'm going shopping for him, I'm like, you just

tell me what you need.

And I'm thinking he's going to ask for staples.

I wish I had the list in front of me somewhere.

But he asked for vodka.

No, he didn't.

I didn't get him any vodka until after the trial, but, um, it was like, all right, I need

four pounds of lamb, four pounds of steaks.

Like, I don't know if you guys see any of the Tim Robbins and stuff, but it was basically,

I, I brought him a paper bag with 15 pounds of various meats and that's, that's all he

wanted.

And that, and he, he didn't ask me to do it again for him either.

Low carb.

Yeah.

Pit the paleo diet.

And in shape for, he got hit up on his suit when he goes in front of the jury.

Yeah, man.

It was really great to see.

Russ, good for you, Ben.

Good for you.

Seriously.

That's what these young public defenders do.

David and I are like, oh, good luck.

I got you out.

Good luck.

The COVID public defenders understand the need of keeping people in their homes and delivering

food to them.

Exactly.

Way to go, young guys.

We get it.

All right, cool.

Well, that's great.

That's such a relief.

You know, people are way, much more healthy and much better able and much more equipped

of fighting their cases if they're out of custody.

The statistics show it.

And eating.

And eating, so normal food.

Yeah.

All right.

So then are we ready to talk about the trial then?

Or is there anything else we want to get into before the trial?

Let's go to trial.

All right.

Get that 12 in a box.

Nice.

All right.

So then the prosecutor in this particular case, have you been working with this prosecutor

the whole time?

Yeah.

I mean, he's ever since, he has been employed at the DA's office ever since I started in

2019.

Okay.

Oh, another young one now.

Well, no, he's older.

But I'm just saying, ever since I've been here, he's there.

He mentioned that he was the oldest.

I think he's 46.

He mentioned that at some, I feel like at some point during the trial, very weird shit coming

up.

So.

Okay.

And then the.

There was never any discussion about a plea bargain, right?

Your client didn't want to plead to anything?

Client didn't want to plead to anything.

They offered him 10 to 20 years.

And, you know, obviously I got to go talk to him about it.

Right.

And, uh, that was, that was a very quick conversation.

Yeah.

Put it that way.

Okay.

At this time, I'd like to give a huge thanks and shout out to Ryan Sullivan, our newest member

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Um, all right.

And then, uh, what about the judge?

Anything about the judge?

Oh, you said this judge let him out.

Is this the same judge that's doing the trial?

Yeah.

Okay.

Okay.

It's gotta be.

They already said Allegheny County is very, very small.

And then, uh, so Ben and Tiersa's on the case at this.

What about motions in liminey?

Oh, yeah.

There you go.

Thank you.

Thank you, Lauren.

Yeah.

Any motions in liminey?

Well, we did.

We filed, uh, the one with the SCD and said in the alternative, we're going to file a rape

shield motion.

But then the Commonwealth ended up on the day of trial, um, just saying, okay, we're not

going to bring up the SCD.

We have no idea why.

I, I really don't know why they decided.

This is the CD of the, of Chantel's phone records?

The STD.

The sexually transmitted.

I thought you said CD.

Okay.

Oh, sorry.

Um, in Pittsburgh, we don't enunciate things.

So that was probably.

Okay.

CD, um, so yeah, uh, the Commonwealth came on the day of trial and said, we're not going

to bring the evidence of that.

Um, so we just ended up not having to argue it, which was great.

And I assume you tried to exclude your client's Viagra and Cialis prescriptions.

No, no.

And the reason was because we wanted the, we wanted his medical records in, um, I, I think,

I guess we, I didn't think about like just asking them to redact the prescriptions, but

like, you know, we wanted the fact the medical records were full of, you know, he had this

huge thing, grapefruit size thing hanging off of his, uh, testicle.

Um, and, and so we, we wanted that in there because that was part of the, uh, part of the

defense.

Okay.

Any other, uh, like major motions of the limiting then?

Mm-mm.

Okay.

Exclude his record.

If he testifies.

He wasn't, he, he was very on the fence.

Um, I didn't, they weren't going to be like, at least in my experience, I told him like,

look, if you testify, you can, whatever you do, just don't say like, I'm a good guy.

I would never do something like this or I'm, or I'm not, uh, I'm not violent because I was

like, you know, if they, if these people hear about your record, like we're, we're cooked,

bro.

So, um, okay.

Yeah.

Well then let's, okay.

Let's move on to Wadir and jury selection.

What's the game plan here for jury selection?

Go ahead.

Jerza.

Um, so I, we were talking about this, uh, before and I think our main goal in jury selection

was to try to get as many men as possible.

Um, try to limit the amount of women.

Um, but also just, I, I believe we both believe in general that men are better on these kinds

of cases, um, that they can put themselves in our clients' shoes.

Um, they know that they could at any time be accused of something like this.

Um, and they're the ones screaming false accusations, ruin lives.

Don't you remember Kavanaugh's confirmation hearings?

False accusations, he has a family.

Okay.

Exactly.

Exactly.

And women are more on the me too movement side of things that we all know so well.

Um, so that is generally, I think on sex assault cases in general, we try to get as many men

as we can.

And then my other goal kind of going off of that was to get, if there are any moms on the

jury, um, I did not want any moms of daughters.

I wanted moms of sons, um, again, because they can put their selves themselves in, uh, our

client's shoes that their sons could be accused of something like this.

If they have daughters, they're going to think, oh, my daughter could be in Chantel's shoes.

Um, so we actually were able to do that shockingly.

I've never, we've never been able to do that before, but we had no moms of daughters.

Um, not that you did any Bax and Wheeler violations.

Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no.

I know you were completely above board in your exercising of peremptory challenges.

Of course, always.

Can you give us a taste of the questioning, like how you ask questions and stuff like

that?

Like, like what were the topics you were bringing up in Baudier?

We're very limited in Pennsylvania.

Um, we are very limited to the form, um, that we, we, the questionnaire that we give jurors.

So we're not really allowed to go into a lot.

I mean, obviously we can ask around, ask about their children, um, their spouse and that kind

of thing as general background and their jobs.

Um, but we're really not allowed to get into too much.

And then we go in the questionnaire and we did have some additional questions that we asked

related to the case, um, for this one.

Okay.

Any interesting interactions with jurors or memorable ones that you want to talk about?

Well, um, there was, so, you know, there's a room full of people.

Like, I don't know how, how jury selection is, is done, um, in LA or in California.

And it's even different in the counties in Pennsylvania, but, um, you know, basically what

we interview the jurors, like one at a time, they all submit a questionnaire and then they

come up and talk about their questionnaire one at a time.

Um, so, you know, and at the very beginning, they're reading out the charges and again, 27

count information, child sex assault.

And it's like, people are just like, why the fuck did I have to be called today?

It took him 15 minutes just to read through the charges.

Exactly.

Um, but so your client's just sitting there taking the heat from the jurors too, right?

Oh yeah.

Yeah.

Just like you're right there next to him.

Just, just everyone's just glaring at you.

Yeah.

And then, you know, it's always interesting because, you know, we're tears and I are like

scanning around there because we have a list of all the jurors and their names.

Right.

And so it's like, as you're reading the charges, we're, you've got to scan around to see like

who's making the most disgusted faces, like kind of gauge people.

Um, and that's, and that's always crazy.

Cause you know, we, you can only see so many of them, but, um, I mean, you had time this

time at least it wasn't quick.

That's true.

That's true.

Oh, but, um, yeah, there was, I'm sorry.

I kind of forgot where I was going.

I know we were, we were all just chatting away.

Yeah.

So yeah.

Any memorable moments?

Yeah.

There was, there was a few, man.

Um, like one of the additional questions, um, that we tended to ask first when people got

up there was like, you know, would the nature of the charges bias you in any way such that

you couldn't reach a fair verdict?

There was three.

And so we had a sheet of paper in front of us and there was several women who I, you know,

I was just like, you know, good morning, this and that, whatever.

And then I would start asking that question.

I swear like three people before I was halfway through it, three women just started like crying

and I was like, Oh my, they're the only cried when I asked them.

So I don't know what the hell I was doing.

That's about when we switched.

But yeah, I mean, I think just the, the one other, uh, notable one for me was, um, there

was a woman who like had a great questionnaire.

She's looking like, we are thinking we might want her.

She was like, uh, she had written down on her form that she was like a risk analyst.

And I asked her, Oh, like, what does that mean?

Like something very basic.

And it's a five minute soliloquy.

Like I'm trying to break it up.

Cause like, okay, we, we get it.

But she went on this five minute speech about what she does and she's very analytical and

she can do this.

And then I was like, we want her and she's going to be the four person.

And that ended up being true.

Yeah.

Okay.

So you, so you did, we're okay with having women on your jury.

Okay.

And though, yeah, it's fine.

You're not excluding women.

All right.

No bats in the wheeler here.

No, no, no, no.

We also, I think the, I would say the overall.

Just not fun women.

Just a risk analyst.

Very by the book.

She's allowed to say.

Maybe a four total.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

We had some.

Um, but I think the most memorable part of jury selection in general is that the, it was

so long.

I mean, we took two and a half days to pick the jury.

And at one point the judge had to come down and was, he was not angry, but he was just

like, you know, I've done so many of these and it has never gone on this long.

What is going on?

And we were all like, people just keep saying they can't be fair.

I don't know.

It's not any of our faults.

Um, but it just took so, so long to pick that jury.

So you got your 12 and two alternates.

Yep.

Yeah.

Now it's time for opening.

Yeah.

Time, time for opening statements.

Um, you know, I had written something the night before and I kind of hated it.

I was like, cause we, I think we ended up breaking for lunch and then we opened like after I can't

remember, but I just remember talking with tears.

And I told her, I was like, yeah, I don't, I don't know if I like it.

And she was just like, um, so are we going to fix it?

I was like, yeah, we should fix it.

And so I kind of, I gave a, I gave a practice run to her and she, she gave me a few pointers.

Um, the, the DA's opening statement, um, was probably their, the best part of their case.

And it was all downhill after that.

Um, because you know, this guy has been doing these cases, these cases specifically for, for

quite some time.

So when he doesn't have to, yeah.

And so when he doesn't have to like, when he can just give the opening that he's been

giving for so long, like it, it was, it was good.

It was, it was, it was a, it was a good opening.

Um, and so, you know, I, it's, it's always strange.

You got to pick like a tone to go after, um, him.

Cause you know, it's like, he's just up there, this poor girl, this and that.

And so I just decided to kind of turn the anger on.

And, and like from, from step one, it was like, you know, he's not guilty for, for two

reasons.

One, because the judge is going to tell, like, he just told you, you got to presume him innocent.

But second, and most importantly, none of this ever happened and just kind of went into it

that way.

Um, it's kind of broke down the difference between like, we're in a court of law.

This is not the court of public opinion.

Um, you know, it's like, this is, this is not, um, you know, if your friend came up to

you on the street, like if, if, if you're in a court of law, this is not the court of public opinion.

If your best friend told you something like this, like your job is not to say, Hmm, well,

I presume that didn't happen.

And in fact, I will never change my mind unless you prove it to me beyond a reasonable doubt.

Like, but now we're asking you to be those hypothetical weirdos.

So, you know, pay, pay attention to what you hear is, but especially what you don't hear.

Okay.

I like it.

It's good.

Um, all right.

So let's talk about the, the evidence.

How's it roll out for the people?

Who do they put up?

They put up Chantel first.

Um, and I did want to mention like, before we went into openings, um, we, we kind of didn't

know exactly what to say in the opening because we didn't have that many inconsistencies in

her statement prior.

Um, but we got very lucky with how inconsistent she was on the stand with her prior testimony.

Um, so Ben did a great job in opening, but it was, it was hard because we were like, we

don't know how much we want to rely on how inconsistent she might be because what if she's not, um, some

of the stuff that we had wasn't super inconsistent beforehand, but, um, she was very, very inconsistent

with her prior testimony on the stand.

Like how?

Um, so she testified and we had, oh my gosh, I had sticky notes that I would, every time

something was inconsistent, I was on her preliminary hearing testimony or on her police report.

And I was trying to put sticky notes everywhere that was inconsistent.

And there were so many.

Um, and at the end of her direct examination, it was almost the end of the day.

And so we thought that we were going to be done and that we could cross tomorrow.

But the judge was like, okay, Mr. Jackson.

And I was panicked.

I was like, I can't do all these sticky notes.

We have to ask for a break.

Um, and I was, Ben was so calm.

He was like, it's okay.

I got it.

I got it.

And I was like, okay.

Um, in full panic mode.

But then the judge eventually finally was like, oh, actually we're very near the end of

the day.

So we'll give you, uh, until tomorrow to cross the exam.

Yeah.

Cool.

Cool.

On the outside.

I was like, oh shit.

Um, I'm going to have to, so, cause I mean, I had taken so many notes too.

And so when the judge was like, okay, go ahead.

I very slowly like just started flipping back through all the, through all the pages of notes

and like, honestly, probably 15 seconds into it.

He goes, okay, counsel up here.

And he was like, are you like, I'm like, well, judge, actually that'd be, it'd be cool

if we could do it tomorrow.

He's like, okay, fine.

I was like, I can't gather all these sticky notes right now.

We got it.

We have, so we stayed at the office until, um, what, like eight, eight 30 PM, just going

through all of them.

And thank God we had that time because there was just so much that we had to get through.

So then, um, like what, what, but what was she kind of like inconsistent about?

Like, what was she saying?

What were the new stuff she was bringing up in her testimony?

Well, the, the biggest thing was, well, there's, there's a few, but I think the most important

part was, you know, on, on direct, she was very clear that the first instance of, uh, vaginal

intercourse was at the third house that they had lived in.

She was a hundred percent clear at the prelim.

She had testified that the house directly before that one was, it actually happened over three

times vaginal intercourse.

So that was absolutely huge because she was clear that once she moved out of house number

two, then she went to house number three and she never went back there.

And she was on direct saying the first time this ever happened was at house three, but

on the record of the prelim, she's saying it happened all these times at house two.

What's great about the fact that you did that going back to prelim too, is that because she

was only 11 when this all allegedly started and because so much time had passed, it's easy

for the DA to excuse mistakes in the timeline.

Yep.

But if you're tying the memory to a location, then you can, and, and since you have that timeline

of when they moved, then, you know, approximately how old she is and you know, there's no way

that it happened back then.

Exactly.

That was a really smart move.

And one of the best things about that point was that the DA on redirect tried to save her.

And so he actually ended up impeaching his own witness, which was the most beautiful thing

ever.

But he tried to say, you know, well, maybe once you moved into house three, sometimes

you'd go back to house one or house two.

And she was like, no, you know, once we moved into house three, we were in house three and

that was it.

And he started trying to get her.

He was like, okay, but you did testify at the preliminary hearing that, you know, at

house one, there was vaginal intercourse.

And she's like, yes.

And he shows her her testimony and she's like, yes, I said that.

And then, and then he's like, so did you, was there ever vaginal intercourse at house

one?

And she was like, no.

And it was just, Ben and I looked at each other and we were like, what is he doing?

What, what just happened?

And it was amazing.

And it was, and he just quickly moved on.

He acted like he never did that.

And he never said that and moved on to the next question.

So at this point, Chantel is what?

20?

19.

Okay.

Um, and what was her demeanor like on the stand?

Yeah, well, that's, that's a really good question.

Um, she came off like very detached, very clinical, um, like did not, one of the most composed

alleged sexual assault victims that I have ever seen.

Like, uh, almost like she was like reading off of something.

It was, and not only that, like there was no emotion.

She never, she never cried.

Um, she's like, every time the DA asked a question, like some, she would not every time,

but frequently she would kind of trail off at the end and be like, was that what you want?

Uh, could, could you, could you re-ask the question?

Uh, like a lot and like always looking, uh, to him for cues.

Um, and even when she said to re-ask the question, which she did so many times, you know, the

DA wouldn't just do that.

He would like then be leading.

I objected.

I let him go a little bit.

You don't want to piss the jury off too much, but it's like, he, it was so many leading questions.

I mean, by the third or fourth one, the judge is like just sustaining him.

The judge is smirking.

There's one juror in particular who like already thinks the DA is a clown.

Um, but she, she, she came off, um, I don't know if robotics is the right word, but I was

about to say our coworkers who came and watched the trial all described her as robotic.

Um, cause that's how it was.

Do you think she was coached by the DA or they had, they had practiced her testimony at least

with the detective or whatever?

A hundred, a hundred percent.

They had, they had definitely practiced it because like we were mentioning a little bit

earlier, there was four houses that they lived in and obviously it was one and then two

and then three and then four.

And so the DA, like at the very beginning of his direct examination goes through the houses,

but he skips one.

He's not only does he skip anyone, he skips the very first house that they lived at.

And he goes, okay, so that's all the places that you lived at, right?

Like this was totally rehearsed.

And she goes, oh no, you missed a spot.

And he's like, oh, and then instantly you get, oh, here's a photo that we had ready to

go for it.

And it's like, you know, this guy has been doing this for, you know, a decade and a half

probably, you're not going to forget the first place where someone alleged this.

So I hit that in closing again.

And I think, I mean, I remember one, the risk analyst, you're like shot arrows with her

eyes at Ken once I brought that up in closing.

But yeah, I think it was rehearsed.

For sure.

And we'll get to this kind of later in our, when we talk about closings, but right behind

us in this office right now, we have what we call Chantel's lie board, which we wrote

all of her inconsistencies and lies in closing.

So there were 12 huge inconsistencies in her story that she changed from preliminary hearing

under oath until trial under oath that we got to impeach her with.

So that was huge.

But I wanted Ben to bring up one of the other biggest ones.

There were 12, but there was one biggest one that Ben thought we were going to win on

alone.

So, yeah, and all right, so this is where I know in the questionnaire, I told you to

ask us about the toes.

So here, here come the toes.

Did you say toes?

I said toes.

So in the police report that there was one lead detective on this who had done, honestly,

a great, a huge amount of work on the case.

But she wrote down that, you know, Chantel, among all this other stuff that she had disclosed,

Chantel told the detective that our client was sticking his toes in her.

In her where?

Oh, no, please don't answer that question.

In her vagina?

Yes.

Okay.

And her anus.

And her anus.

Okay.

Well, so, and that is, you know, that is, it's very clear in the police reports that

she said that.

And while I'm crossing Chantel, most of the inconsistencies, she was just like, oh, yeah,

I said that.

Like, not even, I think sometimes she didn't even realize what she was saying yes to.

But then when I asked her, I was like, okay, so yesterday you were clear that, you know,

it was these parts of his body that penetrated you.

Yes.

And that's it, right?

Yes.

And I go, so why in the world did you, why did you tell the detective that he was sticking

his toes in you?

And she was like horrified by, oh my, I never said that.

I was like, okay.

And then the detective gets on the stand next.

And I'm like, detective, she told you that he was sticking his toes in her, right?

She's like, oh yeah, she said that.

And so during closing, like, like Tirza said, we have this big, it's this big poster board.

It's like a bigger legal pad, right?

And Tirza is, as I'm going through them, she's writing down line number one through line number

12 and, uh, line number 11 is just all caps toes with two question marks, because it was

just like, why, why in the world would you say something like that?

Like you've, you've made up so many versions that you just, now you can't remember what

you said.

And why would a detective put that in their report if it wasn't, if it wasn't what she

said?

Yeah.

Crazy.

Yeah.

Um, when you were.

I want to make a toe jam joke.

Yeah, man.

No, don't.

Please don't.

I can't.

Yeah.

There's only so much we can handle with this.

Like, it's not really.

Ugh.

Um, did you ask her on cross-examination about the birthmark she claimed was there?

I don't know.

I, I don't.

That's lie number 12.

Well, so, I'm not sure if, I, I just.

Um, pointed out that she was there during the surgery.

Like when they, when they introduced, and she was like, yeah, I was there for the, for

the surgery.

I did not.

I think I asked her like, well, you know, the first time you ever said anything to, I guess

I did cross again a little bit, not about the birthmark specifically, but I said, you know,

you, the first time you ever talked to police about any of this was August 1st, 2023.

That's right.

Um, but you waited a whole year to tell detectives about, you know, this birthmark and the scarring.

And she was just like, yeah.

And I didn't want to fuck with her too much about it because they had, they were going to

introduce the pictures and the pictures just so clearly show that it's not an oval shaped

birthmark.

But this is important because on direct, instead of saying that, yes, his penis, there's an

other, there's an oval shaped birthmark on the underside of her penis.

She doesn't say that at all.

She says, oh, there's a slight discoloration near the tip.

So that's changed.

And guess what?

The pictures that they submitted to the jury that you can't even see the tip of his penis.

So it's like so many, and then we went over in closing again too, but it's like, okay,

so she says there's an oval shaped birthmark.

Then they take pictures where there's not one.

And then she says something completely different at trial.

So it's like, you know, what, what do we all think is going on here?

Yeah.

She's like, oh, it's off camera.

Yeah.

Right.

Exactly.

Like, yeah, you're going to say, oh, it's discoloration tip.

And they're not going to take a picture of the tip.

Yeah, they would.

So.

Right.

It was clear that she was shown the picture and or the Commonwealth talked to her about

it and said, listen, there's not an oval shaped birthmark there.

And so she changed her testimony at trial.

Maybe you could only see it when he was erect.

Maybe.

Maybe.

Maybe.

But there certainly was no oval shaped birthmark.

Any, any other nuggets with cross-examination of Chantel or tears that you, you did most of

the cross, right?

Anything you want to share?

I'm trying to think.

I don't think there was anything else huge that comes to mind.

Oh, my gosh.

I need to stop talking.

That's what she said again.

All right.

Okay.

So next is the detective.

Okay.

No, actually.

Okay, well.

Actually, Nito went next.

Okay, yeah.

Who happened?

Well, who testified next?

Nito.

Yeah, I think Ben was just saying.

We did.

The detective came later.

Come on, Tirza.

Everything I say now.

I'm like, no one, Tirza.

Oh, God.

Okay.

So, Nito.

This is a professional podcast.

Sorry.

Okay.

Professional setting.

Sorry.

Very professional.

So sorry.

I'm wearing a tie.

I'm wearing a tie.

I'll keep myself together.

I apologize.

I apologize.

So Nito comes in.

Nito was next.

And Nito.

And he was a prosecution witness.

Yes.

And he, I think, made our case so much better.

So a prosecution witness in name only.

Mm-hmm.

Right.

Yes, for sure.

He came off very poorly and clearly lied about a lot of things.

But our big thing with Nito was that we didn't really paint him as a villain.

We painted him more as a brother who believed his sister and was making up lies to help her case.

Because he believed her.

What's the essence of his testimony?

Yeah.

What lies?

So.

Yeah.

Go ahead, Tarzan.

Go ahead.

All right.

So he, so Chantel at trial had mentioned, like, well, I told Nito about this the first day any of this ever happened.

All the way back in 2017.

Something that she had never said to the police before.

And so Nito then comes in and is like, yeah, that she, she did tell me that.

And, but Nito also gave a statement to the police and he actually said it was actually two weeks after the first time that she, that she ever told me.

Now that's what he said to the police.

And I go, well, wait a minute.

But you had that message.

Well, I had that one too.

Now, so he, when I'm trying to impeach him first about what he told the police, I'm like, well, didn't you tell detective so-and-so this?

And he goes, no, I didn't.

And I'm like, oh, okay.

Well, you, you gave a statement to detective so-and-so and I'm, I have the fucking thing in my hand.

And he goes, I never gave a statement to police.

I'm just like, okay.

That's great, man.

Cause she's coming up next.

Um, yeah.

And so, so I just kind of moved on because knowing that the detective is going to come in and hammer him.

So, um, the next, the next thing that I asked him about, um, we're, I'm sorry.

I've, I lost my train of thought.

I got the message, the Facebook message.

Oh yeah.

Yeah.

The Facebook message.

I'm sorry.

Um, I know you're right.

Okay.

So, um, thank you.

Thank you.

Someone has to, cause I don't know what the fuck I'm doing.

Um, so the, the, the Facebook message, I just asked him straight up.

I was like, okay, do you remember a Facebook conversation that you had?

This is after he said, yeah, she told me one day ago or, you know, the same day that it happened.

Okay.

Well, do you remember a Facebook conversation?

Or I think I said a social media, cause I really wasn't sure what it was.

Um, but it was like a DM.

Right.

And I was like, do you remember that?

And he goes, I mean, I kinda, but, um, like, I don't remember what it said.

I go, okay, well, if I show you a copy of it, would it refresh your recollection?

He's like, yeah.

And so I, I show it to him and he reads it and it's very clear.

Like what the conversation between them was he's messaging her.

He goes, take that post down.

And then she's pissed.

She was like, you know, no, you can't tell me what to do this and that.

And he goes, I'm your fucking brother.

Why wouldn't you say anything to me?

And I was like, you agree that she said that?

And he goes, yeah, I did.

And then the DA gets up on redirect.

She's like, well, you know, that's what you said.

But like, what did you really mean?

And he's like, well, you know, I, I, I meant like, why didn't you tell me sooner?

And because you know, what happened was I had actually forgot that she ever said anything

to me about like, he was just up there.

It was, he, the kid was dude was stressed.

What post did he, did she, what did the post did Chantel make?

I don't, well, that's the thing.

I, it must've been deleted.

That was, that was not on the phone.

The conversation regarding the post was on the phone, but we didn't, we don't know, but

it was clear that it was about that, or at least, I mean, that's what we insinuated and

that's where he went with it.

So.

And when did this conversation occur?

This happened about a month.

So, you know, she discloses middle of June, 2023.

This was early, mid July of 2023.

Oh, okay.

Okay.

Okay.

Yeah.

And that's supposedly in context to him, have him having been previously told that back

in 2017.

Right.

Exactly.

Exactly.

And then she actually at trial when she got caught in a lie had made up that she also told

him another time a couple of years later in maybe 2020 around, um, when the vaginal intercourse

started, um, because she got caught in a lie with one of her impeachment.

So she was like, oh, I actually told Nito a second time to that time.

And, and it was later.

And Nito said that never happened.

Um, he was never, he was never told a second time.

He was only told a first time.

So basically what you needed to get out of Nito was that she didn't actually tell him.

Um, and it was just more inconsistencies in her story.

Right.

Right.

Because he didn't have any firsthand knowledge.

He didn't say that he saw anything inappropriate or he knew anything.

Oh my God.

Was happening.

Or, or he didn't have any reason to report anything.

Right.

Correct.

But we did not talk about the raspberries.

In the trial or in this podcast, this podcast, which was like a huge thing, um, at trial.

So I'm so afraid to ask what after the toes.

I know.

Yeah.

Right.

This trial went sideways real quick, but, uh, no, this was just that the first time she

says that anything ever happened, um, when they first moved into the house, she said that

her and Nito were blowing raspberries on each other's stomachs.

And they're 11 and 12 years.

There's 11 and 12 years old at this point.

Raspberries on the stomach.

You knew that, right?

These kids are blowing raspberries on each other's stomach.

These are the same kids that reportedly were forced to have sex with each other at bio dad's

house.

And now they're 11 and 12 year old, 12 years old, and they're hanging out, blowing raspberries

on each other's stomachs.

In the brother's bed.

In the brother's bed.

And they, no, nothing wrong.

There's nothing wrong with that.

All right.

We don't need to like, you know, make blowing raspberries a thing.

All right.

I, I, I give raspberries to my daughter sometimes.

All right.

We don't need to make this weird.

It's a really different area.

And she tries to do it back to me, but she can't cause she's only five.

As fine as a normal age to do that.

I have a hairy stomach.

No, it's not, it's not, it's not that fun for her.

So much coming out in this podcast.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So it was just, Nito also said the same thing and they both said it as, you know, we were

just blowing raspberries on each other's stomach and it was very innocent.

And then uncle Dan came on the stand at trial.

Yeah.

We're talking about blowing raspberries on each other's stomach while laying in the brother's

bed.

Yes.

And Nito actually, yes.

And Nito actually called it motor boning on the stand.

No.

Oh man.

No, no, no.

Was that on direct?

Yes.

On direct?

He said motor boning?

Yes.

Motor boning.

No.

And then the prosecutor had to ask what that meant, right?

Why did this even come up?

I don't understand why was this even talked about?

Because it was the first incident.

So, because like to tie it all back together, like, because the way Chantel told the story

was we're, you know, blowing, blowing raspberries on each other one day in Nito's bed.

Client walks in and was like, what the hell are you guys doing?

Separates them.

And she says that, you know, later that day, he was like, I know what you guys were doing

up there.

So, you know.

Later, he said, if you're blowing anything.

It's me.

Yeah, correct.

That's verbatim.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay.

So, that's, yeah.

That's why we had to bring up the raspberries.

But yeah.

So, Nito corroborated that story, but instead said motor boating.

So, that was a big, big thing.

Oh, so then, when Nito was testifying, you know, like, did he seem conflicted?

I know you said he was trying to back up his sister, but did he seem conflicted?

Because I presumably, it seems like he would have a good relationship with the uncle.

The uncle not only, like, got into school.

I didn't presume that.

Graduated from honors, is now going away to college.

You know, I don't know.

I just don't, you know.

And I don't know Nito, but did he seem conflicted at all?

Or at least have his uncles back on something.

Nito, no, man, well, Nito hated him by this point because, you know, our client physically

disciplined him.

You know, Nito was a-

Yeah, I picked up on that.

Nito was kind of a shithead growing up, but, you know, he turned around.

He did graduate with honors.

But, you know, I think that, like Tirza was saying earlier, he heard his sister told him

about this.

He's not the cops.

Like, it's not his job to go investigate.

It's his job to be like, I have your back no matter what.

Like, fuck this guy.

And it was, like, he was not only, it was clear that he hated client on the stand, but

he was just, like, Nito was so stressed out.

Like, I mean, he looked, like, in physical pain.

Like, he was not having a good time up there.

Poor guy.

Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, you said that your client said he was a violent person.

You said that your client said he wasn't always nice to the kids and that he was old school

and that he had gotten that kid to turn his life around.

I sort of assumed that there was some corporal punishment and tension there.

And then the fact that Chantel wanted to leave if brother wasn't going to be there meant,

I mean, you put all those pieces together.

It doesn't seem like it was a happy family.

Exactly right.

Yeah, that's a great way to describe it.

I mean, that's what actually happened.

So did we talk about the cross of Nito, or are we talking about his testimony enough,

or did we get it all out?

Yeah, I think we're good.

Yeah.

Okay.

All right.

We'll just end Nito on the motorboating, and next is the detective, right?

Yeah, yeah.

The non-forensic interviewing detective.

Yeah, and, you know, she was also the one who had the premature birth issue, but her and

the baby were okay.

So she was the one who did all the work on it.

And normally, you know, the affiant will sit at the council table with the commonwealth.

But since she was still on maternity leave or wasn't well enough to be there the whole

time, it was just some random guy who sat there.

But when it was finally, it was another detective.

I shouldn't say random guy.

It was another detective.

But he wasn't on the case.

He was not on the case.

But anyway, so when Detective Valenciic, she gets up there and she's testifying, she didn't

really have a whole hell of a lot to say on direct, right, Tarza?

No.

And, you know...

Did she seem like she didn't believe your client?

She was just very...

Or sorry, the complaining witness?

Sure.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

I mean, she definitely didn't believe the client, no.

Yeah, I mean, well, leading up to it, because I had seen this detective at the prelim, and

you know, I've read so many of these police reports.

I mean, it seems like she did, like, some of the most investigative work that I've seen.

So I think she cares.

I mean, she was so professional.

She, when I'm crossing her, because I have, you know, like I said, Chantel had given us

almost every inconsistency that we pointed out.

She agreed that she had said something different on a prior occasion.

But, like, the toes, and there were several other things that she wouldn't give us.

And when I went to the detective, you know, I honestly just forgot to be like, well, so

you're a detective, and you take all these detailed notes, and this and that.

I was just like, you wrote a report, right?

Yes.

Okay, do you remember what she said?

No.

If I showed you the report, could you tell me what she said?

Yes.

And she, like, didn't fight me, didn't say, well, I might have misinterpreted this.

I said, you know, did she say the thing about the toes?

Oh, yeah, she said that.

And everything, like, she was not giving me any...

She wasn't putting up any fights, I think.

I don't know.

She hadn't seen most of the trials, so I'm not sure if she knew that the writing was on the wall or not.

How badly it was going.

Yeah.

So it's kind of, like, just a waste of time.

Maybe some...

Got some inconsistencies out, ready to impeach Chantella.

Yeah, it was quick.

It was quick, for sure.

But impactful.

Yeah.

She told you he was sticking his toes in her orifices, right?

Yeah.

Did...

Yeah.

Yep.

Were they able to sneak in the fact that she was on maternity leave and had the preemie baby or premature pregnancy or anything like that?

Nope.

Oh, good.

Wow.

I'm surprised that...

I don't think they do that.

Usually they're able to sneak in that little thing of humanity for them.

Yeah.

Well, what they did try to sneak in was, you know, you investigate all these child abuse cases.

Yes.

Okay.

Well, do you charge everyone that you investigate?

Oh, no.

Yeah.

And we objected to it.

And they, like, couldn't understand why.

But the judge agreed with us.

And that line of questioning was shut down.

Great.

Okay.

So then who testified next?

Yeah.

Anybody else?

The friend.

Who else could they have called?

Oh, who's the friend?

Go ahead, Tiers.

Yeah, there was a friend that Chantel said that she told about these allegations, she disclosed

to about the allegations when they were in middle school.

So it was her best friend in middle school.

And she had...

What year would that be?

2017, 2018?

They didn't remember the year.

But it was...

It would have been between, like, 2018, 2019, 2020.

Okay.

So she had said that she told her during that time, and that they actually, the way that

she disclosed to her was over a Google Doc, because that is how they communicated in middle

school.

They didn't communicate over text.

The fuck they did.

Right.

Right.

Exactly.

You know the middle school kids, like, oh, look at my Google Doc.

Right.

And they were, you know, they would both type on the Google Doc so that you could both

see it and all these things.

So they actually had a screenshot of this Google Doc that was supposedly created back in 2018.

But the screenshot had nothing, no timestamp, nothing.

It was basically just all this writing.

You couldn't see who said it, who said what.

If Chantel said something, if the friend said something, you couldn't see anything because

it was just a screenshot of the Google Doc.

What did it say?

What did it say on the Google Doc?

So it basically...

Yeah, I think Ben's looking for it.

My uncle...

If it says anything about toes, I'm so done.

No toes were mentioned, unfortunately.

Does your uncle stick his toe in your issue?

Because mine does.

Nothing about the toes.

But, you know, it just says my uncle is a drunk.

From the nose to the toes.

Let's get it.

It's a bunch of, like, I don't like it.

He's going to put me on punishment.

And then, like, oh, he's trying to have sex with me, if that's what you don't understand.

But, like, I know you guys can't really see it.

But it's, like Tia just said, there's no timestamps.

Like, and we wanted to point out, like, anyone could have made this.

That's a Google Doc?

That's not a Google Doc.

That's what they said it was.

That looks like, oh, it has the arrows up there.

What is that?

It's like a search function.

My uncle is a drunk, right?

Yeah.

Yeah.

He tries to have you-know-what with me.

Ew.

I don't want to do it all.

He keeps trying each and every night.

But when I just don't do anything, he yells at me.

And I'm immediately on punishment.

But what?

How does it?

It's so hard for me to understand real life right now.

Plus, I'm studying.

So, you know.

Where's the metadata?

What's the metadata on that picture?

What does that show?

That's the thing.

So, out of all this stuff in her phone, we can't find that.

That looks like a fucking note.

Exactly.

Right?

And so that's-

It's like something she just made.

Yep.

Right.

And she had the story to the police.

Oh, well, you know, my uncle made me delete this, but somehow I just recovered it.

And so now we're going to bring in, you know, the person who's allegedly on the other end of this.

I have never seen a Google Doc look like that.

Yeah.

I mean, so, well, you know what?

We, our investigator, Marty, I was like, hey, can you, like, cook up a Google Doc?

Like, we're going to make one that looks just like this.

And we're going to introduce it and we're going to do all this crazy shit.

You didn't try 402 that out for it not being able to be authenticated?

Oh, we tried.

I tried.

We tried so hard.

Actually, that's a motion to eliminate that we forgot to mention.

We tried to motion to eliminate it and he was, the judge denied it, but he was like, you

know, that doesn't mean I'm letting it in.

They still have to properly authenticate it.

And he ruled that they had properly, I objected again during the trial, you know, that there's

no timestamps, like, what the hell?

Yes, we have these people saying, yep, I think I remember this.

And it was sometime when we were middle school and this is, this is what I remember it to

be, but that's how they authenticated it.

Okay.

That's bullshit.

So this woman came to testify and said she'd known Chantel and that this, in fact, is a

conversation they had.

Yes, she, she definitely started to not remember all of it when she was on the stand.

So she was like, yes, she, yes, she told me that there, yes, she told me through a Google

doc.

Yes, that's how we communicated.

And then when she was shown the Google doc, she was like, yes.

Um, but then on cross examination, she started to get a little more of, you know, I can't remember

exactly who said what, if that's exactly what was said.

Um, so it, it, it, she definitely, and then it came out when on cross examination as well.

Um, Ben asked her, you know, have you talked to Chantel since these charges have been filed?

And she said, yeah, she reached out to me and asked me if I could help her.

So that was all we really needed from her.

All right.

That, that seems like it was, it went okay for you guys.

Yeah.

Um, so then, uh, anybody else testify for the prosecution?

Yeah, they, they had a, um, like a childhood disclosure expert.

I mean, I'm not sure if they have that, uh, where you guys are, but it's, you know.

The people who explain why the kids don't report it.

Yeah.

They have, they always have an expert on, the prosecution always has an expert to explain

why their case doesn't make sense.

Yeah.

Yes.

Why they're a victim is testifying like shit, you know, or why.

Exactly.

They can't, children can't remember anything.

Everything's normal.

And we, we don't actually know.

Totally, totally consistent with someone who's been abused.

Everything you're seeing is consistent with abuse.

Even right now.

Um, so did this, did this childhood, the trauma disclosure expert actually interview Chantel

before the trial?

No.

Police reports, any discovery, meet Chantel.

No.

So they just test by, generally speaking, that kids don't report or under report because yada,

yada, yada.

Authority, loyalty, fear.

Yeah.

Shame.

And there's, you know, they, they have several of these experts that they call and like this

one, like some of them will fight you tooth and nail and like be idiots about everything.

This woman, again, uh, much like the detective, very professional.

And like, I wasn't going to fuck with her too much.

Cause I didn't really care what she had to say.

You know, I pointed out, okay, well you said this, the study doesn't really say that.

Well, you can interpret it that way.

Um, one of the, like I, one of the, I want, cause I objected to her testifying at, at certain

point, like on certain points.

And I got up there and I was just like, you know, obviously you're very educated.

You know, my objections weren't meant to do this.

So I'm like buttering her up, but she, um, she was fine.

Like I, at the end I was like, you know, wouldn't you agree with me?

It's like, the fact of the matter is like, it's just hard to tell when people are telling

the truth.

She's like, oh yeah.

Like I have no idea what's going on.

I can't, I'm not, I'm not here to say that anybody's telling the truth.

She was like, that's why, why are the juries here?

Right.

She's like, I don't know if they're telling the truth or not.

Oh, that's cool.

Were you able to ask her about, I mean, cause a lot of these witnesses will come in, like

David say and say, well, all of this is consistent with someone who's been abused.

But then my thought is always, yeah, but that doesn't mean our client is the one who abused

them.

So were you able to talk to her about that?

Like, this is someone who has a history, a documented history of other people sexually

abusing her.

Well, since like that, again, that, that what we've been discussing about those like eerie

allegations did not come out like in, in full in trial.

Like basically Nito was the one that was like, oh yeah, my sister molested us.

And that, that was it.

So I didn't get to ask any, I kind of just left that alone.

Thanks Nito.

Right.

Yeah.

And cause like you guys said, it's, it was always, we, Tiers and I, and you know, our

other coworkers had discussed like, you know, but we're all biased.

It's like when we heard the blowing raspberry stories, we're like, oh, these, these kids are

definitely sucking each other off.

Like we just didn't know if it was obvious to everyone else.

And I think it probably was to the jury at that point.

So didn't ask the disclosure expert.

There's at the very least, there's some boundary crossing.

Yeah, for sure.

Yeah.

There's some inappropriate behavior happening because they're not really understanding what's

appropriate or not.

Probably because their early childhood experiences were entirely inappropriate.

Yes, exactly.

Um, all right, cool.

Any other witnesses for the prosecution you want to talk about?

Nope.

No.

I think that was it.

All right, cool.

So you didn't really need to toe jam the expert up a little bit on anything?

No, I, um, like I said, I tried to, I, cause I read the studies and I thought I was gonna

like, um, I don't know.

No.

Well, once you got her to say, you can't really tell if she's telling the truth, what the

hell else was there to, and we're done.

No further questions.

Yeah, it ended fine.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay.

So motion to dismiss anything?

Any 27 counts knocked out?

We, we thought about it, but like they, I, I had to go through the judges like, okay,

you know, do you have any motions to make?

And I was like, can I get 10 minutes?

Because there's 27 counts and we got to think about all of this.

Um, but no, there wasn't because I mean, she had the way they had directed her was okay.

Um, oral intercourse.

Did it happen?

Yes.

Was it once or more than once, more than once.

And there was really no like detail given.

And they did the same thing for vaginal, the same thing for anal, the same thing for, you

know, do you grab your breasts?

And so there, there wasn't anything specific I could say, um, or that we could say to be

like, you know, the, the, even if believed there was not sufficient testimony for one of

these counts.

All right.

So it's time for the defense then did you guys put on a defense?

Nope.

We did not.

All right.

Client didn't want to testify or with advice.

Can we talk about that?

With the advice of counsel?

Didn't testify.

Yeah.

Yeah.

He, he, he, he was back and forth for a long time.

Um, but both of our advice was to not testify, especially with how well the trial went.

I mean, it would have been great if he got up there and started in the same way he started

with Ben though.

So listen, I'm a violent man, but I didn't do this.

And you know, he, he really wants, like he's, he's, he's got like a, this gruff voice and

he, he really wanted to, but again, throughout the whole process, um, he was always very

appreciative and, um, like willing to listen to our advice.

Cause you know, I, we all have the clients who are just like, I don't give a fuck what

you tell me, like, I'm going to do what I want this and this guy, he was like the antithesis

of that.

I mean, during trial, he had, he was like getting here early.

He bought tears and I muffins and coffee every day.

Um, and so we told him like, we're, you know, you're not testifying.

He was like, okay.

I was like, this trial has gone too well so far for you to fuck it up.

So, but you go straight to closing.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, so it's like we, so we did the medical records had already been admitted, right?

By, by the Commonwealth.

And they had also.

How did that come in?

Your client's medical records.

Yeah.

So I mean, they brought that in or did you just stipulate to them?

Stipulated to them.

Um, cause again, yeah, like we said, we wanted them in there too.

But what they also, it was like, I think that was their exhibit six.

And then they, they were like, okay, now here's exhibit seven.

Here's one particular page of the medical records.

And so the only thing that we entered, um, were two pages from the medical records that we had as our A and B.

And the first page was, uh, the surgical description of the mask that they had removed from his testicle.

And correct.

And the, um, the second page was, um, his description of the doctor saying, you know, it's so painful.

I can't wear underwear anymore.

So those are the only two.

I was like, this is defendants A and B.

Yeah.

And then it's time to do closings.

Okay.

Tell us about closings then.

Sure.

So, um, uh, the best part had, had spent, um, the, uh, Thursday was the last witness and the judge was off on Friday.

So I got a whole weekend to think about the closing, which was, which was awesome.

Uh, stressful, but awesome.

So I had a lot of time to write it.

And then, um, tears, uh, um, myself and another attorney from our office actually came in on Sunday night.

Um, and we were here to like 11, kind of tweaking everything and getting it ready to go.

Um, so started, started the closing.

We, we already had the idea that we're going to give the, the lie board and tears.

It was like, you know, we got to have a fucking grapefruit to show these people, right?

Like it's, you, you need to use this.

And so our, our, our investigator.

I don't disagree.

I just, this is just, you have, this case was fun.

How excited was Tirza when she told you that?

How excited was Tirza?

You're like.

Oh yeah.

She was fucking thrilled, man.

Um, you know.

Grapefruit, no sugar.

We're posing in the morning.

So it was, um.

People are visual learners.

They need to see it.

So our investigator, Marty, um, he was the one who actually went out and got the grapefruit.

Grapefruit.

Um.

Wait, wait, wait.

Before you talk about this, when she testified on the stand, she talked about there being

an oval birthmark, right?

Oh.

Did she ever say, hey, there was a giant fucking grapefruit slapping against me the whole time?

Nope.

Okay.

Never.

That's the thing I feel like you might miss a birthmark, but you're not going to miss a

grapefruit size testicle.

Exactly.

Exactly.

Okay.

Sorry.

This needed to clear.

No, no.

That's okay.

Yeah.

I also, we also did forget to say there was another officer who testified who just, who

took the photos of his penis at the, at the jail.

So he had to testify to put those in.

So those did come in.

They are, and they were in evidence.

The judge was like, uh, do you not want to put these on the big screen and we can just

pass them around?

And we were like, yeah, our client would probably prefer that.

And the jurors, you just saw them like quickly looking and passing them, like trying not to

stare.

Your poor client.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It was sad, but okay.

Go.

So yeah.

Um, we, the closing when actual grapefruit.

Oh yeah.

We had, we had tears ahead them in, in her bag.

You had to have a backup grapefruit, obviously.

Yeah.

So, um, you know, when, when we had, when I had practiced my closing the night before

it was, I think it was like 42 minutes and I was like, that's, that's kind of long.

I'd like to shave it down.

And, um, I, I can't with this whole episode, but, uh, so before I'm not sure if this was,

um, at one point, like I'm looking up and, uh, with the oldest juror, we put like, there's

probably this guy was 80 years old probably.

And it was great.

We forgot to talk about him on the jury, but we were like, oh, you're tired.

What do you do with your time?

He's like, well, I sit on my couch and I drink booze.

And we're like, you're on the jury, man.

Congratulations.

Um, but anyway, so I'm, I'm like in the middle of the closing and like, I'm reading, I'm reading

some off my notes and I just see this guy like waving at me and the judge isn't paying

attention.

I'm like, judge, I don't like this guy needs something's going on here.

And, um, the juror was giving him a sign like this.

He was like, judge, I need a break.

And, uh, so he let the, he let the jury go to the bathroom and the judge asked me, he's

like, Mr.

Jackson, how much longer do you have?

I, and I truly, I was like, well, judge, I don't, how long have I been going?

He's like, it's been 50 minutes.

And I'm like, oh my God.

I was like five, zero.

Um, I was like, judge, I got like another 25 in me.

I think he's like, okay.

You know, it is what it is, but whatever.

There's 27 counts, man.

Yeah.

And we went through, you know, every, I told him when he came back, cause he seemed, and

I was like, don't be concerned.

The jurors are very engaged.

They're all still writing notes.

Like it wasn't like they were losing interest at all.

And then comes the grapefruit.

And then they were very engaged.

That's the, that's the, that's the episode title.

And then comes the grapefruit.

So, um, you know, cause it was having already introduced like the, um, like the, the surgery

part that described this mass, I, it was in centimeters.

And so I'm reading, I was like, and then when you go, when you guys go back, no, it knows

the metric system.

No, it's a centimeter.

Exactly.

I, so I told, I was like, you know, when you go back there, look at defendants exhibit

a, so I was like, I've converted this to inches for you, but it's, you know, six inches

by this, by this.

And I had the grapefruit hanging out right next to me.

And I, and the DAs are, are looking over at our table.

Like what the, what the fuck is that?

So I, I just picked it up and I was like, see, like, this isn't even like, this is actually

smaller than what was on his.

And I was like, and this is the guy that's raping someone every other day for six years.

Like, come on notice.

Yeah.

Right.

Yeah.

Never said anything.

Oh yeah.

By the way, a year later, here it is.

Um, but so yeah.

And we, we get in wrapping all this up, um, you know, the night before I had like a

different ending to the closing and tears that was like, you know, that's great.

And I thought it was like clever.

Cause I can't remember exactly what I said, but she was like, Oh yeah.

And she was like, fuck that.

Like get emotional.

I know you can do it.

Like, go ahead and get emotional.

And so I changed the, the ending of it.

And, um, it was, it was awesome.

I said something to the effect of, um, you know, if the Commonwealth had any sense of

justice, they would have withdrawn these charges when they, when their two star witnesses got

on the stand and perjured themselves multiple times.

But since they won't do it, you have to, because, and I was like, you know, meanwhile, our client

has to sit here through this mockery of the, of a trial.

You're looking at photos of his penis.

And we, now we got to understand we have the lie board right next to me.

And I go, and this is the case they put on.

Um, and then I picked up the grapefruit and showed it to him one more time.

And, you know, closing with, I was like, I said it at the beginning.

I'm telling you again, Mr. Tift is not guilty because none of this ever happened.

Um, so then went and sat down.

I was like, just so fucking, it was, I was, I was like buzzing, man.

It was, it was awesome.

I felt really good.

Um, I left the lie board up.

And so then the DA, also when we were doing the lie board, like, so I was standing up there.

And so every time Ben went through one of her lies, I started writing away.

Yeah.

That's what I said when we practiced it the night before.

I was like, these, these jurors are going to think I'm Vanna White.

It's fine.

But I, yeah, I started writing them and the jurors loved it.

I mean, they were writing every single time I wrote, they were looking at it, writing down,

but the DA, we set it up like right in front of them.

So the DA, he like came around and was standing right next to me while I was writing it, just

staring at me.

And like halfway through, he was like, are you done?

I'm like, no, I have many more.

Thank you.

Not even close, buddy.

But I told Ben to take it down because I thought the DA was going to come up and like scratch

off our lies and explain them away.

So on his, on his second argument, cause the DA gets a rebuttal argument after the defense

argument, right?

So we, in Pennsylvania, we go first.

Really?

What?

I hate it.

We hate it.

But you don't have the bourbon.

Right.

Right.

Well, so it's like they, um, how it goes is in openings.

Um, they go first, we go second in closing.

We go first.

They go last.

That's all Pennsylvania or Allegheny County?

All of Pennsylvania.

It sucks.

What the fuck?

Yeah.

I hate it because we don't get to respond to them at all.

Well, but that's bullshit.

That's just the burden.

You have to start talking about, okay.

All right.

So we object here in California.

We object to your closing argument rules in Pennsylvania.

No, thank you.

I'll come back to that as well.

Okay.

So the DA gets up there for his argument.

You have the whiteboard up with the 12 lies and there's a grapefruit somewhere.

So instead of addressing any of them, he doesn't.

And he just hands the board back.

He walks the board over to us and is like, can you put this down?

I'm like, yeah.

And it ended up looking great because he's like, I don't want the jury looking at all

these lies.

But Ben, you have to tell, but you have to tell the, you know, he, he gets up and the

first thing he says was some weird.

She was like looking at the jury and he goes, well, I told you, I told, and I'm thinking

like, what the fuck, what do you mean?

You told us, um, he is then, uh, this is like the wildest closing.

I just have to preface it as the wildest DA closing I've ever seen in my car life.

I'm excited.

We have toes and grapefruits and all kinds of crazy stuff.

If this is wild, I'm excited.

Oh man.

He's, he starts, he starts saying that like, you know, well, you know, Mr. Jackson can

see villains everywhere except on his right.

And you know, like, well, I'm just at this point, he's like, I was like, okay, I'll let

that one go.

And if shit starts getting crazy, whatever.

But then he starts talking about like, wow.

So Chantel must be a ninja.

And literally he's saying the words ninja master manipulator, uh, like a Marvel villain.

He said something about this, the suicide squad of master manipulators.

He was like, wow.

You know, she must be Jeffrey Dahmer talking about his alleged victim.

Like he's saying like, I were painting her as this quote unquote super villain.

And you guys only have two options.

Either he did all of this or Chantel is a super villain.

And like, just making really idiotic arguments.

And like, it was, it was a short time into his closing.

Cause that's the thing.

He said, Tirza was mentioning it earlier.

Like we didn't, we paint, we did not paint Nito, her brother as a villain.

We were like, look, anyone can see why he did this.

He loves his sister.

He's had, he has her back.

He came in and lied to you, but he thinks he's doing the right thing.

You know what I mean?

That's, that's what a good brother does.

Um, and he said something like, I went out of my way during my closing.

To say like, look, what didn't happen here?

Chantel didn't sit down with her brother and was like, Hey, I'm going to make all this

shit up.

I need you to lie for me.

She decided to do this.

He's following in her footsteps, not knowing it.

And Ken, the, the DA, like one of the first things he said is closing.

Like, so what?

Mr. Jackson wants you to believe that they just sat down and made all this up together.

And I'm thinking, I'm looking at the juror and they're all looking like, what the fuck

is this guy talking about?

It was clear to me that like Ken had something prepared and just didn't change anything in response.

And that's when he starts going off script.

Like that's when he comes over to council table and he grabs the fucking grapefruit.

He said like, yeah, and he's like this little fucking weasel looking guy.

And he's like, sir, do you mind if I take this?

I'm like, all right.

And without saying anything, he just takes a pen and underhandedly stabs a hole into the

bottom of this grapefruit.

What?

Just fucking.

I didn't think here's about a second one, but okay.

You need the backup grapefruit.

He does that.

I'm like, I'm, I look at Tirza and we're like, what the fuck?

Tirza, you got to explain like the face on the female jurors.

So the juror number one, who was a male starts hysterically laughing.

Like he cannot hold it together.

He just starts cracking the fuck up and we're trying to hold our laughter in because he's

so close to the jury when he's doing it too.

So everybody's like, what is happening?

But juror number six, who was a female juror, like was like in, in disbelief.

And she like looked down and she was just disgusted.

Like she could not look at the prosecutor in the eye after that at all.

She was like looking down, like shaking, like she was like, what the fuck is this guy doing?

Stabbing this fucking grapefruit in front of me.

What did he say when he stabbed it?

Well, that's, that's, that's the thing, right?

So when he, when he, during the actual stab, he said nothing.

He just fucking stabs it and he goes.

And so, you know, we told you that she was going to describe the surgery and she told you

he had a scar like right here.

That was his whole point.

But like, he didn't realize that like in our thing, like we use that as like, this is the

mass that was removed.

Like, I guess he was using that as his, his like nutsack and just was stabbing it.

It was, and then he started saying something, cause you got to understand the scar he was

saying was at the bottom of this guy's sack.

And he goes, he made a point to the jury.

He was like, you know, obviously when you're having sex, you can see the, the bottom of

someone's, um, you know, like testicles and everyone's looking like, what the fuck is

this guy?

And then, yes.

And then he, he's saying all this wild shit.

And then he also says like, he's like, and yeah, maybe, uh, maybe she's inconsistent about

some of the times that these happen, right?

Maybe she is, but I cannot remember the past seven years of my sexual experience either.

And again, this is where juror number one, the construction worker who's wearing sunglasses.

Now he's like audibly laughing and I'm, I'm looking and smiling cause everyone's like, yo,

it's not hard to describe zero fucking times, pal.

Um, but we're really trying to keep our composure, but it is so fucking hard during this.

We just keep looking at each other.

I'm looking down, trying to burst into tears.

And the craziest part was, you know, there was a couple of, there was secretaries from

our office who were like watching this closing.

Cause like tears and I did not see this firsthand, but enough people reported to us that like,

this was a fact.

So remember he stabs the grapefruit and he's talking all this crazy shit.

Then he's got to go put the grapefruit down back in front on our table.

And then he, so he puts it down and he turns around and apparently some juice had got on

his fingers.

He's looking at the jury and he fucking sucks the juice off of his fingers.

No, no, no.

It happened.

I mean.

No.

Oh God.

Ball sack juice.

Right, exactly.

After you just as well as his ball sack.

I can't with this case.

Wild.

We kept, we kept making a joke that the jury was going to come back with a question during

deliberations and be like, can we actually charge the DA with something?

Like actually, we are violated by the DA in this case.

Oh God.

Yeah.

Okay.

How's your client reacting in this moment?

Is he enjoying this?

You know, like, is he, is.

I actually don't know.

I was like, we were sitting on tears and I were sitting on either side of them.

Like I was making so many faces like at the jury.

Like, can you believe this guy?

So I'm not really sure how he was reacting.

Yeah.

Honestly, I don't think I looked at him.

I don't think he was really reacting that much.

What about the judge?

What about the judge?

Oh, excellent question.

The judge is, is, is laughing as well.

Like he's.

And he's trying to put his hand in front of his face and we can't see him.

Like when he started talking, like he said villain first and I'm thinking like, okay, maybe

I should object.

He said, when he said Jeffrey Dahmer, um, I looked at the judge and he's just like, he's

like, you know, if you want me to, I just remember shaking my head.

I was just like, we're good.

Let him go.

Let him go.

I love those moments where you have this telepathic conversations with the judge.

I was like, nah, I'm, I'm just gonna, let's see where this goes.

That's stabbing a grapefruit.

I mean, this is.

And also, and like given also to, we didn't mention that he has another DA at the table

with him as his co-counsel, who is a female DA who would have done a much better closing,

but she's sitting there and I just know that she is like, what the fuck is he doing?

Like he just destroyed our case.

She is waiting for the earth to swallow her whole in that.

Right.

Right.

I'd be like, yeah.

Like I got to be associated with this.

Like what the hell?

Oh man.

It was such a wild experience to watch.

Um, all right.

That's, that's a, that's probably the best closing argument for a DA I've ever heard of.

Yeah.

Fantastic.

That was pretty awesome.

Um, okay.

So then were they out for?

Yeah.

How long did the jurors deliberate for?

So they, they got the case at, um, just after two 30 and Friday on a Friday or Thursday.

This was a Monday.

Cause my Monday weekend.

That's right.

That's right.

Okay.

So, um, and you know, the judges here, they'll keep people the varying time.

Normally they want to let them go right at four 30.

And like the clerks will text us like, okay, they're letting them go.

Um, or just give us an, they're going to stay a little bit longer, but they'll keep us in the loop.

Um, I didn't get a text.

And now we're at, you know, four 30 is the end of the day for these courts.

And so we're at five 30.

I'm like, what the fuck is like, they wouldn't have just sent the jury home.

Like without telling me and tears is here.

Our coworker, Kevin sits right across and you know, it's, so it's getting close to like decision time.

Kevin's like, well, this judge usually will keep them till six o'clock.

And I'm like, okay, so it's five 30.

And then tears and Kevin are like, man, the worst thing in the world would be if we got a verdict right now.

Like we're fucked if we get a verdict and at five 50, I get a call from the clerk and it's like, Hey, come on over.

We got a verdict.

And it was like, you know, I'm on the phone with the clerk and Kevin and tears are like just panicking and like trying not to let me see them panic.

Um, and so anyway, so we get the call at five 50 and the client has been outside the office, like chain smoking, listening to Spotify on his, uh, on his phone.

Just like having a great time.

We're like, okay, it's time to go over.

And so, uh, you know, he was, he was stressed and you know, now we're all stressed.

I'm trying, I'm thinking like, man, the DA really fucked this up and I feel really good about the closing.

Like I'm, I'm really hoping it's good news, but it's hard to, you never know, you know what I mean?

And so we make it through security.

We're walking over the courthouse, which is right across the street from our office.

So we get through security.

We're in the elevator and it is, you can cut the tension with the rope and it's the, it's like the most painful silence ever.

And the elevator starts to move and like, no one is looking at each other.

We're not saying fucking anything.

And then the client, he, I don't know where he just like to break the silence.

He just goes, like not knowing if he's going to see the outside ever again.

And that was, that was just so fucking cool for him to do that.

Like kind of lighten the mood.

And then our coworker, Kevin was like, all right, so when we get the good news, like you come in and drinking with us.

And we're like, dude, you're going to jinx us.

Like, what the fuck?

Like, shut up.

But he was like, oh yeah.

So then we made it to the courtroom and, um, you know, it's, those are the, the most stressful moments.

Like the most stressful hour.

They had so many verdict forms to read.

Oh, well that's, it was, it was crazy.

Cause you know, so we're wait, we all get seated and you know, they're saying, look, we're about to bring the jury in.

And the client, you know, he's out of jail.

So now he's taken all of the shit out of his pockets.

Like just in case he's got to go, it's, uh, you know, emotional time.

And I'm trying to hold tears back.

It was rough.

We, I shook his hand one last time.

And then it's like, you know, the jury comes in and they, you know, the four person has a verdict slip and they got to hand it to the clerk who has it to the judge.

Judge takes a brief look at it.

He gives it back to the clerk.

Okay.

Now it's time to read.

And, you know, in real time, probably 30, 40 seconds have surpassed, but it already feels like we've been in there for 35 minutes.

Yeah.

And, you know, so then the, the four person starts reading and, you know, she reads the caption.

The first one is not guilty.

And you're like, Oh my God.

Like you just such a weight off your shoulders.

But then you're like 26 more.

And it's a, it's an 11 page verdict form.

And the four person, the risk analyst woman, she was like putting some zest on it.

She was like, she would read a count and then take a pause.

Not guilty.

And it was just like that.

Oh my God.

She was loving her moment.

She was, man.

And, um, there was no, they didn't, they didn't like signal to you.

No one smiled at you or winked or anything like that.

I was going to say that.

So I always try to look when they're walking in and see if they make any faces, if they look at the client.

And at first when they walked in, no one looked at him.

And so I was instantly scared.

I was like, Oh no, why aren't they looking at him?

And then when they got up into their seats, um, two of the jurors that I really liked looked right at him.

And so I instantly was like, okay, maybe we're okay, but no one smiled or any, they are always, I feel like the jurors are always like, I don't know if people instruct them, but they're always so good at like not showing anything throughout the whole trial.

Like we could not read them at all during the trial other than the laughter discussed.

But other than that, you couldn't read them.

So, uh, so not guilty for 11 page, like how many, this just went on the same zest 27 times.

Oh yeah.

Like, yeah.

And it was, it was like halfway through and like, cause you know, I'm standing up there, my legs are shaking.

Like it's cause it was, it was insane.

And, um, and the client starts like, when we get halfway through, it starts just bawling his eyes out.

Like, I mean, it was, he was just bawling his eyes out, looking at me and I'm like trying to half hug him.

So he's not, he's just, he's crying so much.

Um, and I was like, it's okay.

You can cry.

And then I started crying.

Ben started crying.

It was just a lot of tears.

Well, it was like, cause I knew that I heard him start sniffling.

And I'm like, if I even like divert my eyes a little bit, I'm going to start crying.

And I, I kept it together until we were one foot out of the courtroom, one foot out of the courtroom.

Now I'm just a blubbering mess.

We're all crying.

Um, and Kevin, like I, I keep talking about our coworker, Kevin, but he had won a trial like this, uh, last June.

And me and him went to his client's house and we're drinking with him.

And I got a picture of him and the client hugging.

Right.

And I told him, I was like, I need one of those.

I need one of those.

Um, after this case.

And so Kevin was there, like, I'm all crying.

He took so many pictures.

Um, it was, it was, uh, it was incredible because we hated the case before we, before we started

trying it, like before Chantel got on the stand and started testifying wildly.

It was like, you know, this, there's a chance that this guy who I've gotten to know for the

past 18 months, like he's, he's done.

So it was, it was a massive, uh, relief.

And so we, and I was just going to say, we were, yeah, we were all crying in the hallway, obviously so happy.

And, uh, our client comes up and, and he says, can I hug you?

And I'm like, of course you can hug me.

And he hugs me.

And then afterwards he goes, you understand I'm a little paranoid now.

Like, I love him.

I love him.

He's the best.

We drank with him after we went straight to the bar and celebrated.

And it was truly the best, like being able to drink and celebrate with him since he was out.

Love it.

Did that, do you guys talk to the jurors at all?

We, we, we wanted to, but it was, you know, by that time it's like probably quarter after six.

And we were like, basically after in court hours.

Yeah.

And, um, so we were hanging around in the sheriff's like, you guys got to go.

I was like, but we want to talk to the jurors.

And the one sheriff was like, oh yeah, that's fine.

And the other one came, he was like, no, get out.

Like, you're not, you're not staying here.

So we got, we got booted.

Um, so we didn't get to talk to him, but that's awesome.

And then have you guys kept, kept in touch with your clients since then?

I guess it was only like a month ago.

This case, uh, it's not guilty.

Yes.

We got the verdict on July 14th.

It seems like it's been three months ago.

Time is, time is weird, but yeah.

Um, I've, he's texted me at least a couple of times a week just

to shoot the shit.

Um, we were actually, we were going to go out to lunch today.

Me, Tirza and Dan, but Tirza had to do a plea.

So we had to reschedule.

But like I said, he was, he's, he really wants to take us out to lunch.

He's, he's a great guy.

He's, he's funny.

Um, it's yeah.

So good.

Yeah.

And like we said, like, yeah, he always brought us muffins and coffee every morning and then

drinking with him.

It was just, he is the best, one of the best clients that I've had at my time here.

Well, Ben, Tirza, it's been great having you guys on the podcast today, spending the afternoon

with you.

I, I mean, I've enjoyed listening to the, listen to you two, both share your story.

And I can only imagine how, how well you guys worked together during the trial on behalf

of your client.

Um, so it must've been a, it just sounds like it was a great job you did.

Yeah.

Way to do public defenders proud guys.

Yeah.

Hell yeah.

Thanks.

Thanks for having us.

Yeah.

It was, it was great.

Yeah.

So we're going to close it out, close it out with a question we ask all our guests.

We can start with, uh, we'll start with Ben, Ben.

So how you've been a public defender since 2019, uh, tell the A and G verse why you became

a public defender.

Yeah, I, I became a public defender.

I mean, ever since law school, I knew I wanted to do criminal defense.

Um, I being a public defender, um, you don't have to worry about, um, drumming up business

or, or telling, or telling people, no, you, you can't afford help in this scenario.

I had worked at an insurance, an insurance defense firm prior.

And I mean, I remember turning away indigent people and that, that sucked.

And, um, I've always been a big proponent of, I feel like our job is,

um, we can hold police and the system accountable to follow the rules because it's easy for them

to chip away at, um, people who don't have the resources to put up a fight.

And then before you know it, um, it's, it's not just the poor people who are, um, you know,

getting rolled over.

It's the rest of us.

I think it's one of the most important things.

So that's why.

Yeah, I agree.

I agree.

Yeah.

Um, and here's that, why'd you become a public defender?

So, um, I've actually wanted to be a public defender since I was 14.

Um, so my brother was in the system, um, and he went to prison for something he didn't do.

Um, and he was actually represented by our office.

Um, and our office had a lot of problems in the past.

Um, people know that we were sued by the ACLU.

Um, so when he was represented by our office, I felt that he didn't get the representation

that he deserved.

And ever since that time and, you know, being a family member, being in the courtroom, visiting

him in prison, all of that, um, really shaped why I wanted to be a public defender and make

sure that people in that position, not only defendants, but their family members and everybody

had the proper representation, um, throughout their, you know, throughout the case and throughout

the time.

And so ever since my experience, um, back when I was 14, I knew that this is what I wanted

to dedicate my life to.

Um, and I'm so happy that I did because I love this job so, so much.

Thank you.

That's great.

That's great.

Wow.

Um, all right.

Well, thanks for being on the show today.

It's great seeing you and Lauren, as always love the, such a pleasure.

Yeah.

Um, until next time.

Um, oh boy.

Okay.

One last one.

Thanks guys.

All right.

Thanks for the show.

Bye guys.

Thanks for tuning in to this week's episode of another not guilty shout out to Daniel Mark,

original A and G theme music composer and Mike Grimm for the remix.

And guess what?

We'll be back in two weeks with another not guilty straight from the trenches.