A jury in Los Angeles on Wednesday said a woman who hit and killed two young brothers in a crosswalk while speeding and impaired in 2020 must pay $21 million in punitive damages, in addition to $176 million in compensatory damages awarded last week.

The verdict against Rebecca Grossman also requires her former boyfriend, retired Major League Baseball pitcher Scott Erickson, to pay an additional $1.17 million in punitive damages. He is equally liable for the $176 million awarded on June 2.

The total damages award of $198.17 million comes nearly six years after Grossman struck 11-year-old Mark Iskander and 8-year-old Jacob Iskander in a crosswalk in Westlake Village in west Los Angeles County while speeding in a 2018 Mercedes-Benz AMG. Erickson was speeding near her in a 2014 Mercedes-Benz AMG, and witnesses testified they appeared to be racing.

Grossman, 62, is serving 15 years to life in prison after a jury in February 2024 convicted her of two counts of second-degree murder, two counts of vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence and one count of hit-and-run driving resulting in death or serious injury.

An appellate panel affirmed her convictions in a 143-page opinion published on March 17. The California Supreme Court rejected her review petition on Wednesday.

The damages award is $1.17 million more than the $21 million the Iskanders’ lawyer Brian Panish suggested in is closing argument on Tuesday. Panish suggested $20 million against Grossman and $1 million against Erickson. Erickson’s lawyer Deborah Tropp said Erickson is worth “approximately $1.2 million” and suggested jurors award only minimal or nomimal damages.

The compensatory damages awarded on June 2 include $8 million in past damages and $51 million in future damages to parents Karim and Nancy Iskander for Mark’s death, $6 million in past and $42 million in future for Jacob’s death, $10 million to Nancy for past emotional distress and $25 million for future, and $6 million for past emotional distress and $28 million for future to younger brother Zachary Iskander.

Polling then indicated two jurors believed Nancy deserved more than $35 million: Juror 10 said no to both past and future and juror 8 said no to future. They said yes to all other damages, which indicates they don’t believe the amounts are excessive.

One juror — juror two — said no when Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Huey P. Cotton Jr. asked if he agreed with the punitive awards on Wednesday. It’s unclear why he disagreed.

Grossman’s husband, plastic surgeon Peter Grossman, was a defendant because his wife’s SUV was registered in his name. He was a key witness in the punitive damages phase because the Iskanders’ lawyers at Panish | Shea | Ravipudi LLP said he was conspiring with his wife to shield her assets while taking money from his brother’s trust with the help of Sherman Oaks-based attorney Aaron Bregman, who is his close friend. The assets include their mansion in Hidden Hills that sold for $13 million.

Panish said in a statement:

This case was about choices—dangerous, reckless, and selfish choices that cost two young boys their lives. The evidence showed exactly what happened: excessive speed, disregard for the rules of the road, and a complete failure to protect human life. The jury held both defendants accountable for the devastating consequences of those choices.

Mark and Jacob were doing everything right. They were in a crosswalk, with their family. They should have made it home safely that night. This verdict sends a clear message that everyone must be held accountable when their selfish actions put innocent lives at risk.

The facts of this case are as heartbreaking as they are clear.

Erickson’s lawyer Jeff Braun said in statement:

First and foremost, we want the Iskander family to know that our hearts are broken for them and the unimaginable loss they have suffered. As parents ourselves, we cannot begin to comprehend the pain of losing two children. No amount of money can ever compensate for such a profound loss, and our thoughts remain with the family as they continue to navigate this tragedy.”

On behalf of our client, we respect the jury’s verdict and the process that led to it. While we are disappointed with certain aspects of the outcome, we are grateful for the opportunity to have the case heard and decided by a jury. The right to present a case to one’s peers is a cornerstone of our justice system, and we respect the jury’s service and careful consideration of the evidence.

In the coming days, we will review the verdict with our client and discuss the appropriate path forward. Today, however, our focus is on acknowledging the extraordinary loss the Iskander family has endured. We extend our sincere condolences to them and continue to keep them in our thoughts.

The Grossmans’ lawyer Esther Holm had not replied to an email seeking comment as of late Wednesday.

Nancy and Karim Iskander said in a statement:

To all of you who have loved us, Mark, and Jacob, and who have stood by our family from the very beginning — we are deeply grateful.

Today we thank you, and we thank the jury for delivering the punitive damages verdict today and , along with the previous wrongful death verdict.

We are especially thankful that the jury saw the truth and delivered justice with clarity and courage, guided by the outstanding work of the wonderful Brian Panish.

As you might imagine, our hearts remain broken and no verdict can ease the pain of losing our two sweet boys. It is a profoundly sad day when a jury is forced to place a dollar value on the lives of our children.

We understand this verdict will be appealed and that it may be years before any money is ever collected, if at all. What matters most to us now is that the perpetrators are finally beginning to show signs of accepting accountability, and that through this trial, many more people have had the chance to meet Mark and Jacob — to learn who they truly were and the light they brought into this world.

Sleep tight Mark and Jacob. We love you.

Erickson testified in the liability phase and in the punitive damages phase. He said he accelerated to 55 miles per hour when he saw the boys in the road so he could pass them and avoid them. He said he didn’t see Nancy and Zachry, and he knew when he saw Grossman’s vehicle alter that she’d hit something.

“And you thought right then, it was the boys she hit, didn’t you?” Panish asked.

“I didn’t know what she hit,” Erickson answered.

“The only thing that you could reason in your mind, in your heart of hearts was, it was Rebecca Grossman that hit the boys that you avoided, right?” Panish asked.

“I had to assume that,” Erickson answered.

“Did Rebecca Grossman ever tell you was his her car that hit the two boys and killed them?” Panish asked.

“No. She did not tell me,” Erickson answered.

“So Rebecca Grossman never, ever told you that she struck and killed the two boys. Correct?” Panish asked.

“I don’t recall that,” Erickson answered.

Erickson disputed his former MLB competitor and friend Royce Clayton’s testimony about a phone call they had shortly after Grossman struck the boys.

Clayton was with Erickson and Grossman at a restaurant before the crash and planned to meet them at Grossman’s home to eat tacos and watch the U.S. presidential debate. He spoke to Erickson on the phone after the crash, and he testified that Erickson told him they were “f***ing flying” and Grossman had struck the boys. Clayton also said he urged Erickson to contact police.

Erickson testified he never told Clayton any of that.

“You saw Rebecca Grossman hit the boys. That’s what Royce Clayton testified that you told him. Isn’t that true, sir?” Panish asked.

“I never said that,” Erickson answered.

“Well, because if you do say that, then you’re liable, aren’t you?” Panish asked.

Judge Cotton overruled objections that the question was argumentative and called for a legal conclusion, and Erickson answered, “I don’t know.”

Panish asked if Erickson has “ill will” toward Clayton.

“Yes. I’m not happy with Royce,” Erickson answered.

Panish asked Erickson about his testimony that he spoke to Grossman on the phone briefly after the crash and before he went to the scene and watched police and Grossman for hours.

“Rebecca Grossman called you and said, ‘There’s been something terrible that’s happened.’ You said, ‘Did you see the boys?’ She said, ‘Oh, the boys,’ and she hung up, right?” Panish asked.

“Yes,” Erickson answered.

Panish asked if Erickson told Grossman not to tell anyone they were drinking or racing.

Erickson answered “no” and “we were not racing.”

“Could you answer the question? Did you tell her, ‘Don’t say we were racing?’” Panish asked.

“No,” Erickson answered.

Erickson also testified he knew he was wrong to present a different vehicle as the one he was driving when Grossman struck the boys. Jurors heard earlier in trial that Erickson owned two Mercedes-Benz SUVs but used one registration for both, a practice law enforcement officers call cold plating.

Erickson presented the wrong vehicle for inspection to experts hired by the Iskanders’ lawyers and “during that inspection, you never once told anyone that this was a fake vehicle and it was not involved in the incident, did you?” Panish asked.

“Correct,” Erickson answered.

“You knew that the victims were spending money hiring expert witnesses to inspect a vehicle that you lied and knew wasn't in any accident, didn’t you?” Panish asked.

“Yes,” Erickson answered.

“And you didn’t care about the victims or anyone at that time, did you?” Panish asked.

“I did care,” Erickson answered.

“You did care. Well, my experience is people that care are honest. Would you agree with that?” Panish asked.

“Yes,” Erickson answered.

“So you said you care, but you were dishonest, allowing their experts not to inspect your vehicle because you told them this other vehicle was in the accident, just like you told the sheriff’s department, right?” Panish asked.

"Yes,” Erickson answered.

He acknowledged deleting texts with Grossman and said he did so because of limited phone storage.

“You knew if somebody got a hold of those messages, they could be damaging to you and Rebecca Grossman on your accountability?” Panish asked.

“I did not know that,” Erickson answered.

“In fact, sir, as you sit here today, you deny any responsibility or accountability whatsoever for the death of Mark and Jacob Iskander, correct?” Panish asked.

Erickson paused for about 10 seconds before he said, “Yes.”

“It took you a long time. Isn’t it true, sir, that you really do know that you’re responsible and you should be accountable, and that’s why it’s hard for you to say that?” Panish asked.

Judge Cotton overruled an argumentative objection.

“Well, you know, sir, don’t you, that if you're racing someone and that other person — not you — kill someone, you can be held responsible. You understand that, right?” Panish asked.

“I was never racing,” Erickson answered.

Erickson testified in the punitive damages phase that he feels “really terrible about what’s happened” and believes if he had “somehow been able to stop” he “probably” could’ve saved the boys’ lives.

“I feel really bad about my actions and some of the terrible behavior I did, and not being very honest,” Erickson said during questioning from Braun.

“I truly believe that now that if I would have somehow been able to stop, I probably could have possibly save their lives. That’s a hard thing to live with,” Erickson said.

Panish followed up by asking Erickson, “In the six years that you felt terrible, how do you think the family was feeling?”

Judge Cotton overruled Braun’s argumentative objection and Erickson answered, “It’s heartbreaking and devastating, I’m sure, and obviously a loss that could never be fixed.”

Liability phase witnesses

My May 4 article has details on the first 16 witnesses.

The other witnesses were:

Michael Kelley, a deputy with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department who testified Grossman’s eyes were drooping and watery and he smelled the ‘light odor” of an alcoholic beverage when he first approached her. Jurors saw videos of Grossman’s three field sobriety tests.

Michael Takacs, a Los Angeles County sheriff’s detective who analyzed Grossman’s blood test results while with the District Attorney Office’s Major Crimes Unit. He testified Kelley perfectly conducted Grossman’s field sobriety tests, and that her blood results show she was impaired when her SUV hit Mark and Jacob. He also said the Valium and Diazepam (benzodiazepine or benzos) in her system would increase impairment.

Kari DeClues, a forensic scientist with the Orange County Crime Lab who tested one of two blood samples provided by Grossman and concluded the alcohol level was .073. Another scientist tested the other sample and concluded the alcohol level was .074. Jurors heard about the results earlier in trial from Ariana Adeva, the crime lab’s assistant director. Grossman’s blood samples were tested in both Orange County and Los Angeles County because vehicular homicide cases require two tests and the counties agree to test each other’s samples.

Robert Snook, an expert witness hired by the Grossmans’ lawyers at Lewis Brisbois Bisgaard & Smith LLP. Jurors saw video of his Dec. 18, 2025, deposition in which he testified Grossman was speeding at 73 mph when she struck Mark and Jacob. He also said he doesn’t believe Erickson hit the boys. The Iskanders’ lawyers played the video in their case-in-chief on May 4.

Mark Hair, a longtime friend of Grossman who was drinking alcohol with his wife, Cindie Hair, and Grossman at their Westlake Village home the day of the crash. Grossman went from the Hairs’ home to Julio’s Agave Grill, where she drank a margarita before speeding down Triunfo Canyon Road and striking Mark and Jacob in the crosswalk at Saddle Mountain Drive. Hair testified in a video deposition on July 25, 2025, that he saw Grossman drink half of the margarita he mixed for her “and that was the last time I made note of her consumption.”

Dale Dunlap, a civil engineer with Expert Engineering Sciences, Inc. who analyzes roadway design in California and testified as an expert witness about the intersection where Grossman struck Mark and Jacob. He said the intersection does not have defects in its design that contributed to Grossman striking the boys, and a motorist traveling the 45 mph speed limit has time to see people in the crosswalk and react.

Jennifer Nagel, a dentist in Thousand Oaks who met the Iskanders during an Easter service at church. Her son Conner was friends with Mark, and jurors saw photos of the boys at church and school, and one at Dodger Stadium. Nagel visited the family at their home the day after the crash, and she testified about their devastating grief and their lives since then.

Grehtel Bartraza, a Los Angeles County sheriff’s sergeant who was a deputy when she responded to the crash scene. She testified about what she saw and did at the scene, including her observations of Grossman’s daughter, Alexis Grossman, and witnessing Grossman’s blood draw.

David Raymond, a mechanical engineering professor at California State University - Los Angeles who analyzed the damage on Grossman’s SUV and the boys’ fatal injuries.

Sergio Lopez, who was working in the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office Auto Insurance Fraud Unit when he was assigned to investigate Erickson’s vehicles and license plates. He detailed Erickson’s illegal “cold-plating” scheme that used the same registration for his two Mercedes-Benz SUVs. Erickson’s lawyers emphasized in cross-exam that the scheme had nothing to do with the crash.

Vanessa Meneses, a forensic scientist at the Orange County Crime Lab who analyzed Grossman’s blood sample lab results to determine her alcohol level at the time of the crash. She testified it was .11 to .13. at the time of the 7:10 p.m. crash on Sept. 29, 2020.

Richard Curry, an investigator with the Orange County District Attorney’s Office who analyzed the event data recorder on Grossman’s vehicle. His confirmed earlier testimony from Michael Hale, an investigator with the Orange County District Attorney’s Office who said Grossman reached 81 mph three seconds before the crash, and she applied her brakes 1.5 seconds before but not at the moment of impact. Curry and Hale said her SUV was traveling 73 mph when it struck the boys.

Robert Leffler, a California Highway Patrol officer warned Rebecca Grossman in 2013 that driving at speeds up to 90 mph endangered her life and the lives of others. Jurors saw his deposition videotaped on July 3, 2025, in which he testified he saw news coverage of the crash and remembered pulling her over on the 101 freeway near Westlake Village seven years earlier. He said he clocked Grossman at 92 mph in a 65 mph zone but gave her a break by writing the ticket for 80 mph. He described her speeding car as similar to a “sore thumb sticking out, the fastest car moving through the traffic.” He said she was apologetic.

Jeffrey Muttart, who directs research and training at the Driver Research Institute in Connecticut. He testified as an expert witness about Grossman’s and Erickson’s speed and movements as well as the layout and safety signs at the intersection where Grossman struck Mark and Jacob. He said Grossman’s actions “are consistent with impairment” and said her speed “made avoidance near zero, when a 45 mile an hour speed would yield near 100% avoidance.”

David Huelsen, retired Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department who investigated the crash with Detective Scott Shean. Jurors saw videos of his deposition testimony from June 8, 2025, and Nov. 26, 2025. He testified about responding to the intersection after the crash and interviewing Grossman. He said she told him she’d had one margarita.

Chamie Delkeskamp, a teacher and associate pastor at Ascension Lutheran Church and School in Thousand Oaks. Jacob was a student there and so was Mark before he moved to Oaks Christian School. She said she “came to know the Iskander family very, very, very well” and said the family “very, very, very, very tight knit.” She described Mark as “motivated, responsible, trustworthy” and “really, really smart in particular in math.” Jacob “had so much Scripture memorized” and “knew Hebrews XII by heart.” She said she “as a pastor for 27 years do not have that memorized, and so the pastoral staff would be like, ‘Oh my goodness. We cannot believe this kid knows all of this.’ It was amazing.”

Sherif Iskander, who is Karim Iskander’s younger brother. He testified about seeing his brother start a family and become a great father who was “extremely attentive” and “put his family as priority.” He said Mark “was like a role model for Jacob.” “Mark would teach him everything he knows. Jacob would tell me that Mark is so smart he’s going to become a brain surgeon.” He said Jacob was “very bubbly and “very outgoing.” He also testified about learning of the boys’ death and how Karim and Nancy have struggled since then.

Karim Iskander, who testified for two hours about his family and what happened the night Jacob and Mark were killed. Iskander grew up in Egypt and earned a doctorate in biomedical sciences from Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, where he met Nancy, who also is from Egypt. He moved to Westlake Village when he was working for a company that was acquired by the biotechnology Amgen Inc., which is based in nearby Thousand Oaks.

Jason McGee, a former Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy who is a state trooper in Colorado. He testified in a deposition on Nov. 11, 2025, about responding to the intersection after Grossman struck Mark and Jacob. He drove her to Los Robles Regional Medical Center and saw a nurse draw blood from her that was tested for alcohol and drugs. He said Grossman “saw the news, realized it was the incident she was involved in and made statements about seeing the kids in the street.” “She also made statements about how she couldn't live with herself if it was true, and her reaction just didn’t seem genuine, but she was very distraught, and obviously dealing with a lot.”

Rene Castaneda, crash reconstructionist who owns Castaneda Engineering Inc. in Clovis, California, who analyzed the crash and Grossman’s and Erickson’s speeds and movements. A surveillance camera recorded Erickson’s vehicle traveling by “quite faster” than other vehicles; Castaneda estimated his speed at 71.5 miles per hour. Grossman’s vehicle entered the video 2.89 seconds after Erickson’s at 50.3 miles per hour, then increased in speed to 73 miles per hour five seconds before Mark and Jacob were hit. Grossman hit 75 mph then “three seconds before she arrives at the area of impact, she’s still applying full throttle, traveling at 78 miles per hour.”

Nancy Iskander, who testifeid for two hours and 10 minutes about her family, what happened the night Mark and Jacob were killed and her ongoing grief. She said she “had unlimited dreams” for Mark as her first-born child and now feels “the sense of loss that you don’t go get over.” “It’s a sense of loss that you have to … face every day, every single day.” She remembered grabbing her son Zach and rushing out of the way when she heard and then saw two vehicles approaching that “looked to me like they were playing or racing.” “It wasn’t two regular cars, you know, driving towards an intersection, and it was extremely fast.”

Dean G. Kilpatrick, a professor of clinical psychology at the Medical University of South Carolina who evaluated Nancy and Karim Iskander. He described Nancy as “a very strong, resilient, impressive woman and human being.” “I’m impressed with the fact that things could be a lot worse if she didn’t have these positive resiliency factors.”

Pamela Curry, who was walking in the area when she heard revving engines and saw a “jovial” woman speeding in a white SUV who “looked like she was having fun.” “It just really sickened me.” Curry testified in Grossman’s criminal trial in 2024, and she testified again on July 22, 2025, in a video deposition that was entered as evidence in the civil trial. “She looked like she was having fun and looking back over her shoulder, and I was disappointed that I would see a grown woman not even looking forwards as she’s driving fast.”

Defense witnesses:

Rose Wiltshire, who testified in a video deposition that Grossman is a “business associate” she’s known for 20 years. She estified about a text message she received from Gross that said, “I do take accountability that I turned my head to the right, probably one or two seconds longer than I should have, when I saw a woman crashing on rollerblades on the right side of the road. I did not know it that night, but it was the mom. This grabbed my attention, and it probably would anyone else’s.”

Theodore Corwin, a retired plastic surgeon in Westlake Village who testified via video under a subpoena. He answered quesitons about complaints he heard about the intersection of Triunfo Canyon Road and Saddle Mountain Drive, where Grossman it the boys, through his role with a homeowners association. “The complaints related to traffic speed at that location, and people feeling unsafe crossing at that location. … It was different people expressing their experience, but I have no specific problem that I recall.” Holm had trouble in the exam because some of her questions called for answers that would involve hearsay and Judge Cotton sustained objections.

Mark Wessel, a retired traffic engineer who worked for the city of Westlake Village for 33 years. Holm tried to question him about complaints the city received about the intersection, and possible changes to the intersection rejeceted by the City Council. One change was to install signs with flashing lights. He testified in cross-examination that he doesn’t believe the changes would have made the intersection more safe.

Rob de Geus, the city manager of Westlake Village who also answered questions about safety complaints and improvement suggestions for the intersection. As she did with the other witnesses, Holm had trouble eliciting the testimony she wanted because so many of her questions called for answers that contained hearsay, and Judge Cotton sustained objections from the Iskanders’ lawyer Andrew Owen.

Raymond Taylor, who retired in 2018 after 25 years as Westlake Village’s city manager. He also answered questions about complaints regarding the intersection. “My recollection is the public safety committee had evaluated this very carefully and concluded that ... there was no pedestrian accident history there, and that they relied on the traffic engineer for the ... objective standards for the placement of that crosswalk, and felt that a any changes were not needed.”

Andrew Kwasniak, an engineering consultant and crash reconstructionist with Tatum Group in California. He testified the intersection’s “stopping sight distance doesn’t conform with known and accepted engineering standard as existed at the time of the collision.”

Cory Gaudet, a Los Angeles County sheriff's deputy who investigated Erickson for reckless driving. He testified Erickson’s friend Royce Clayton, a retired Major League Baseball shortstop, never told him that Erickson said he and Grossman were racing as Clayton testified he did in trial. Gaudet grew emotional as he recalled being at the intersection after the boys were struck and seeing their parents.

Melissa Wolfson, who lives about half a mile from the intersection and complained to City Hall that it was unsafe for pedestrians,

Defense attorney also entered portions of Huelsen’s depositions as evidence beyond what jurors from the Iskanders’ lawyers.

You can watch all testimony on my YouTube channel through this playlist.

Liability and compensatory closing arguments

Panish suggested jurors award $438 million in compensatory damages during his 2 1/2 hour closing argument on June 1. Erickson’s lawyer Jeff Braun suggested $10 million; Holm suggested whatever jurors feel is reasonable.

Punitive damages opening statements

Braun began his opening statement in the punitive phase by asking the 12 jurors, “Good morning. Anybody want to switch places with me today?”

Judge Cotton said the comment was “improper” as Panish called it “totally improper” and asked the judge to strike it from the record.

“Comment is stricken,” Cotton said.

Braun, a partner at McNeil Tropp & Braun LLP in Newport Beach, tried again.

“Good morning. Before anything else, I want to speak to the Iskander team plainly and respectfully, because they’ve suffered an immeasurable loss,” he said.

“It’s irrelevant to this phase of the trial,” Panish interjected. Judge Cotton sustained the objection.

Braun said “on behalf of my client, we acknowledge the jury’s prior fight, and we express genuine remorse for the harm that has occurred.”

“We accept your verdict on liability and on the finding that the conduct was involved malice, oppression or fraud, and we will not argue those determinations. We’re here for a different task today,” Braun said.

He said the punitive phase is “limited in scope.”

“Your role now is not to decide what happened or whether my client is responsible. That’s already been decided. Your role is to determine the amount of punitive damages, if any, that serves the law’s purpose of punishment and deterrence. Not vengeance. Not anger, and not to compensate for the loss,” Braun said.

Panish said he believes the punitive damages phase is “the most important part of the trial” because the purpose of the damages is to punish the defendants and send a message to society.

“You’re going to send a message that this conduct is not tolerated, and it’s going to stop others from engaging in this conduct, drunk driving, and all racing, all this cover up, all of this,” Panish said.

“You’re going to set a message that this conduct is not tolerated, and it’s going to stop others from engaging in this conduct, drunk driving, and all racing, all this cover up, all of this,” Panish said. “That’s what this punitive damage part of the trial is going to be about, sending a message to not only Erickson and Grossman, but to everyone in our community that this conduct, if you do it, you’re going to be punished, and if you can deter some people, that’s going to make it all worthwhile.”

Punitive damages witnesses

Len Esmond, a certified public accountant for nearly 40 years, worked for the Grossmans from 2015 to 2025. He prepared their personal tax returns and those of their business entities, including the Grossman Burn Center LLC, Grossman Medical Group Inc, Grossman Plastic Surgery Inc, and Grossman Surgery Center Inc. He said their income in 2020 was $1,167,192; 2021 was $1,339,519; 2022 was $1,389,611; 2023 was $1.9 million and 2024 was $1,053,283. That’s about $6.9 million in five years. He also testified about the annual profits for Grossman’s surgery centers.

Roy Pasco, a former financial controller for the Grossman Burn Foundation who answered questions about the corporations and finances.

Robert Leffler, the California Highway Patrol officer who ticketed Grossman in 2013. The Iskanders’ lawyers played another except from the video deposition in which he testified Grossman told him “something to the effect of, ‘I hope you don’t need the services of the Grossman Burn Center’ … or something like that, or ‘you’d better hope you don’t need the services.’ It was something in that nature, of you know, the Grossman Burn Center not being an option for me in the future, potentially.”

Scott Erickson testified for 48 minutes on June 5 in the punitive phase after a multi-day witness stand appearance in the liability phase. A clip of him testifying about what happened to the $46 million he made during his 17 years in professional baseball has been viewed millions of times.

Peter Grossman testified on June 5 and June 8 about he and his wife’s income and his companies for his plastic surgery business . Grossman’s father founded the Grossman Burn Foundation, and Grossman is a nationally prominent surgeon whose patients include comedian Jay Leno.

“Your wife killed Mark and Jacob Iskander, didn’t she?” Panish asked.

“My wife was involved in the accident, and she bears responsibility for that. I don’t particularly care for the word kills,” Grossman answered.

“Your wife was driving a motor vehicle that killed two youths while she was over the legal limit of alcohol, correct?” Panish asked.

Judge Cotton overruled an objection and Grossman answered, “No.”

“No? Your wife wasn’t over the legal limit of alcohol?” Panish asked.

“I do not believe she was over the legal limit of alcohol, sir,” Grossman answered.

Panish asked if the Grossman discussed “preventing Panish from getting control or access to all your assets.”

“We talked a number of things, and I believe that may have been a conversation,” Grossman answered.

“Is that a yes?” Panish asked.

“Yes,” Grossman answered.

“In fact, part of your scheme and plan was to transfer assets so the Iskander family couldn’t collect from your family, correct?” Panish asked.

“No,” Grossman answered.

“So you didn’t rely on lawyers to create all these trusts and transfers documents? You did that all yourself?” Panish asked.

“I don’t believe that was your last question. I think you asked me if I did it with an intent to hide. The answer to that is ‘no’,” Grossman answered.

Panish also asked Grossman about a “documentary” being produced about his wife’s prosecution and imprisonment. He referenced Paul Huebel in the courtroom, whom Grossman described as “a former newscaster, or news figure, and he is also an investigator.”

Grossman said he and his wife aren’t paying for a documentary but “people have asked us to make a documentary.”

“And Marla Maples, she’s been involved in helping in the documentary, right?” Panish asked.

“She has been involved, yes, sir,” Grossman answered.

“And Howie Mandel is another one you recruited to be involved in this documentary, right?” Panish asked.

“Not to my knowledge, sir,” Grossman answered.

Grossman said he’s “not privy” to the production details but “I know that there is people are making a documentary.”

“I certainly have not objected to it, but I have not had anything to do with the financing of it,” he said.

Grossman said he believes the “that at one time there was a title called ‘Gross Injustice.’”

“It’s called ‘Judicial Misconduct’, isn’t it, sir?” Panish asked.

“I have no idea about that, sir,” Grossman answered.

Panish played excerpts of recorded calls between the Grossmans, including one in which Peter Grossman said Nancy Iskander is “full of sh**” when she said she saw Rebecca in the hospital while doctors were trying to save Jacob’s life.

Panish also asked Grossman about his decision to “disinherit Rebecca from everything.”

“And the reason you were disinheriting her was to avoid creditors, wasn’t it, sir?” Panish asked.

“No, sir,” Grossman answered.

“Let’s see what you told your wife when you all were talking on the tape recorded line,” Panish said.

In the call, Rebecca asked, “When are you thinking about putting the house up for sale?”

“I would like to do it, honey,” Peter said. “I just don’t know the market yet, you know?" The real estate market and interest rates and stuff like that. I mean, again, if somebody came to me right away, I do it right away.”

Peter said he wants “to be a little bit more aggressive than I am right now, which is doing nothing, but I don’t want to be impulsive.”

Rebecca asked, “Are you worried that Panish is going to try to come after it?"

Peter said “he can’t” but “he’ll try.”

“There is no community equity anymore,” he said.

The recording ended and Panish asked, “You were worried about Iskanders getting to the money, weren’t you?"

“No, sir. I think it just said that I wasn’t worried about what Mr. Panish was going to do. Rebecca asked me that question,” Grossman said.

Holm said in her closing on Tuesday that jurors “heard phone calls” and “some of those things you heard were not very nice.”

“But this trial and this phase of the trial is about the conduct at the time of the accident,” said Holm, a partner at Lewis Brisbois Bisgaard & Smith LLP in Costa Mesa.

“I hope that you stay focused on that, because it’s not about what happens years later, it’s not about people talking about what happened, it’s about the actual conduct at the time, this, and it’s also not about opinion. So, Dr. Grossman has his opinions, he’s certainly entitled to those. You don’t have to agree with those. I know you don’t agree with those, and that is your prerogative. That’s the jury system. You’re supposed to come in here and say what it is you feel,” Holm said.

She said the jury’s $176 million verdict for compensatory damages “sent a message.”

“It tells us what you’re thinking,” she said.

You can watch all testimony and arguments on my YouTube channel, and you can find extensive coverage on TikTok, Instagram and Facebook.

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A jury in Columbia, South Carolina, on Monday acquitted a former gas station owner of murder for fatally shooting a teenage boy he chased after falsely accusing him of shoplifting bottled water.

Jurors deliberated about eight hours before declaring Chikei Rick Chow, 61, not guilty of murder for the May 28, 2023, shooting death of 14-year-old Cyrus Carmack-Belton.

Judge Heath Taylor’s clerk published the verdict about 8:45 p.m. Eastern Standard Time.

Chow’s son, Andy Chow, testified his father shot Cyrus after Cyrus pointed a gun at him. Prosecutors say the boy had a loaded 9 mm gun but never displayed it before he was shot.

Chow’s lawyer Shaun Kent said in his closing argument that prosecutors didn’t believe their own case.

The state “put witnesses on the stand: ‘Guns aren’t that bad. 14-year-old kids have guns all the time.’ And they had witnesses literally with their hands on the Bible, looking at you, talking about ‘guns are prevalent; it’s not that big of a deal,’” Kent said.

“That was the testimony. I didn’t make that up. That was the testimony that they submitted. Do I think they believe any part of that? Not a line of that,” Kent said.

Jurors deliberated about eight hours before declaring Chow not guilty of murder. They did not have lesser included charges to consider such as manslaughter.

His mother, father and other friends and family wept in the courtroom as the clerk polled the jury.

Chow’s lawyer Jack B. Swerling told reporters Chow was “defending his son. He was not trying to hurt the young man.”

“I feel sorry for the family. As I said during my opening statement, my heart goes out to them, but 14-year-old kids should not be roaming the streets of Columbia or South Carolina with semi-automatic pistols loaded and ready to fire.” Swerling said.

“We’re not celebrating the fact that this young man got killed. We just think that the jury sliced it the right way with Andy Chow coming out of store, thinking and having a reasonable suspicion that he may have taken something, leaving the store and going to follow him, and the father going after his son to make sure his son is okay,” he continued.

“What would you say to the Carmack family if you could say anything to them now?” a reporter asked.

“My heart goes out to them. I know I can’t imagine what they’re going through, or what they have been through, losing a son. I can’t. As a parent myself, I cannot imagine any pain … more difficult than that. So I feel for them, I really do, because they didn’t do anything. They didn’t. They didn’t bring on the suffering themselves.”

“This was something that their son put them into, and you know, young people need to learn. You can’t walk around the city carrying semi automatic weapons loaded. Look, what happened if he didn’t have a gun? This would not have happened,” Swerling said.

A laweyr for Cyrus’ family told reporters on Monday night that the question of why the 14-year-old had a gun “was answered when he was shot dead in the streets 130 yards from a store where he did absolutely nothing wrong.”

“The question was answered when this jury found him not guilty today. The question was answered because a child, a 14-year-old child, shot dead in Richland County, got no justice. When the family got no justice," said attorney Todd Rutherford, standing beside Cyrus’ father, Troy Belton, in a video from WIS-TV in Columbia.

“The anger is palpable tonight. You can feel it. You can touch it, because people saw a child that looked like their own. That did nothing wrong. A child that all the witnesses described had fear in his eyes when he left the store. And then he started to run as two grown men chased him down over a football field and shot him dead. This should not happen,” Rutherford said.

Prosecutor Dale Scott played video of Cyrus walking out of the store and the defendant, his wife and his son chasing after him.

“This could have been it. He could have walked off,” Scott said during his 50-minute closing argument.

“Let him go. Just let him go. We don’t need to be here today. Let the boy go. What have you got to lose? Why not call 911. It takes one second,” said Scott, a senior assistant solicitor in South Carolina’s 5th Judicial Circuit.

Andy, 23, testified he only wanted to see where Cyrus was going so he could tell police, but the boy tripped and then pointed a gun at him and his father fired a shot to protect him. Other witnesses testified Cyrus never displayed the gun before he was shot.

“He chose to chase down an eighth grader. The boy was so terrified that he ran out of his shoe and continued running. The boy was so terrified he’s losing clothing. He drops his phone. He drops his mother’s phone, but he continues running. Wouldn’t that have been even another great opportunity for them to stop?” Scott told the jury.

Kent said Chow and his son followed Cyrus out of the store because they believe he’d stolen bottled water and “it’s their property.”

“They’re emotional about it, and that’s why he ran after it. The question isn’t, ‘Do you think it’s right?’ The question is, ‘Is it legal?'“ Kent said.

Kent said Scott questioned Andy Chow and “got right in his face ... and he was saying everything to him, but the one thing he didn't say to him is, ‘You have been charged with following this young man out of the store, and you are criminally liable for following this young man out of the store.’”

“Because he’s not. He’s not liable. He’s not criminally liable. He has not been charged, and he did not do anything wrong,” Kent said.

Prosecutors “don’t have evidence to offer, but they have fear, passion, emotion, and they want to get that out of you,” he said.

“They want that fear, passion, and emotion, and for you to ignore the law. We do not get to take the law the way that we want it to be. We take the law the way that it is. Let me tell you that again, we don’t get to take the way that we want it to be,” Kent said.

“The solicitor can’t say, ‘Well, I want it to be illegal for a shopkeeper to go out of the store. Shopkeepers should not be able to follow somebody. That’s what I want. Andy, that’s what I want!’”

“That’s not the law,” Kent said.

Jurors earlier in the evening indicated they wanted to go home, but Judge Taylor told attorneys he’s concerned the huge amount of media attention could influence them, so he brought the jury into the courtroom and told them they can’t go home.

“Typically once the deliberative process begins, we ask you to stay here as long as possible. Certainly, we’re not going to do anything inhumane, but I’m going to ask you to keep deliberating,” the judge told them.

A court employee “is going to get with you shortly with regard to orders for dinner, and we’re just going to ask you to keep working.”

“I understand it’s been a long day. It’s been a long day for everybody, and I know y’all are diligently working, and I appreciate that, but we’re going to ask you just to keep working, and we’ll get your dinner orders,” Judge Taylor said.

You can find many trial highlights on my TikTok and Instagram pages, with a lot of information in the captions. I’ve been overwhelmed with the interest and the kind messages thanking me for my coverage. This trial was so important to so many people, and I’m glad I could help them follow it.

Thank you for supporting my independent legal affairs journalism. Your paid subscriptions make my work possible. If you’re not already a paid subscriber, please consider purchasing a subscription through Substack.

Upgrade

This is an independent, reader-supported project. Anyone who pays for a subscription is providing crucial assistance to bolster my independent coverage. Thank you!

A federal judge on Friday reinstated a jury’s defamation liability verdict against an online commentator sued by rapper Megan Thee Stallion.

Milagro Cooper does not qualify as a media defendant under Florida law because she was “commissioned” by rapper Tory Lanez and his family to defame Megan, according to a 25-page order from U.S. District Judge Cecilia M. Altonaga in the Southern District of Florida. Lanez is in prison in California for shooting Megan and injuring her feet in 2022

A federal jury in Miami on Dec. 1 determined Milagro is a media defendant, which entitled her to be notified before she was sued. Megan’s lawyers didn’t do that before they filed the lawsuit on Oct. 29, 2024, so Judge Altonaga tossed the defamation liability finding and the accompanying $16,000 in damages. That reduced damages to $59,000 for intentional infliction of emotional distress and promotion of an altered sexual depiction.

Megan’s lawyers asked the judge to alter the judgment and reinstate the defamation verdict in a 20-page motion filed on Dec. 23. Milagro filed notice of her intent to appeal the judgment, but the 11th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on March 30 said it wouldn’t schedule briefing until Judge Altonaga considered Megan’s motion to change the judgment.

The order issued Friday details how the jury came to decide if Milagro qualifies as media.

The judge ruled on Feb. 7, 2025, that Milagro is not media so the lawsuit could proceed despite the lack of pre-suit notice. Milagro’s lawyers, however, wanted the jury to decide the issue during trial, and Megan’s lawyers at Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP said they were fine with that. Altonaga said near the end of trial that she believed the record was now “quite different” and the jury should decide, and Megan’s lawyers agreed.

“Plaintiff also took an active role in addressing a jury question regarding how to properly evaluate the media-defendant factors. Her counsel participated in drafting, revising, and approving the jury instructions and special interrogatories without making the objections Plaintiff now asserts in the Motion,” according to the order issued Friday. “On this record, Plaintiff invited any alleged error and thus may not challenge the interrogatories under Rule 60(b)(1).”

However, Judge Altonaga said “extraordinary circumstances” justify reinstating the defamation finding. The key issue, the judge said, “is whether Defendant was commissioned by the Petersons to publish or broadcast those three defamatory statements,” referring to Lanez’s legal name, Daystar Peterson, and his father, Sonstar Peterson.

The evidence shows Defendant was commissioned by the Peterson family to make the three defamatory statements. When first approached by Daystar Peterson on September 17, 2020, Defendant stated, “if you gave me . . . any exclusive it’d change my life” and afterward maintained a close relationship with the Petersons.

The first defamatory statement — Defendant’s December 21, 2022 post calling Plaintiff a non-credible witness — was made the same day Daystar texted Defendant, “It’s Tory[.] Hit me[.]”

By that date, Defendant had received payments from Sonstar, obtained information from the Peterson team before other media outlets, and sent materials to assist Daystar’s criminal defense.

The second defamatory statement — Defendant’s January 5, 2023 appearance on DJ Akademiks’s podcast — was also made the same day Sonstar texted Defendant, “Hi Mila, call me asap.”

The third defamatory statement — Defendant’s August 7, 2024 post asking whether Plaintiff was “caught trying to deceive the courts again” — followed the June 10, 2023 Zoom meeting where participants, including Defendant, discussed using a “third-party” strategy because statements damaging to Plaintiff needed to come from someone other than “Tory[,]” whose own statements “[could] be held against him[.]”

Defendant confirmed her understanding of that role, inquiring about the content the Petersons were “looking for[.]” And as late as February 2024, Sonstar continued to direct Defendant to speak on matters he could not address himself. The third statement was consistent with that ongoing arrangement.

In sum, because the trial record shows that Defendant was commissioned by the Petersons to publish or broadcast the three defamatory statements, the Court finds as a matter of law that Defendant was not entitled to pre-suit notice.

You can read the entire order here.

Megan said in a prepared statement that the ruling “is a reminder that the truth matters and ultimately prevails.”

“I’m truly grateful for the judge’s thoughtful and thorough consideration in reinstating the jury’s defamation verdict and holding the defendant fully accountable for all of her actions. I’m ready to finally close this chapter and I hope this sends a powerful message that spreading lies and defamatory statements has clear consequences,” Megan said.

Previous articles:

Ex-gas station owner on trial for murder for shooting teenager accused of shoplifting

Closing arguments are scheduled Monday in the trial of an ex-gas station owner in South Carolina who shot and killed a teenager he falsely accused of shoplifting.

Rick Chow, 61, is charged with murder for shooting Cyrus Carmack-Belton, 14, in his back after he ran from the Shell station and convenience store Chow owned in Columbia on May 28, 2023.

Chow’s 23-year-old son, Andy Chow, testified on Friday that he ran after Cyrus because he believed he stole bottled water and wanted to see which direct he fled. He said he didn’t intend to catch up with him, but the boy tripped and pointed a gun at him as he was trying to stand up.

“I see he trips and falls flat on the grass, and so I was running full speed, so I end up catching up to him, and when I catch up to him, I see something is in his hand,” Chow said.

“I’m not sure what it is yet, but as he starts to get up, I see that it’s a gun, and he starts — and he points it at me. So I immediately put my hands up,” Chow testified.

“I start to back away from him quickly, and then I yelled, ‘He has a gun,’ and then I turn to my dad, who’s coming up behind us, and I yell at him again, ‘He has a gun,’ and I’m still backing up, and I watch my dad, and I hear I watch him yell, ‘Drop it! Drop it!’” Chow continued. “And he yells ‘No.’”

He said his father “pulls his gun and fires one shot.”

“After the shot, I turn and I look at him, and I see he takes one or two steps, drops his gun in front of him, and then ducks to the ground and stays on the ground,” Chow said about his father.

Dale Scott, a senior assistant solicitor in South Carolina’s 5th Judicial Circuit, screamed at Chow louder than I’ve ever heard an attorney scream at a witness. It happened after he ended his cross-exam by confirming with Chow that the shooting wouldn’t have happened if he and his father had stayed in their store instead of running after Cyrus.

Defense attorney Shaun Kent followed up in re-direct by asking Chow, “It doesn’t happen if Cyrus doesn’t pull a gun on you either, correct?”

“Correct,” Chow answered.

In re-cross, Scott screamed, “You don’t even know there’s a gun if you stay in the gas station! Right?”

A defense attorney said “Your Honor,” but Judge Heath Taylor didn’t intervene.

“You don’t know he’s got a gun if you stay put in the Shell gas station, correct?” Scott asked.

“Yes, sir,” Chow answered.

“I’m correct?” Scott asked.

“Yes, sir,” Chow answered.

Jurors saw video from body-worn cameras of Chow talking to police at the scene of the shooting. Defense lawyers entered it as evidence in their case in chief.

In the video, Andy Chow tells an officer the boy tripped and he “was like running next to him, and then that’s when he had like pulled out the gun.”

Chow said his father yelled “like, drop it or something.”

“And that’s when my dad — he didn’t drop it, so my dad shot him,” Chow said.

Eyewitnesses testified Cyrus never displayed a gun and appeared frightened as he ran from the Chows.

Lori Ann Carson, who was at the Shell station with her daughter and grandchildren, said she saw the teen's shoe fly off and saw him fall to the ground.

Carson testified Cyrus “looked frightened, scared” and “like he needed help.”

“And how is that you can say he looked frightened and scared? How do you say that?” asked Assistant Solicitor Byron Gipson.

“The way his eyes were just like, like a young child just in trouble and just needed help. He just looked scared, in his eyes,” Carson answered.

“And is that what compelled you to do a little bit more?” Gipson asked.

“Yes,” Carson answered.

She said the boy was “like one of my grandkids, one of my kids.”

“I just had to help. I just couldn’t, I could not not do nothing. I could not do nothing,” Carson testified.

“The best thing I could do was just get my family out the way. I didn't mind if I got hurt, but I needed my family out the way, and I, I had to go down there and help him,” she continued, becoming emotional.

“And that’s what you did?” Gipson asked.

“And that’s what I did,” Carson answered.

Gipson later clarified with Carson that she didn’t see anything in Cyrus’ hands.

“I saw his backpack on his back, but I didn't see anything in his hands,” Carson testified.

“And as he ran down Spring Street, what was in his hands?” Gipson asked.

“I didn’t see anything in his hands,” Carson answered.

“And as he fell multiple times, what was in his hands?” Gipson asked.

“I didn’t see anything in his hands,” Carson answered.

“And from your vantage point, you feel certain you would have seen if something was in his hands?” Gipson asked.

“Yes,” Carson answered.

Carson’s daughter Kennedy Carson testified said she saw one of the men extend his arms as if pointing a gun after Cyrus fell.

Carson got into the well of the courtroom to demonstrate Chow’s stance.

“Turn me in the direction of where Cyrus would have been facing,” Gipson said.

“Maybe a little lower because he had tripped and he was coming back up,” Carson said.

“Like that?” Gipson said as he repositioned himself.

“Yes,” Carson said.

Judge Taylor overruled Chow’s lawyer Jack B. Swerling’s objection for leading.

“Did you see Cyrus Carmack-Belton turn around at any point?” Gipson asked.

“No,” Carson answered.

“Did you see him point anything at Rick Chow or Andy Chow at any point?” Gipson asked.

“No,” Carson answered.

Jasmine Broadwater testified was going to a restaurant with her aunt when she saw “a young man running” then “heard a pop sound.”

“We saw a young man go down to the ground, and we saw an older man have a gun in his hand pointed in a gun stand,” Broadwater said.

“You said you heard a pop. Did you recognize what that sound was?” asked Assistant Solicitor Weston Liefer.

“Not at first until I seen him hit the ground,” Broadwater answered.

“Okay. And when you saw Cyrus hit the ground, what did you see anybody else doing at that time?” Liefer asked.

“Me and my aunt, we were just staring. We saw the older guy had his gun pointed still, and I believe his son was running behind him. He had came to a stop as well,” Broadwater answered.

“After you realized that a shot had happened, what did you guys do?” Liefer asked.

“We stopped. My aunt said, ‘Jas, he just shot that boy. You need to call the police.’ We’re both about to call them. So we both puled out our cell phones,” Broadwater answered. They drove closer “and we still see Cyrus on the ground.”

“He looked like he was trying to push himself up, like how somebody’s doing push-ups, like he was shaking really bad, and he propped back down on the ground, started banging on the ground like in pain,” Broadwater testified.

She and her aunt were “moving real slow, because we wanted to make sure we saw everything.”

“And that’s when I got on the phone with 911 and explained to them, like, ‘Hey, we just saw the gas station owner shoot a young boy,’” Broadwater testified.

She said Andy Chow, who chased Cyrus, too, “was standing with his hands on his hips, like he was trying to catch his breath.”

“Whenever you were pulling out, who did you see holding a gun?” Liefer asked.

“Mr. Rick,” Broadwater answered.

“Did you see Cyrus holding anything?” Liefer asked.

“No,” Broadwater answered.

In cross-exam, Kent focused on what exactly Broadwater saw and her statement to a 911 operator.

“When you talked to the 911 operator, do you remember specifically telling them you did not actually see the shooting?” Kent asked.

“I stated in my 911 calls that I think I saw, and then I — my aunt was behind me, as you can hear in the 911 call, she said, ‘No, Jasmine, he did shoot that boy,’ and I said, ‘Yes, he did,’” Broadwater testified.

Kent told Broadwater, “I’m not trying to trick you, but I want to make sure I understand, and I think that is exactly what I heard on the 911 call, but when you were talking to the 911 operator, you initially said, ‘I didn’t see anything,’ correct?”

“No, I said, ‘I think I saw,’” Broadwater said.

“You think you saw. You were not positive when you talked to them, correct?” Kent asked.

“Because of my emotions,” Broadwater answered.

“Fresh to the incident as possible, close to possible, emotional situation?” Kent asked.

“Correct,” Broadwater answered.

“And then utter what you remember to the 911 operator, fair?” Kent asked.

Kent said the 911 operator asked Broadwater, “‘Did you see him shoot, shoot the boy, or did you just hear the gun go off?’ and your response was, ‘We just heard the gun go off, and then we happened to see the owner pointing the gun at the boy while he was on the ground.’ You remember that?”

“Correct,” Broadwater answered.

Kent said Broadwater gave two additional statements and “each statement after that first 911 call, would you agree, got a little more detailed?”

“Yes,” Broadwater answered.

“And this was after you had met with law enforcement the next day?” Kent asked.

“Yes, when I met with law enforcement,” Broadwater answered.

Jurors have seen several demonstrations in the well of the courtroom from attorneys and witnesses. I’ll have more in my article on the verdict, and you can watch short testimony clips on my social media pages that include news article captions.

My posts on TikTok and Instagram are getting huge attention, and I feel I have a responsibility to share as much informative testimony as I can.

Closing arguments are Monday morning, and I’ll stream on my YouTube channel.

Testimony ends in brothers’ wrongful death trial

Closing arguments also are Monday in a wrongful death lawsuit trial in California over two young brothers killed by a speeding and impaired driver.

Lawyers for Rebecca Grossman and Scott Erickson rested their case last Wednesday. Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Huey Cotton instructed jurors on Friday and told them to return on Monday at 9 a.m. for closing arguments.

Attorney Brian Panish will argue for the plaintiffs, who are Nancy and Karim Iskander, whose sons Mark, 11, and Jacob, 8, died on Sept. 29, 2020, after Grossman struck them with her 2018 Mercedes-Benz AMG in a crosswalk in Westlake Village.

I’ll post video of the arguments on my YouTube channel and will try to live stream, too.

Thank you for supporting my independent legal affairs journalism. Your paid subscriptions make my work possible. If you’re not already a paid subscriber, please consider purchasing a subscription through Substack.

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I’m proud and humbled to have accepted the Los Angeles Criminal Courts Bar Association’s Journalism Excellence Award last night.

Thank you to the board members for the amazing recognition. And thank you, retired California Court of Appeal Justice Tom Goethals in Orange County for the generous introduction.

Here’s what Justice Goethals said:

I met Meghann Cuniff about 10 years ago late one afternoon in the hallway on the 11th floor of the main Orange County Superior Courthouse in Santa Ana. I recognized her because I had seen her in my courtroom almost daily for nearly two years, pounding away on the keyboard of her laptop, but we had never spoken.

The day’s hearing was over, and the hallway was empty, except for Meghann, and there she was again, pounding on her keyboard, trying to finish her story. She looked up and gave me her biggest and most embarrassed smile. I introduced myself, and she immediately said she knew who I was. I soon discovered that she was the Daily Journal’s Orange County courthouse reporter, and for some reason I sat down, and we had a nice visit, and we have been friends ever since.

As you know, Meghann is an extraordinary reporter. She’s smart. She’s determined and insightful and creative. She has an uncanny ability to simplify a complicated legal story to make it interesting and readable for both lawyers and non-lawyers. She also relates to people in a very human way, and it makes them feel comfortable to share their stories with her.

Every solid reporter I have ever known over the years, and it’s been 50 years, has taken great pride in her work, and Meghann certainly does that, and it shows. She works hard every day to get at the facts and to report them to her audience. These are her real gifts, but what makes her the whole package, the complete package, as a reporter, I think, is she also seems to really love her job. She gets up every morning, and she wants to go to work. How many of us can say that? I congratulate the Criminal Courts Bar Association on its wisdom in choosing to give Meghan this award, and I congratulate you, Meghan, on receiving this well-deserved honor. I now give you, ladies and gentlemen, your 2026, Journalism Excellence Award recipient, Meghan Cuniff.

I spoke a few words at the dinner, mostly about what a pinch me I’m dreaming moment this is for someone who grew up in Oregon and had never been to Southern California until I was 25.

I wrote a blog for The Spokesman-Review in Spokane, Wash., called Sirens & Gavels, and every Friday I posted Associated Press articles about crime and courts news around the country. I remember sharing articles in 2010 about a trial in Los Angeles for a man who killed the rapper Dolla, and I thought to myself at the time that the cases down here seemed like a totally different world from what I knew.

One thing I learned in Spokane is that the criminal justice system universally matters to communities and the real people who live in this country. Then I got to the Los Angeles Daily Journal and learned about Big Law and realized there are some attorneys who work misdemeanor theft cases, and there are some attorneys who try to turn theft into a $20 million trade secrets lawsuit. Those cases are important, too, but I always think about my time covering crime in communities when I think about how important our state criminal courts are, even the ones without celebrities in them.

As a journalist, I want to continue teaching people about the important work of the people in the trenches of our criminal justice system, and I want to spotlight the humanity that happens in our courtrooms every day. The recognition from the bar association reminds me who I am as a journalist, and what I want my core values to always be.

Congratulations to the other honorees:

Joseph H. Low IV — President’s Award, Extraordinary Contributor to the Criminal Justice System

Joseph A. Gutierrez — Joseph Rosen Award, Lifetime Achievement

Joseph A. Markus and Joseph E. Markus — Johnnie Cochran Jr. Award, Relentless Pursuit of Justice

Hon. H. Clay Jacke II — Hon. Robert Takasugi Award, Judicial Excellence

Vanessa Rownaghi and Yusun Kang — Jerry Giesler Award, Trial Attorney of the Year

Cameron J. Gomez — Richard Hutton Award, Rising Trial Attorney

What I’m covering right now

Testimony continues Monday in a civil wrongful death trial over two young brothers killed by a speeding driver near Westlake Village, California.

Defendant Scott Erickson testified last Monday and Wednesday. Plaintiffs’ attorney Brian Panish questioned him for about six hours. Panish represents Nancy and Karim Iskander, whose sons 11-year-old Mark and 8-year-old Jacob died after Rebecca Grossman struck them with her 2018 Mercedes-Benz AMG.

Grossman is in prison. Prosecutors dismissed a misdemeanor reckless driving charge against Erickson, who was speeding near her, after he filmed a public service announcement about safe driving.

Erickson’s lawyer Jeff Braun has not finished questioning him. Karim Iskander testified last Thursday, and Nancy Iskander is expected to testify this Tuesday.

Panish will get another chance to question Erickson after Braun questions him. Esther Holm, who represents Grossman and her husband, Peter Grossman, questioned him for about 25 minutes on Wednesday before Braun questioned him for about an hour.

Jury rejects death penalty in Florida gang murder

A Florida jury on Friday rejected the death penalty and recommended the men who murdered gang member and rapper Charles “Julio Foolio” Jones Jr. be sentenced to life in prison without parole. The same jurors a week earlier convicted Sean Gathright, 20; Isaiah Chance, 23; Rashad Murphy, 32; and Davion Murphy, 29.

Jurors deliberated less than two hours after hearing four days of testimony about the men’s childhoods and families.

They found prosecutors proved all aggravating factors, including the men were gang members, that the homicide was committed “a cold, calculated, and premeditated manner without any pretense of moral or legal justification” and “created a great risk of death to many persons,” but they agreed the mitigating factors outweighed them and recommended Judge Michelle Sisco sentence the men to life in prison without parole. The judge scheduled sentencing for June 22.

Chance’s girlfriend, Alicia Andrews, is to be sentenced this Friday (May 22) after a jury last October convicted her of manslaughter, a lesser included offense to first-degree murder charge, and acquitted her of conspiracy.

Gathright and the Murphys were convicted of first-degree murder, conspiracy to commit first-degree murder and three counts of attempted second-degree murder, which was a lesser included to attempted first-degree murder. Gathright also was convicted of evidence tampering.

Chance was convicted of the murder and conspiracy charge. He was not charged with attempted murder.

Gathright and the Murphys were the gunmen on June 23, 2024, outside the Home2 Suites hotel next to the University of South Florida while Chance and Andrews stood by in the same hotel parking lot after tracking Jones through the city.

Jones was prominent in drill rap, which celebrates violence and mocks death, and was in Tampa celebrating his 26th birthday.

He’d been shot several times before, including a shooting in Texas linked to one of the guns used to kill him.

The huge amount of evidence against the men ranged cellular location data and surveillance video, including from a Tesla that was charging in the lot when the men ran by and executed Jones.

I heard all the testimony while covering the trial on YouTube, and while the men’s guilt seemed certain, their punishment seemed totally in question. Florida lawmakers changed the state’s death penalty laws to allow for a jury to recommend death on an 8-4 vote, after a jury in 2022 rejected death for the mass murderer at a high school in Parkland on a 9-3 vote in favor.

Defense witnesses in the penalty phase included Nahshon Nicks, a community activist who has a child with Chance’s mother and has known Chance since he was six years old. He testified on Wednesday about Chance’s childhood, and he wanted to read a letter aloud to the jury.

Judge Sisco wouldn’t let him, and she sent the jury out of the courtroom to discuss that with him. Nicks told the judge, “The number one concern for our youth and our urban communities is homicide and suicide, right?” Sisco cited trial testimony from Robert Howard. who was with Jones when he was shot.

“I think it was Robert Howard testified that the people that are in the gangs in Jacksonville consider themselves the little Chicago, which I think would be distressing for any member of the community,” said Sisco, who presides in Florida’s 13th Judicial Circuit Court in Tampa.

“When it comes to gang violence, you certainly don’t want your community to be the little Chicago. … I’m just curious if there’s something going on in Jacksonville in particular that has made this scourge really blossom?” the judge asked.

Nicks said “a big self-fulfilling prophecy component” leads people to “look at it as entertainment until it becomes reality.”

“Unfortunately, the glamorization and attention hijacks the pleasure sensors to where endorphins, dopamine, cytosine is almost like a high that you’re constantly chasing, but it’s leading to counterproductive behaviors,” Nicks said.

Judge Sisco referenced the videos for the drill rap that Jones produced and said, “The more clicks you get, the more violent, the more outrageous the conduct, the more clips — clicks and it becomes lucrative, right?”

“Yes, Your Honor,” Nicks said.

The only other death penalty trial I’ve covered was the federal sentencing of serial killer Joseph Duncan in Idaho in 2008, and the main argument was defendant’s violent history — including murdering adults and attacking prison guards — means he’ll continue victimizing society in prison.

The argument in Florida last week seemed to be, “They are evil.”

Assistant State Attorney Scott Harmon detailed the men’s calculated planning in a 2 1/2 hour closing argument in which he said there was enough premeditation “to convict thousands of men.”

Harmon and prosecutors Michelle Doherty and Anna Ismer were like the Grim Reaper as they aggressively cross-examined defense witnesses who testified about the men’s childhoods and their current relationships. When witnesses indicated the men had nice relationships and childhoods, they’d emphasize that to try to show the jury the men knew better and were not victims of their own circumstances.

One testimony moment drew huge attention online as people noted what was being described was essentially modern-day slavery. It was from Raul Banasco, a jail administrator in Travis County, Texas, and private conultant who testified enthusiastically about putting these young men to work.

“In reality, we need that labor. We need that sweat equity, and we will put them out there to work because we do have an aging prison population,” Banasco said.

The youngest defendant, Gathright, was the only one to testify.

He acknowledged murdering Jones, apologized to Jones’ family and said he wants to build a productive life in prison.

“To the victim’s family, you know, I want to send my deepest condolences and my you know — I understand that it’s hard losing a child, a best friend, a brother, a cousin, and for that, I just cannot say sorry enough,” Gathright said.

“You know, I feel terrible about the situation, but I’m a firm believer that God can use anything for good that the devil wanted for bad, and so I am grateful for the people I’ve met, for the lessons that I’ve learned, for just this experience in general, because it’s one that I’ll never forget, and it’s going to shape the rest of my life,” Gathright said about being convicted of murder and ensuring he’ll die in prison.

“There’s that saying, it’s kind of cheesy, but you make lemons out of lemonade, or whatever?” his lawyer Jenna Finkelstein asked.

“Lemonade out of lemons,” Gathright corrected her.

“I obviously don’t make lemonade, but it sounds to me like you are going to try and make the best of a bad situation. Does that sound about right?” Finkelstein asked.

“Of course,” Gathright answered.

“And are you going to continue to do that?” Finkelstein asked.

“Of course. I’m going to try to, you know, continue a humble life, a righteous life, you know, try to do the right things at all times,” Gathright answered.

In cross-exam, Harmon asked Gathright, “Were you remorseful as you were running back with that AR-15 in your hands?”

“Like I said, I try to remember nothing from that night,” Gathright answered.

“Was it traumatic to you as you went back to the car with that AR-15? Was it still smoking? Was it still warm in your hands from firing?” Harmon asked.

Judge Sisco sustained Gathright’s lawyer’s objection.

“Were you feeling remorse as you were getting back into the Impala?” Harmon asked.

“Like I said, I just try to focus on today and moving forward,” Gathright answered.

The generational cycle of poverty and prison was on full display as the Murphy cousins’ uncle Winston Leo Murphy testified. He’s serving 70 years in prison for second-degree murder, as is his brother and Davion Murphy’s father, David Murphy, who had schizophrenia.

I’ll cover Andrews’ sentencing on Friday. I’ll also continue covering the Iskanders’ wrongful death trial and will send out another Substack this week with more testimony highlights.

Here’s a playlist with all YouTube coverage of the Julio Foolio capital murder trial.

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A retired Major League Baseball player testified on Friday that he sought his cousin’s advice before telling police his friend and former baseball competitor was the driver of a second SUV investigators were trying to identify after a speeding driver killed two boys in a crosswalk in 2020.

“At that time, there was no knowledge of what that vehicle was, who was involved, the other driver of the car. And I knew this information,” Royce Clayton said.

Clayton said his cousin, a former sheriff’s deputy, told him, “You have to tell your story to a detective, because the most important part, Royce, is you don’t know what’s going to happen.”

“In some instances, people that are involved in certain situations, as he’s explained to me, are culpable or actually blamed for something that happened, and you don’t want this,” Clayton testified. His cousin said, “I guarantee you that they know who the other person is, and you will be withholding information.”

Clayton is a key witness in a trial over a wrongful death lawsuit brought against retired MLB pitcher Scott Erickson, his ex-girlfriend Rebecca Grossman and Grossman’s husband, Peter Grossman, by Nancy and Karim Iskander, whose sons Mark, 11, and Jacob, 8, died after Grossman struck them with her 2018 Mercedes-Benz AMG GLE43 at 7:10 p.m. on Sept. 29, 2020, in Westlake Village, California.

Grossman, 62, is serving 15 years to life in prison after a jury in February 2024 convicted her of two counts of second-degree murder, two counts of vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence and one count of hit and run driving resulting in death or serious injury. An appellate panel affirmed her convictions in a 143-page opinion published on March 17.

Erickson, 58, was charged with misdemeanor reckless driving, but the charge was dismissed after he recorded a public service announcement about the dangers of it. [This article has been updated to correct a previous statement that Erickson was not charged with a crime.] He testified in Grossman’s criminal trial, and his lawyers said he’ll testify in the civil trial, which began on Friday, April 24. Peter Grossman is a defendant because his wife’s SUV was registered in his name. He’s a prominent plastic surgeon whose father founded the Grossman Burn Foundation.

The trial is in Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Huey Cotton’s courtroom in Van Nuys. It’s expected to last two months, and it’s being video recorded and streamed live online. I am streaming live on YouTube and Facebook and sharing videos of all testimony, as well as short clips of big trial moments there and on TikTok and Instagram.

Clayton testified on the trial’s sixth day.

He played shortstop for 11 teams from 1991 to 2007, and Erickson pitched for six teams from 2004 to 2019. They became friends early in their careers and after retirement sometimes met at bars and restaurants in Westlake Village in west Los Angeles County, where Clayton coached baseball at Oaks Christian School.

They saw each other at the Stonehaus Winery, then met Grossman at Julio’s Agave Grill. She’d been drinking earlier with friends at their home, and the Iskanders’ lawyer Brian Panish told jurors in his April 24 opening statement how she told them in a text message not to tell police she’d been drinking.

Clayton testified he planned to join Erickson and Grossman at a new home Grossman purchased on Westlake to eat tacos and watch the U.S. presidential debate. They left the restaurant together, and Clayton stopped at a grocery store and Grossman and Erickson were going to drive their Mercedes-Benz SUVs to her home.

Clayton was apparently in the store when Nancy Iskander and her three sons were crossing Triunfo Canyon Road at the intersection of Saddle Mountain Drive and Erickson and Grossman approached in their speeding SUVs.

Panish told jurors in his opening that Iskander heard “revving noise” and saw the vehicle approaching.

She grabbed her youngest son and “dives out of the way, but because Mr. Erickson is racing and he’s in the first lane, he blocks off the boys’ ability to escape, and they’re both hit at 73 miles an hour by Mrs. Grossman. 73 miles an hour,” said Panish, a founding partner of Panish | Shea | Ravipudi LLP in Los Angeles and one of the most successful plaintiff’s trial attorneys in the United States.

Clayton testified on Friday that he spoke with Erickson on the phone as Erickson hid in bushes and watched the crash scene, and Erickson told him and Grossman were “I don’t know if you use the word ‘racing’ — but they’re traveling a high rate of speed,” Clayton testified.

“She was directly behind him, and he said as he came up to this crosswalk, he saw the children,” Clayton began to cry and could not continue.

After a brief recess, Panish continued his exam by asking Clayton about his conversation with Erickson regarding attorney James Silverstein and prominent sports agent and attorney Jeff Borris.

“Did you have any discussions that night from the scene where you told Mr. Erickson that he should contact a representative?” Panish asked.

“Yes,” Clayton answered.

“And you felt that Mr. Erickson should contact the lawyer, and you told him that, right?” Panish asked.

“Yes,” Clayton answered.

“And you actually texted him the contact information of Mr. James Silverstein, a local lawyer that you knew?” Panish asked.

“He was recommended to me. I didn’t know Mr. Silverstein until a friend recommended him,” Clayton answered.

Panish confirmed Clayton got Silverstein’s name and contact information that night and texted it to Erickson.

Clayton testified his conversation with his cousin addressed “the legal part,” but “the conscience part of me” also emphasized “just the devastation these people must be going through in not knowing who was involved and what happened.”

He said he knows that “in certain situations, you’re considered telling information about something that you know legally, that can get somebody in trouble, or whatever, it’s called snitching” and his cousin told him, “You’re not snitching on anybody. When it comes to kids, this is something that’s going to come out.”

“And you don’t want to have your situation where you can lose time with your children, your family, if they try to blame you and be culpable for what happened. So you have to tell what you know,” Clayton said his cousin told him.

Panish followed up on his earlier testimony about his call with Erickson.

“And when Mr. Erickson talked to he told you he swerved to avoid the boys in the crosswalk. Is that right?” Panish asked.

“Yes,” Erickson answered.

“He also told you they looked at his rear view mirror and saw Rebecca Grossman hit both boys, didn’t he?” Panish asked

“Yeah,” Erickson answered.

Panish questioned Clayton about texts Erickson sent him about talking to police.

“No big story dude, I just know that you’re gonna have to tell the police that you met us for one drink and you went home. It’s that simple and she only had 1 drink the bill will prove it, but you have to account for that 4th drink because I had 2,” Erickon wrote two days after the boys were killed.

Erickson texted Clayton again the next day, “Did you speak to the detectives I assume everything went smoothly.”

He didn’t know that Clayton had already told police he’d been with Erickson and Grossman that night and knew Erickson was driving the other Mercedes-Benz.

“Were you worried about blowback or reactions of Mr. Erickson?” Panish asked.

“No,” Clayton answered.

“Were you worried about being labeled a snitch?” Panish asked.

“Yes,” Clayton answered.

Panish said he where he grew up — Inglewood — “Somebody that goes to the police and reports someone else is a snitch, right?”

“Yes,” Clayton answered.

“So you put that on one side, and you weighed out those factors and the other side that you told us, and you decided ... that you needed to do that. You needed to do right thing to do,” Panish said.

“It was the only thing to do,” Clayton testified.

Erickson’s lawyer Jeff I. Braun tried to discredit Clayton in cross-exam and ended up eliciting testimony that Erickson said he and Grossman were “f***ing flying down the street.”

Braun pressed Clayton about whether Erickson used the word “racing,” and he asked if Erickson said “the miles per hour estimate that they were driving at.”

“No. I can clarify this in a very simple explanation, sir,” Clayton said. “So if I’m talking to you and we’re friends, or, you know, we know each other ... you don’t use the word ‘racing’ because nobody’s going to say that.”

“‘We were f***ing flying down the street.’ How about that?” Clayton continued.

“Did he say, ‘We were f***ing flying down the street,’?” asked Braun, a partner at McNeil Tropp & Braun LLP in Newport Beach.

“Yes,” Clayton answered.

Braun asked if Clayton in the last six years “ever told anybody that Mr. Erickson told you we were ‘f***ing flying down the street’?”

Clayton said Braun “and the law officers are very specific.”

“Did he tell you he was racing? The word racing? No, maybe not. I don’t recall. ... I’ve known him for 30 years. How is Scott Erickson going to describe him driving? ‘Oh, we’re driving down the street at a high rate of speed.’ Nobody talks like that,” Clayton testified.

“He was talking in the way Scott Erickson talked to me to explain that he was in front of Ms. Grossman, driving at a high rate of speed, racing or flying down the f***ing street, however you want to describe it, and that’s what happened,” he continued.

Braun represents Erickson with Deborah S. Tropp-Thompson, who acknowledged in her opening statement that Erickson sped up, but she said he’ll testify he did so to avoid striking the boys.

Erickson “believes he is going 50 to 55 miles per hour when he is 20 to 30 yards from that crosswalk when he first sees, and is surprised to see, two kids in the road, two children in the road, and he describes them as being near that center divider,” she told jurors.

Erickson feared that even if he slammed his brakes “he very likely would not have been able to stop in time, and was very concerned he might hit the kids,” Tropp-Thompson said.

“And in this crucial moment, he will tell you that he made the decision to speed up a bit more because from where he was and where the children were, he knew he could clear the intersection safely and not harm the children,” she said. “The evidence will show that he was right and that that is exactly what he did, and that’s exactly what happened.”

Tropp-Thompson told jurors Erickson lives in Nevada and “does the golf circuit for charities.”

“He is going to be here as much as he can. This trial is important to him, and taking the stand is important to him. If he is not here every day, it is because he is in Nevada. He will be here as often as he can,” she told the jury.

The Grossmans’ lawyer Esther P. Holm told jurors in her opening that Grossman “did have a margarita, but we believe the evidence will show she was not impaired.”

"She did not mention that tests placed Grossman’s blood-alcohol content at .08 — the legal limit for driving in California — three hours after the crash when her bood was drawn. Other tests put it at .73/./74. Jurors also have seen tests showing she had Benzodiazepines and Valium in her system.

Holm said Grossman “never saw the children in the crosswalk” and “did not try to flee the scene.”

“You heard a bunch of witnesses that Mr. Panish brought up. All these people are going to say this and that. But not one of those people, not one of those persons, can come in here and tell you they knew what she was thinking,” Holm said. “There’s not going to be a psychic or a psychiatrist or psychologist that comes in here and says, ‘Ms. Grossman meant to do this,’ or … ‘She was clearly doing that.’”

“The only person who knows what Ms. Grossman had in her head is Ms. Grossman. So while well, people can say, ‘Oh, I believe this is what happened,’ it’s speculation,” said Holm, a partner at Lewis Brisbois Bisgaard & Smith LLP who is working with partner Matthew P. Harrison.

Panish showed jurors photos of the Iskander family during his opening and said they’ll see may more “not because we’re trying to get sympathy” but because they “have the burden of proving what we’ve lost.”

“And the only way that you can determine what someone has lost is to see the evidence of what they had,” Panish said. “So what you’re going to see is what this family had and what was taken from them, and worst of all, what they’ve been left with.”

Panish spoke about each boy as their school photos were displayed on a courtroom monitor.

“These are the kind of kids that you want to have in your community. They were respectful, kind, loving, smart and funny,” Panish said.

Mark “was the big brother. He was gifted in math and science. He dreamed of being a neurosurgeon or a comedian.”

Jacob “was a disciplined kid that at this age would wake up five or six in the morning and go for a run before he goes to school.”

Jurors saw video of the boys doing push ups together while slapping hands.

“This kind of sums up the relationship. Just take a look,” Panish said.

The video played for about 35 seconds.

When it stopped, Panish said, “Their mom was filming that with great pride and joy. That will never happen again.”

Testimony continues on Monday morning. You can find a playlist of all witness testimony on my YouTube channel.

They include:

Michael Hale, an investigator with the Orange County District Attorney's Office in the vehicular homicide unit who analyzed the crash for Los Angeles County criminal investigators. He testified Grossman reached 81 mph three seconds before the crash, and she applied her brakes 1.5 seconds before but not at the moment of impact. Her SUV was traveling 73 mph when it struck the boys, Hale said.

Rafael Mejia, a detective with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department who responded to the crash scene and spoke with Grossman.

Scott Shean, a Los Angeles County sheriff's detective who investigated the crash and interviewed witnesses, including about the speeds of the SUVs and alcohol consumed by Erickson and Grossman.

John Denton, a now retired Los Angeles County firefighter and paramedic who responded to the crash scene.

Chris Morgeson, who testified he was bicycling when he saw two dark-colored sedans and a white SUV later identified as Grossman’s speeding, then saw the SUV parked near a police car on Triunfo Canyon Road.

Alexis Grossman, via deposition. Jurors watched a video of Grossman’s daughter testifying in a deposition in February.

Ariana Adeva, the assistant director of the Orange County Crime Lab’s Identification Bureau. She said Grossman’s blood samples showed a blood-alcohol level of .074 and .073, and her blood had levels of caffeine, fluoxetine, norfluoxetine and nordazepam.

David Matero, an emergency room physician at Los Robles Regional Medical Center in Thousand Oaks who saw Jacob and Grossman after the crash. He said Grossman was “was relatively dismissive from the beginning” and “annoyed at the whole process.”

Donald Prijatel, who was driving in the area shorlty ebfore the crash and saw two Mercedes SUVs at a red light and heard both rev their engines before speeding away. Prijatel minutes later came upon an accident scene and heard a woman screaming at him not to run over her child.

Jake Sands, a passenger in a white Infiniti QX driven by his friend when he saw two Mercedes SUVs racing and saw the black SUV narrowly miss a family in the crosswalk, then saw the white SUV strike a boy.

Yasamin Eftekhari, who said she was driving when two Mercedes SUVs sped by her and saw two people struck in the intersection. “They like, tapped their brakes for a split second and just kept driving,” she said.

Blake Byfuglin, a criminalist with the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department who tested Grossman’s blood samples and testified she had benzodiazepines in her system.

Christopher Lopez, a Los Angeles sheriff’s criminalist who confirmed Byfuglin’s results through separate tests.

Sylors Chem, a Los Angeles sheriff’s criminalist who testifeid Grossman’s blood samples for alcohol and testified her blood-alcohol content was .08 at the time her blood was drawn, three hours after the crash.

Teryl Grasso, an emergency medical technician at Los Robles who tried to save Jacob’s life and also saw Grossman when she was at the hospital. She testified about the boy’s “angelic” face and cried as she described his parents’ devastation. She said Grossman “looked intoxicated,” “was very loud” and at times uncooperative. Hospital staff moved her to another area after she repeatedly yelled for a doctor she knew, who was treating Jacob at that time.

Garrett Smith, a 27-year veteran of the California Highway Patrol who examined Grossman’s Mercedes-Benz and testified there were no mechanical issues.

The judge presiding has been a judge since 2009.

Cotton was an attorney at Cozen O’Connor from 1988 to 2009 and was a senior trial attorney for the Defenders Association of Philadelphia and a staff attorney with the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. He earned his law degree from Temple University.

Closing arguments are Monday in the LAPD shooting wrongful death trial

Attorneys will give closing arguments on Monday, May 4, in a civl wrongful death trial over a police shooting at a Burlington Coat Factory in North Hollywood that killed a teen girl who was hiding in a fitting room.

Officer William Dorsey Jones Jr. finished testifying on Thursday, April 23.

He said he believed a man assaulting a woman with a bike lock had a gun when he fired three rounds inside the store, killing the man as well as a 14-year-old Valentina Orellana-Peralta, who was hiding with her mother in a fitting room.

Jones said he didn’t realize the man was holding only a bike lock and “I thought it was a gun” and he’d shot a woman in her face.

“You have fractions of a second to react. This is, in my mind, a life-or-death situation. I've got to save this lady’s life while protecting my own life,” Jones testified.

He thought the man “was going to fire a shot,” “so I get a center body mass picture in my optic, basically the center body mass” as he’s been trained.

“In my mind, I think he’s trying to take cover to because he sees my gun. So anyway, I come up in my optic, I get a sense of body mass, and I try to track his movement. And as he's moving, I shoot, shoot, shoot, and then the movement stops,” Jones testified.

“So at that moment in time when you’re shooting, as you mentioned, you’re shooting based upon what you observe and the threat that you believe exists at that time?” asked Jones’ lawyer Christian Bojorquez of the Los Angeles City Attorney’s Office.

“Yes,” Jones answered.

“And at the moment that you believe the threat no longer exists. you do what?” Bojorquez asked.

“You stop firing,” Jones answered.

Attorney Nick Rowley, who represents the girls’ parents, followed up.

“You know that that statement that you’ve repeated over and over and over again during your testimony, ‘I thought she was shot in the head. I thought she was shot in the head,’ is essential to your defense of this case. True?” Rowley asked.

“No, that’s what I believed at the time, sir,” Jones answered.

“And you know that by saying, ‘He had a gun. I thought he had a gun. I thought he shot her in the head and he was going to shoot me,’ is what you need to say in order to preserve your career. True?” Rowley asked.

Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Frank M. Tavelman overruled a defense objection.

“No, that’s what I believed at the time,” Jones answered.

“As an officer of the law, you know that if you fired upon someone who did not have a firearm and you did not have a reasonable belief that they had a firearm, that you lose your job and you go to jail, potentially. True?” Rowley asked.

Boroquez objected, saying Rowley’s question “calls for a legal conclusion.”

“Your Honor, this is completely inappropriate,” Boroquez said.

Judge Tavelman sustained the objection, so Rowley asked, “You understand there are consequences to shooting someone who is unarmed, who does not have a firearm, who does not pose an imminent threat, true?”

“True,” Jones answered.

“And those consequences could be pretty severe for you?” Rowley asked.

“Yes,” Jones answered.

I posted all of Jones’ testimony on my YouTube channel. I’ll have more coverage of closing arguments and the verdict.

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A federal judge in Florida on Monday rejected Megan Thee Stallion’s request to legally bar commentator Milagro Cooper from talking or posting online about her, calling the request an “overbroad and a classic example of a prior restraint on speech that triggers First Amendment concerns.”

U.S. District Judge Cecilia M. Altonaga said in her 21-page order that parts of the injunction sought by Megan’s lawyers at Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, LLP “fall outside the scope of the harassment described” in her cyberstalking petition, and that there was no evidence Milagro tried to contact her or appear at her performances.

A jury in Miami on Dec. 1, 2025, found Milagro liable for defaming Megan and intentionally inflicting emotional distress on her by coordinating with rapper Tory Lanez, legal name Daystar Peterson, who is serving a 10-year prison sentence in California for shooting Megan. Jurors also concluded Milagro knowingly promoted a digitally altered sexual depiction of Megan in violation of a Florida law enacted in 2024. 

Jurors awarded Megan, legal name Megan Pete, $75,000 in damages, but Judge Altonaga didn’t enter judgment for the defamation claim because jurors concluded Milagro was a media defendant and Megan’s lawyers didn’t serve her with a cease and desist notice before suing her.

That reduced damages to $59,000.

Megan’s lawyers asked Altonaga to permanently enjoin Milagro from making “defamatory statements” about Megan regarding her testimony in Lanez’s trial and from statements “that are intended to incite third parties to engage in threats or violence against [Megan], her professional team, and/or her family.”

They also wanted the judge to order Milagro to delete statements “that formed the basis for the jury’s verdict in this case,” and they wanted Milagro prohibited from coming within 500 feet of Megan, her residence or any place she’s expected to be, and within 1,000 feet from Megan’s musical performances for five years.”

“On this record, Plaintiff has not demonstrated why her need for a permanent injunction outweighs Defendant’s future exercise of her First Amendment rights,” wrote Altonaga, the chief judge in the Miami-based Southern District of Florida.

The judge said some of Megan’s requested restrictions “fall outside the scope of the harassment” she describes, including baring Milagro “from direct, indirect, or third-party contact” and requiring her to stay away from Megan and her performances.

“There is no evidence that Defendant has ever attended Plaintiff’s performances or attempted to contact or seek out Plaintiff,” according to the order. “It is unclear how Defendant could govern her conduct to be at least 500 feet from any location Plaintiff is expected to be, nor how the claimed cyberstalking is associated with any physical proximity to Plaintiff.”

The judge also said the issue of Megan’s “personal identifying information” regards only Megan’s Florida residential address that she “testified she obtained the address from public voter registration records after the lawsuit was filed to brief a venue challenge.”

“Plaintiff does not contend that Defendant has threatened to disclose it or any other private information,” according to the order.

Altonaga also said Megan request that Milagro “be required to remove all statements and postings addressing the jury’s Verdict is far removed from any redress for the claimed harassment and is far too broad a restriction on speech.”

Megan’s lawyers requested the injunction under a claim Megan brought against Milagro for cyberstalking. The legal remedy for a civil cyberstalking claim brought under Florida law is an injunction ordered by a judge, and Judge Altonaga said she’d consider a request for one in the $59,000 judgment she signed on Dec. 2.

The judge, however, said in Monday’s order that she’s “not convinced the Verdict shows Plaintiff succeeded on the merits of her cyberstalking claim,” and she’s not convinced “that Plaintiff met the requirement of showing Defendant’s communications ‘served no legitimate purpose’ with the trial evidence and the post-Verdict events described in the Motion.”

Altonaga detailed two reasons for denying the injunction: lack of irreparable injury to Megan and the existence of a remedy she said is already adequate.

Regarding injury, the judge said the jury’s verdict “represents an adequate remedy at law for Defendant’s past conduct.”

“Because the Petition is based on the exact conduct for which Plaintiff received a complete, legal remedy, Plaintiff must show a likelihood of future irreparable harm that cannot be redressed by monetary damages to obtain a permanent injunction prohibiting future conduct,” according to the order.

“But Plaintiff has not shown that any of the content at issue in the [Second Amended Complaint] and addressed at trial remains publicly available,” the judge wrote. “Nor does she point to new content that is causing injury. Indeed, Defendant advises that her ‘prior pages have been deleted, are inaccessible,’ and ‘no longer exist.’”

Altonaga said she isn’t persuaded by Megan’s lawyers argument that Milagro continues to harass Megan and “her wrongful conduct could resume through new accounts and platforms.”

“Plaintiff does not assert that Defendant’s ‘post-Verdict harassment’ consists of cyberstalking. Instead, Defendant’s alleged post-Verdict harassment consists of Defendant:

• saying she is ‘gonna start working on [her] mixtape[;]’

• responding to a social media user that she does not ‘get on the Internet and cry about what” social media users say

• posting images with a promotional photograph of CBS news reporter Gayle King

• sharing her perspective of the action during a CBS News Miami interview

• posting about the contents of the Verdict form

• accusing a witness who testified for Plaintiff of perjury

• saying Plaintiff made herself out to be the ‘the black Regina George’

• allegedly downplaying her defamatory statement

“This described post-Verdict conduct, for which no cyberstalking Petition was filed, does not satisfy the definition of cyberstalking,” the judge wrote.

Altonaga said an “additional defect” in the requested injunction is that Megan’s lawyers don’t explain how Milagro’s post-verdict conduct “has caused or is likely to cause irreparable harm, nor why she believes Defendant is likely to repeat her wrongful conduct.”

The judge also noted that Milagro could have to pay Megan’s attorney fees.

“Plaintiff does not provide the Court with any reason to believe that Defendant — who is not accused of creating or initially posting the Deepfake Video and voluntarily removed her post — has not been adequately deterred by the Judgment awarding Plaintiff damages and Plaintiff’s potential future recovery of reasonable attorney’s fees and costs,” according to the order.

“Following the trial, Defendant has acknowledged having learned her lesson and expressed regret “that someone was hurt” because of

her words,” Altonaga wrote, citing Milagro’s interview on CBS local news in Miami.

“At bottom, Plaintiff offers no evidence or arguments sufficient to persuade the Court that she will suffer irreparable harm if a permanent injunction is not entered. Based on this record, the Court is hard pressed to find any evidence of an actual and imminent injury flowing from Defendant’s conduct that has not already been redressed by money damages,” she wrote.

She also said that even if Megan’s lawyers showed a likelihood of irreparable harm, her alleged injury “does not outweigh the harm a permanent injunction would inflict on Defendant because Plaintiff’s requested relief constitutes an impermissible prior restraint on Defendant’s speech.”

She said her conclusion is “bolstered by Florida law” and cited a 2024 ruling by Florida’s Third District Court of Appeal that said “injunctions are not available to stop someone from uttering insults or falsehoods.”

Angry social media postings are now common. Jilted lovers, jilted tenants, and attention-seeking bloggers spew their anger into fiber-optic cables and cyberspace. But analytically, and legally, these rants are essentially the electronic successors of the pre-blog, solo complainant holding a poster on a public sidewalk in front of an auto dealer that proclaimed, “DON’T BUY HERE! ONLY LEMONS FROM THESE CROOKS!” Existing and prospective customers of the auto dealership considering such a poster made up their minds based on their own experience and research. If and when a hypothetical complainant with the poster walked into the showroom and harangued individual customers, or threatened violence, however, the previously-protected opinion crossed the border into the land of trespass, business interference, and amenability to tailored injunctive relief. The same well-developed body of law allows the complaining blogger to complain, with liability for money damages for defamation if the complaints are untruthful and satisfy the elements of that cause of action. Injunctive relief to prohibit such complaints is another matter altogether.

You can read the entire ruling here.

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Judge schedules singer D4vd’s preliminary hearing in murder case for this Thursday

A 21-year-old alternative pop singer known as D4vd will remain in jail without bail in Los Angeles after pleading not guilty today to the murder of a 14-year-old he’s also accused of sexually abusing.

Prosecutors allege D4vd, legal name David Anthony Burke, murdered Celeste Rivas Hernandez to try to end a criminal investigation into his sexual abuse of her and to protect his lucrative music career after she went to his home in the Hollywood Hills on April 23, 2025.

Her family reported her missing a year before, on April 5, 2024. Her remains were found in the front trunk Burke’s impounded Tesla on Sept. 8, 2025.

He is charged with first-degree murder, continuous sexual abuse of a child under the age of 14 and unlawful mutilation of human remains.

He faces a possible death penalty if convicted of the murder charge under three special circumstances: lying in wait, committing the crime for financial gain and murdering the witness in an investigation.

Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman announced the charged at a press conference today. Prosecutors have not decided if they’ll seek the death penalty.

Hochman said Celeste was a witness in an investigation “into the lewd and lascivious sexual acts committed by Mr. Burke.”

“I had the chance to meet with some of the family members of Celeste, and their grief is incalculable as to what happened to their daughter,” Hochman said.

“What they have demanded, what we have assured them that the District Attorney’s Office, working with LAPD, would give them: ...is the proof beyond a reasonable doubt on who killed their daughter, on how their daughter was killed, when their daughter was killed, and bring that killer to justice. That killer that we have now charged is David Anthony Burke,” Hochman said.

In court, D4vid’s attorney Blair Berk said they “believe the actual evidence will show David Burke did not murder Celeste Vivas Hernandez, nor was he the cause of her death.”

“And we would like to be able to have the evidence come into the light of day at the earliest opportunity in order to establish that,” Berk said.

Berk was joined in court by D4vid’s other lawyers Regina Peters, who works with Berk at the West Hollywood law firm Berk Brettler LLP and Marilyn Bednarski of McLane, Bednarski & Litt, LLP in Pasadena, whose other recent clients include journalist Don Lemon.

Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Theresa R. McGonigle scheduled the preliminary hearing conference for April 23 as Berk requested.

If it happens, Berk and her co-counsel may not have seen much of the discovery because transferring the electronic files will take so long.

Berk said she’s been given “almost no discovery thus far.”

“We’ve received a three-page follow up report, no autopsy report, and a copy of the complaint, and we would ask the people respectfully to produce discovery at the earliest opportunity,” she said.

In response, Deputy District Attorney Beth Silverman told Judge Theresa McGonigle that prosecutors have “approximately 40 terabytes of discovery in this case.”

“Moreover, in order to obtain the transcripts from a grand jury investigation, counsel has to file a motion. She knows the way the system works. I’m not able to gather those they have to be provided after the court orders them released because it was an investigation,” Silverman said.

Silverman said it’s “unlikely that there will be very much discovery provided” soon “given the voluminous nature and how long it’s going to take to copy onto drives.”

Silverman also said she’s trying to get the medical examiner to unseal the coroner’s report, which Berk said is “surprising news given the District Attorney’s Office held a press conference this morning where they discussed the cause of death, apparently under seal and not released by the coroner’s office, as did the robbery-homicide unit, to the press.”

“So we would again reiterate we believe that Mr. Burke is entitled to discovery. We have served the people with notice. They have 15 days to produce discovery in this case. We would ask that they do that in conscientious earnestness and as quickly as possible. I ask the court to make an order today,” Berk said.

The judge did so.

D4vd’s case was assigned to Los Angeles County Superior Judge Charlaine F. Olmedo, who oversees complex and/or lengthy criminal cases.

Olmedo’s previous high-profile trials include the rape case against “That 70s Show” actor Danny Masterson.

In the press conference this morning, the chief of the Los Angeles Police Department defended the length of time investigators took to build a case.

“I want to be clear about something. My duty is not to fuel speculation. It’s to deliver justice, and that requires patience and discipline on everybody’s part. This investigation was driven by a single purpose, to secure justice for Celeste Rivas and for those who loved her,” LAPD Chief Michel Moore said.

“We had to be certain that nothing we did or said would ever jeopardize this case. Ms. Rivas was a reported runaway from Riverside County. During the course of our investigation, detectives learned that she had been involved in a sexual relationship with Mr. Burke when she was a minor and he was an adult,” Moore said.

“The condition of her remains delayed the medical examiner’s ability to be able to determine cause of death. The substantial amount of time that passed between her death and discovery meant that crucial evidence had degraded or disappeared, and as detectives worked to uncover the truth,” Moore said.

Detectives “also had to sift through and debunk a great deal of false information circulating publicly,” the chief said.

“These challenges were real, and they required patience, precision and an unwavering commitment to the facts, despite these obstacles and despite intense public pressure,” Moore said. “Our Robbery-Homicide Division detectives remained steadfast in their duties. They recovered and analyzed a substantial amount of digital and forensic evidence. They stayed focused, disciplined and committed to uncovering the truth. Their work in close collaboration with the District Attorney’s Office, has brought us to this moment today.”

“Why has it taken so long for an arrest?” a reporter asked Hochman.

“I think the police chief got it right that in a situation where you don’t have an eyewitness account, or we can’t put point to a video that shows the killer killing someone. You have to go through the very rigorous and thorough investigation to look at all the digital and forensic evidence. You have to speak with witnesses, often who are cooperative and some who are not cooperative, in order to obtain all the information necessary to decide who did what, when, how, and what their mental state was at the time. That is what we’ve been doing ... between September 8, roughly, and today, when we bring these charges on April 20,” Hochman said.

LA police shooting trial continues on Tuesday

I obtained video of the April 8 opening statements in the civil trial over the Los Angeles police shooting that killed a 14-year-old girl in a Burlington Coat Factory on Dec. 23, 2021.

Here is James Touchstone’s opening for the defense:

I’m uploading plaintiffs’ attorney Haytham Faraj’s opening statement today.

My previous article has details on the testimony so far.

Testimony continues Tuesday, and I’ll have video on YouTube and Facebook. I’m also sharing highlight clips there and on TikTok and Instagram.

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A former Los Angeles police officer testified this week that he wrongly believed another officer disobeyed his commands before that officer opened fire in a clothing store at an assault suspect, killing the man and a 14-year-old girl who was in a nearby dressing room.

Michael Mazur acknowledged he yelled “slow down” at Officer William Dorsey Jones Jr. and didn’t believe he had, but he testified he realized Jones “actually did” after he reviewed footage from body-worn cameras.

“In the moments before those three bullets were fired out of that AR-15, you were trying to slow things down, true?” asked Nick Rowley, who represents the parents of Valentina Orellana-Peralta.

“True the — at which point, sir? I’m trying to specify at which point, sir,” Mazur said.

“Sir, when you were saying, ‘Jones, slow down. Jones, slow down’ you were trying to slow him down, weren’t you?” Rowley asked.

“Yeah, I focused on him, correct,” Mazur answered.

“And he didn’t listen to you, did he? He kept going?” Rowley asked.

“With review of the body-worn, he actually did. But at the time, no, I did not assess that he was,” Mazur answered.

“You thought he was not listening to you at the time?” Rowley asked.

“At the time, sir,” Mazur answered.

Mazur, Jones and four other officers were searching for a pantless man who assaulted a woman with a bike lock in a Burlington Coat Factory in North Hollywood on Dec. 23, 2021, when Jones ran to the front with his AR-15. Jones fired three times at the assailant and killed him, but a bullet also skipped off the floor, pierced a drywall partition and struck Orellana-Peralta, who was hiding in a dressing room with her mother while trying on dresses for her quinceañera.

Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Frank Tavelman is allowing the entire trial to be video recorded and streamed online, so I’ve been in the courtroom recording from the Courtroom View Network pool stream and am sharing testimony videos online.

A clip of Tavelman halting Rowley’s questions about Mazur’s meetings with lawyers has drawn attention as attorneys debate the issue in the comments.

Rowley raised the issue in his exam after Mazur testified he now doesn’t believe Jones disobeyed him.

Rowley said Mazur has communicated with “these lawyers,” referring to defense lawyers Christian Richard Bojorquez of the Los Angeles City Attorney’s Office and James Touchstone of the Fullerton-based law firm Jones & Mayer.

Judge Tavelman sustained an objection under California Evidence Code § 352, which allows a judge to exclude relevant evidence if its helpfulness is substantially outweighed by potential prejudice, confusion or repetitiveness.

Travelman also offered his own reason, saying Rowley was presuming “facts not in evidence, that he’s communicated with these two representatives from the city.”

“He said he had a lawyer. I’m assuming it was a different lawyer than the ones that are present in court. Is that correct, sir?” the judge asked.

“No, your honor,” Mazur said, identifying Bojorquez as his lawyer.

Tavelman reversed course and overruled the objection.

The judge jumped in again a few questions later as Rowley asked Mazur how often he met with the attorneys.

“The court’s going to sustain its own objection under 352. It is common for witnesses to meet with lawyers to prepare cases. That’s not uncommon or inappropriate in any way. So I’m going to sustain my own objection, because I think it would lead to unnecessary speculation,” said Tavelman, who’s been a Los Angeles County Superior Court judge since 2014. He was a Los Angeles deputy district attorney from 1999 to 2013.

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Rowley pushed back, saying, “I think the amount of time isn’t getting into the attorney-client privilege,” but Tavelman still wouldn’t allow the questions.

“It’s leaving the jury with potentially the wrong impression that lawyers shouldn’t be meeting with witnesses before they testify, and that routinely happens in almost every case,” the judge said.

Rowley said Mazur is “a client” and not a witness, but Tavelman said, “I’m not looking to debate the issue with you, counsel. You can ask you another question.”

Rowley moved on, but he questioned Mazur about his testimony preparation again this morning after discussing the issue with the judge outside the jury’s presence.

Rowley, a nationally prominent trial lawyer and founder of Trial Lawyers for Justice, commented on my Instagram clip tonight: “I had a discussion w the Judge this morning and after hearing me out he allowed me to go into this very subject!!! Officer Mazur testified that he spent a total of six weeks preparing to be cross examined by me! It almost 200 trials and 25 years of practice, I have never heard of a witness being prepared for 6 weeks.”

He said in another comment, “Judge Tavelman is actually a very good and fair Judge. We are happy to be in front of him. He intervenes with the defense also. He’s just doing his job and is always willing to reconsider his rulings. He has been right 90+ percent of the time with his rulings and I do not believe he is bias against us.”

On Wednesday, Mazur also testified he told Jones to “sling” his rifle, but he disputed Rowley’s assertion about why he did so.

Mazur eventually acknowledged he wanted the officer to be part of the “arrest team” after Rowley reminded him of his deposition in which he said that. Rowley initially wanted to play a video clip of the deposition for the jury, but Judge Tavelman said he could only use the deposition to try to refresh Mazur’s recollection.

“There’s no playing of the clip. You can bring up the transcript and let him review it and see if it refreshes his memory first, because he’s saying he doesn’t remember. Not that he didn’t say it,” Tavelman said.

Tavelman discussed the issue with the attorneys in chambers so we don’t know what they said, but apparently they didn’t communicate well because they immediately ran into the same issue when Rowley resumed questioning.

“Did you want to bring it up to him to review it?” Tavelman said.

“No, it’s straight impeachment,” Rowley said.

“I said he didn’t remember. So you can re-ask the question if you’d like,” Tavelman said.

“Okay. When you told Officer Jones to sling that, that was because you were going to have him and [Officer] Suarez be your arrest team, correct?” Rowley asked.

“To the best of my recollection, I believe so with that current assessment time, sir,” Mazur answered.

Mazur had told Officer Jordan Head to use his “40,” referring to a 40 mm less-than lethal weapon, on the assailant before Jones fired his AR-15.

“And you believe when this happened and these shots were fired, you believe that this situation was, in your words, ‘fucked up’, yes?” Rowley asked, referring to a comment from Mazur that is audible y on the body-worn camera footage but has not been played for the jury.

Bojorquez began cross-examining Mazur on Thursday and will continue when the trial resumes next Tuesday, April 21.

Officer Jones testified last week and on Monday. Rowley’s co-counsel Haytham Faraj questioned Jones about Mazur’s “sling it,” and Jones said he heard it.

“As soon as he says ‘sling that’ you see me put the weapon over my head and put it in that sling-carry position,” Jones said.

“I hear him say ‘sling it’, and I’m the only person with the weapon that is slingable. Everyone else has firearms. [Officer] Escobar has his shotgun. I wasn’t in the sling at the time,” Jones said.

The testimony doesn’t match what Jones said in his deposition. Faraj played a portion after asking Jones about his oath to tell the truth.

In the video, a lawyer asks Jones, “Did you ever hear Officer [Michael Mazur] tell you to 'sling that' with regard to the AR-15?” and Jones answered, “No, I believe he was speaking about the less-lethal option.”

“Now in that deposition, sir, when you were asked, ‘Do you remember Officer Mazur telling you to sling that?’ you said, ‘No, it was about the less lethal,’?” Faraj asked.

“That’s what I thought at the time,” Jones answered.

“Here in court, your testimony is, ‘Yeah, it was for positive weapons retention,’” Faraj said.

“That’s correct. It goes both ways, whether it’s officers slinging a less-lethal option, whether it’s me slinging my rifle,” Jones said.

“So when I hear that statement being made, I climb in my sling automatically, whether he’s talking to me or whether he’s telling someone else. It’s almost like if you get a verbal key or verbal cue. He could be talking to ‘Hey, everyone with Escobar. You have your shotgun. Officer Head, you have ... the 40 millimeter launcher. Hey, sling that, sling that.’ We all have slings. We’re gonna climb in our slings,” Jones continued.

“Sir, he looked right at you and said, ‘Sling, sling that.’ You recall that?” Faraj said.

“I don’t know where he’s exactly looking at. To me, it looks like he’s looking north down in the store to where they think the threat may be,” Jones said.

Faraj also asked Jones how he felt “in this moment as you’re getting out and getting the patrol rifle out of the car.”

“I’m trying to take in the environment. I’m trying to — There’s people to my left side, and they’re kind of talking, and I kind of hear them give descriptions of possible descriptions of suspects. I’m just trying to make sure that I get my weapon system up and running and get in that location as fast as I can,” Jones answered.

“Are you excited to be using your firearm in a real situation for the first time?” Faraj asked.

“Absolutely not. That’s the last thing I want to do, have to do. But that’s my job. When I took this oath in the department, it’s to have reverence for life. That’s everybody’s life. So if someone’s in there shooting, and we have a mass shooting two days before Christmas, then I’ve got to do what I was sworn to do,” Jones said.

A use-of-force expert also testified this week. Judge Tavelman said he expected Richard Bryce’s testimony to take four hours, but Bryce’s testimony stretched over 2 1/2 days, the last day remotely so he didn’t miss his already rescheduled flight home.

Tavelman allowed jurors to submit questions for Bryce, a former undersheriff in Ventura County.

The judge reviewed the questions in chambers with the attorneys before telling jurors he wouldn’t ask some questions because he deemed them legally improper, couldn’t understand what they’re asking “or it may be that it’s going to come out later in the trial.”

“It’s not because the lawyers don’t want them asked. They’d love all of your questions, hopes, dreams, aspirations to be answered by this trial. I’m the one who has to say no,” Tavelman said.

The first question was, “Would a gun pointed at an officer be considered an exigent danger?”

“It could be. It would depend on the circumstances,” Bryce answered.

The second question was, “In reviewing the clip by clip, how did you make an opinion if it’s hindsight, rather than viewing the officer’s eyes at the time?”

“I base that on in viewing it clip by clip, what a reasonable officer could have done rather than shoot [the assault suspect], or in this case, the young woman in the dressing room, all of those things came into play, the fact that he didn't adequately assess the backdrop, which is required,” Bryce answered.

The judge told him the question was “a little bit broader.”

“Well, that’s a little bit broader than the question. So the question was simply, ‘How are you determining if something is 20/20 hindsight or from the officer’s perspective at the time it’s happening?’ That was the limited question,” Tavelman said.

Bryce said he considered Jones’ investigative interview and deposition. Tavelman interjected: “Well, hold on, sir. So you did it based upon your review of the deposition and other statements that were made. That’s how you made the conclusion?”

“That was one of two of the things I used. Yes, Your Honor,” Bryce said.

“And what else did you utilize to make that determination?” Tavelman asked.

“The training that he’d received, the evidence that was available to him prior to shooting and the direction that he’d been given by Officer Mazur about not using his weapon,” Bryce answered.

The third and final question was, “In your professional opinion, what was the right course of action in this situation, for the entire diamond formation of officers and Officer Jones?”

“The diamond formation should have continued to proceed at a reasonable pace down the aisle to assess backdrops and attempt to locate the location of the suspect,” Bryce answered.

I have more videos of Bryce’s testimony to upload on my YouTube channel and Facebook page, and more clips to share on Instagram and TikTok.

I’ll be back in court recording when the trial resumes on Tuesday. Legal Affairs and Trials with Meghann Cuniff is officially an S-Corp now, and one goal is to expand video coverage of trials in Los Angeles and Orange County.

Thank you for supporting my independent legal affairs journalism. Your paid subscriptions make my work possible. If you’re not already a paid subscriber, please consider purchasing a subscription through Substack.

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This is an independent, reader-supported project. Anyone who pays for a subscription is providing crucial assistance to bolster my independent coverage. Thank you!

A jury in Honolulu, Hawaii, on Wednesday convicted a man of attempted manslaughter for an altercation with his wife on a cliffside hiking trail after jurors determined he acted under extreme mental or emotional disturbance.

Prosecutors sought a second-degree attempted murder conviction against Gerhardt Konig, but the jury’s emotional disturbance finding made his crime attempted manslaughter under Hawaii law.

Attempted murder carried a potential life sentence, but attempted manslaughter in Hawaii has a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison. There is no mandatory minimum sentence. Judge Paul B.K. Wong scheduled sentencing for Aug. 13 at 8:30 a.m.

Mr. Konig has been in jail with no bail allowed since his arrest on March 24, 2025, after an eight-hour manhunt near the Pali Puka Trail on O’ahu. He and his wife, Arielle Konig, moved to Maui from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 2023 with their sons and had flown to O’ahu to celebrate her birthday.

Mr. Konig, 47, worked on Maui as an anesthesiologist before his arrest, and Ms. Konig, 43, works for a nuclear engineering company. They were in counseling after he found flirtatious texts between her and a coworker, which Mr. Konig deemed an “emotional affair.”

Mr. Konig researched their finances and the cost of his first divorce in the months prior to the trip, and the prosecutor pointed to that evidence when arguing he wanted to leave her but was worried about the cost of divorce and child support. Mr. Konig also researched “dangerous hikes” online and selected the Pali Puka Trail himself.

After the verdict, Mr. Konig’s lawyer Thomas Otake told reporters they “plan on appealing, but that doesn’t take away from our respect of the jury, their service, their dedication and their verdict, and we look forward to to appealing.”

“I mean, we are thankful that they did not convict them of attempted murder, which would have been life in prison, and so we just thank them for their service, and we look forward to an appeal related to some of the judge's rulings throughout the case and before the trial,” Otake said.

Deputy Prosecutor Joel Garner appeared a bit shaken as he spoke to reporters. He said he’ll recommend Judge Wong sentence Mr. Konig to prison and said he didn’t know if he could be be released with credit for time already served in jail.

“We respect the verdict. We respect that the jury did their job, considered the evidence and came to a verdict that they thought fit evidence and proof on all sides in this case. So that’s all I can say about that. Thank you,” Garner said.

The trial was the first attempted murder or murder trial Garner has prosecuted as a first chair. Deputy Prosecutor Franklin “Donald” Pacarro, a long time prosecutor in Honolulu, was next to him at the prosecutioon table but did not question witnesses.

In his closing argument, he told jurors their instruction about emotional disturbance is “a long instruction” so “we’ll keep it simple.”

“There’s no evidence that the defendant was acting under extreme mental or emotional disturbance when he tried to kill Arielle. Don’t be confused by his testimony. He did say he was under severe emotional distress, but he said that after he tried to kill Arielle,” Garner said.

Garner said Mr. Konig only said he “was under severe emotional distress after he began to think about the consequences of his actions and how his actions would affect himself.”

“That’s what that is. The defendant was not under extreme mental or emotional disturbance when he tried to kill her. He only became that way when he began to think about the consequences,” Garner said.

The instruction Judge Wong read jurors said, “The question of defendant's self control or lack of it at the time of the offense is a significant factor in deciding whether he was under the influence of extreme mental or emotional disturbance.”

In his closing, Garner said the evidence demonstrates Mr. Konig used “logical thinking” when trying to kill Ms. Konig in three ways: “Plan A” was to push her off the cliff; “Plan B” was to “inject her with the syringe, knock her out, push her off the cliff” “Plan C” was to “beat her with the rock, knock her out, drag her over, or just simply kill her outright.”

“The intent behind every single plan was to kill Arielle,” Garner said.

Garner’s cross-exam of Mr. Konig focused not on what exactly happened on the trail but on the details of the couple’s troubled relationship and Mr. Konig’s actions to plan the hike and research his own prior divorce and financial situation.

But while they presented evidence of premeditation, Garner and his colleagues at Honolulu County’s Office of the Prosecuting Attorney didn’t charge Mr. Konig with premeditating his wife’s attempted murder. His top charge was attempted second-degree murder followed by lesser included offenses of attempted first-degree assault, attempted second-degree assault and third-degree assault.

Jurors never had the option of considering if Mr. Konig’s premeditated the crime, and the second-degree charge required them to consider the emotional disturbance affirmative defense if they agreed prosecutors had proven it beyond a reasonable doubt. Mr. Konig had the burden of proof to establish he acted under mental or emotional disturbance, but the standard was preponderance of the evidence, not beyond a reasonable a doubt.

Jury forewoman Makalapua Atkins told reporters said they closely followed the instructions and “the pushing part was not really anything that we were determining on, because they both said they pushed each other.”

“So we did determine that there was definitely a scuffle on top of the Pali Puka Trail that resulted in an injury to the head that could be bodily injury and serious,” Atkins said. “They both had showed that there was relationship issues that there had begun prior to this situation on Pali Puka Trail.”

Atkins said she’s “not necessarily sure” if the “emotional affair” Ms. Konig admitted to “was the root, but I do commonly believe that somebody that’s been married to someone for eight years, in a relationship for that long, and having some kind of affair happen after having two young kids under the age of two, might have some kind of emotional disturbance.”

Emile Konig, Mr. Konig’s son from a previous marriage testified that his father called him from the trail twice on FaceTime and told him he’d tried to kill his wife.

Mr. Konig wept on the stand as he testified about the calls and said his son must’ve misunderstood him when he mentioned that Ms. Konig had accused him of trying to kill her. He said he called his son because he was suicidal and wanted to say goodbye.

Otake didn’t address the emotional disturbance instruction in his closing, but he emphasized that Mr. Konig was emotional in “the FaceTime with Emile that they call a confession.”

“There’s no assurances of reliability. He explained to you what happened in that call. We need to consider it in the context in which it took place, and ask ourselves, ‘Is this a reliable, you know, thing that happened? That we can rely on two highly emotional participants in the phone call?” Otake said.

Mr. Konig testified his wife attacked him first by trying to push him off the trail. He wept as he testified he felt “terrible” that he’d struck her with a rock and continued to cry as he testified about feeling suicidal and calling his son to say goodbye.

Judge won’t suppress evidence found in metadata search

The trial included an unusual argument over whether investigators violated the scope of a search warrant when they located a Walmart receipt in Mr. Konig’s email for an 800-hour Knight 64GB hidden voice recorder because the search term “separate” appeared in hidden metadata.

Otake wanted Judge Wong to prohibit the receipt as evidence because he said investigators violated the “spirit” of the search warrant. In a hearing on March 30, Otake’s associate Manta Dircks said allowing Detective Thomas Iinuma of the Honolulu Police Department to testify about the receipt creates “a dangerous world moving forward for search warrants and digital forensics.”

Dircks said an investigator “with any knowledge of coding” could select keywords that open “the door to all emails containing that source code, whether or not it’s relevant in the actual body of the email to the case. So it’s very scary precedent.”

Judge Wong concluded investigators located the email by lawfully using the keyword separate.

“These parameters in this search warrant in this case prevented law enforcement from conducting a discretionary and indiscriminate search of the defendant’s laptop. The Constitution does not prohibit all searches, but only unreasonable searches," said Wong, a graduate of University of Southern California and Boston College Law School who’s been a judge in Hawaii’s 1st Circuit Court in Honolulu since 2017.

You can read the defense memo here.

People around the world followed the trial

The trial was video recorded and streamed online, and Ms. Konig’s testimony and the testimony of two women who rescued her captivated people across the country.

Many of my newest Substack subscribers found me through my YouTube channel, which is approaching 100,000 subscribers almost three years after I started it from scratch with no goal other than surviving as a journalist after two decades working for dying newspapers. I also surpassed 115,000 followers on Facebook last night.

I’m enjoying covering trials across the country through my social media platforms, which include testimony videos and detailed descriptions that essentially are short news articles about the testimony, with quotes.

The editor of the South Maui News included my videos of Mr. Konig’s trial in his online coverage, and the attention my channel is receiving will help me continue to bring a newsier approach to the social media platforms that have been dominated by so-called content creators who are thriving on the advertising revenue that once sustained newspaper journalism.

My goal is to better incorporate this Substack into my trial coverage by writing regular reports about the testimony that organize the videos and summarizes them for the subscribers who rely on my social media platforms for accurate, no frills trial coverage.

The trials I’m covering now aren’t the complex, Big Law-saturated cases I wrote about for the Los Angeles Daily Journal and ALM / Law.com. They are state court criminal trials that attract huge audiences online and provide opportunities to not only educate people about the legal system but also showcase the humanity that happens in our courtrooms every day.

In Mr. Konig’s trial, my clips of Ms. Konig’s testimony and the testimony of the women who helped her drew millions of views on TikTok and Instagram, including one that was shared by the page “Hiking Girls,” which says it is “empowering women who travel & hike worldwide.”

Ms. Konig testified her husband hiked to the top of the trail alone after she said she didn’t want to continue. He met her on the way down and they took photos of each other that they shared with family on Snapchat. Jurors saw one of Mr. Konig at the edge of the trail with the caption, “Don’t look down.”

She testified she was surprised when he grabbed her “forcefully by my upper arms, and he said, ‘I’m so fucking sick of this shit. Get back over there.’ And he starts pushing me back towards the cliff.”

“It felt almost like he was kidding at first. And I was like, ‘What are you doing?’” Ms. Konig testified. “But he, he had grabbed me really hard and was moving me, so we kind of wrestled a little bit, and I threw myself onto the ground because there’s a lot of trees and shrubs there so that I could hold on.”

She said her husband had a syringe he’d apparently retreviewd from his backpack.

“And he says, ‘Hold still.’ And I see the syringe, and I just kind of batted it away from from us both,” she testified.

The syringe “fell on the ground, sort of near us,” she said.

Mr. Konig was digging into his backpack “with his left hand, and then kind of holding me down with his right hand,” Ms. Konig testified.

“I’m screaming, and I’m saying, ‘What the fuck are you doing? Get off me.’ And he’s saying, like, ‘Fuck you. You’re done. So, so sick of your shit, so done with you,’” Konig testified. “And I'm trying to kind of protect myself and get out of there, but also, he’s gripping his hand closed really hard, and ... there’s a vial in his hand, so I was trying to pry his hand open so I could grab that vial out.”

She said she pleaded with him to stop and told him, “Everyone knows we’re on a hike. They’ll know this wasn’t an accident, and our kids will be orphans. You’re, you’ll go to jail, and I’ll, I’ll be dead. Like, you have to stop.”

“Did telling the defendant any of these things that you told him, did that get him to stop?” Garner asked.

“No, not really. And I had said, like, ‘Your mom just sent me a really beautiful text for my birthday. Like, your family will be upset if I die.’ He can’t face our kids after this, you know?” Ms. Konig said.

She said he seemed to calm but “then he just starts hitting me with a rock.”

“I just started screaming. Because in my mind, he was trying to knock me unconscious to get to be able to drag me over the edge,” Ms. Konig testified.

She then heard a woman say “We’re here. We’re calling 911.”

“Gerhardt just kind of froze and knelt back away from me, and I just crawled away really slowly. And again, he seemed just frozen,” Ms. Konig testified.

Jurors had already heard what happened after that. Hiker Amanda Norris was the first witness to testify after opening statements on March 19.

Morris, a nurse at Kapi‘olani Medical Center for Women & Children in Honolulu, testified that she was hiking with a friend vacationing from Canada and “thought somebody had fallen” when they heard a woman screaming for help because “it’s not uncommon for someone to fall because of the ridge being so steep and narrow.”

Morris said she saw a man on top of a woman, hitting her with a rock it “looked like in the head.” The woman screamed, “Help me! Help me! He’s trying to kill me,” Morris testified. She identified the man in the courtroom as Konig and said he and the woman “saw us, and he stopped and stood up.”

“Did the defendant say anything?” Garner asked.

“No,” Morris answered.

Morris said she and her friend Sarah Buchsbaum, a nurse in Vancouver, B.C., “were a little afraid for our own safety, since we were kind of close to the edge” so they backed down the trail and “kind of turned a little bit of a corner, and that’s when Sarah started to call 911.”

Buschsbaum said when she first saw Ms. Konig “she was on her stomach, crawling towards us.”

“Her face was covered in blood, her head was covered and she was just fully covered in blood,” she testified.

“Did the woman say anything?” Garner asked.

“She screamed, ‘Help. He’s trying to kill me. Call 911,’” Buschsbaum answered.

She and Morris “initially backed up a bit because we were right on the edge and we didn’t want to get attacked,” Buschsbaum said.

“And as we were backing up, I was calling 911 and Amanda was yelling at her, saying that we were calling for help,” Buschsbaum testified.

Jurors heard Buschsbaum’s two-minute 911 call during her testimony. She told the dispatcher, “Someone’s currently being attacked on the top of Pali Puka, where there’s a man trying to kill her. She has blood all over her face.”

Garner asked Buschsbaum about making eye contact with Konig when she first saw him.

“How long did you make eye contact with the defendant?” Garner asked.

“For approximately 30 seconds,” Buschsbaum answered.

“You describe seeing the defendant’s eyes?” Garner asked.

“It’s like a cold, emotionless stare,” Buschsbaum answered.

“How did you feel as you made eye contact with the defendant?” Garner asked.

“I felt very uneasy,” Buschsbaum answered.

Ms. Konig testified she didn’t see the women until after she broke away from her husband.

“One of them went behind me and was kind of sweeping to make sure he wasn’t coming after us, visually scanning to make sure he wasn’t coming after us,” she testified on March 24.

“One of the women had, like, a large metal water bottle, and she had that in her hand, and she was like, ‘This is the only weapon I have,’” she continued.

Garner told jurors in his closing argument that Morris and Buschsbaum are the reason Mr. Konig stopped attacking her.

“Arielle screaming for help didn’t stop the defendant. Arielle fighting back for her life didn’t stop the defendant. The only thing that stopped the defendant, the only thing that was enough for him to stop, is two eyewitnesses coming up on the scene and seeing him beat her with that rock. The only thing that got him to stop was being caught redhanded,” Garner said.

Garner reminded jurors that Buschsbaum testified she looked into Mr. Konig’s eyes and “it made Sarah feel so unsafe that she and Amanda went back down the trail before they called 911.”

Otake, however, reminded jurors that Buschbaum initially identified the wrong person when police showed her a lineup of photos that included Konig and several other men.

“The eyewitness picks the wrong person out of the photo lineup, and still she stared at him, looked into his cold, dark eyes, saw him very clearly?” Otake said.

Otake said what happened between the Konigs “before the hikers got there, it is essentially she said, he said.”

“The witnesses told you they didn’t see much. One witness only saw one hit. The other didn’t see a hit at all. One of them picks up the wrong person in the photo lineup. Okay? Everything before that — they told you they can’t say what happened. They don’t know how it started. She said, he said,” Otake said.

Garner argued Mr. Konig got rid of the syringe and vial during the more than eight hours he spent hiding, but Otake emphasized that not only did police never find a syringe, neither Morris nor Buschbaum saw one when they saw the Konigs on the trail.

“Why in the world, if you bring a syringe to incapacitate someone, to make it easier, to throw them off the cliff, why would the syringe be Plan B? It would be Plan A. You would use the syringe first, and then you would be thrown off,” said Otake, co-founder of Alapa & Otake, LLC, in Honolulu.

Ms. Konig’s lawyer contacted police about a bag of medical supplies, including syringes, that she found in the couple’s Maui home after she returned there following her discharge from the hospital. Garner used the bag and its contents as evidence against Mr. Konig.

Jurors saw the bag and its contents during the testimony of Tracy Spacek, a detective with the Honolulu Police Department who also testified about the lava rock Mr. Konig used to strike Ms. Konig.

Scott Henderson and Michelle Amorin, criminalists with the Honolulu Police Department, testified about DNA and blood test results for the rock, which Otake argued in his closing show Ms. Konig touched the rock on the portion that wasn’t stained with her blood.

“The rock was in her hand. The DNA shows that. That blows away her whole story that she didn't have the rock. The rock was in her hand. Her DNA is all over that,” Otake said. “This idea, ‘Well, maybe when she was blocking and it hit her.’ That’s not going to lead to that much of her DNA on it more than him.”

Garner objected for speculation, but Judge Wong overruled because Otake was arguing what he believes the evidence shows, which is what closing arguments are for.

“If he’s holding the rock the whole time and she’s just blocking, there’s going to be more of his DNA than hers,” Otake told the jury.

Defense argues police chase didn’t happen

The police search for Mr. Konig resulted in the trial’s most viral moment. A trio of Honolulu Police Department officers testified about seeing him emerge from a forested area near the trail after they’d seen looking for him for about eight hours.

Officer Chauncey Nicola said he got out of the unmarked police van and yelled, “Police! Stop!” but “he turns and he runs away from my vehicle to this brushy, like the grassy area, because we’re still in the roadway.”

“So as I got closer, I reached out and I grabbed his right arm,” Nicola testified. “I’m still yelling, ‘Police! Stop! Police! Stop!’ And I was able to grab onto his right ar’m.”

“So as I got closer, I reached out and I grabbed his right arm,” Nicola testified. “I’m still yelling, ‘Police! Stop! Police! Stop!’ And I was able to grab onto his right arm.”

Mr. Konig “tries to pull — like, break my grip. So he tries to pull on and continue running away from me, to get away from me,” Nicola testified.

“We both fell down, and I fall on top of him,” he continued.

“Who falls on top of who?” Garner asked.

“I fell on top of him,” Nicola answered.

Nicola said Mr. Konig reached for his black bag so “I’m trying to use my physical strength to pull the bag away from him, which I was able to, and I’m able to pull it out off of him and get it away from him.”

Nicola got the bag, but he said Konig continued “to push and fight, and he’s trying to, like, grab all over.”

“So I don’t know what he's going for. He’s looking for his waist. He’s going for his pants. So I don’t know if he has a weapon or not. So I try to — I continue to try to gain control of him. So I give him some distractionary strikes to his large muscle group area,” Nicola said.

Garner had each officer demonstrate for jurors the tone they used when they yelled at Mr. Konig to stop, but the big viral moment came when Otake had Officer Asten Koki stand next to his client in the well of the courtroom to demonstrate their size difference. Mr. Konig denies fleeing from police, and his lawyer’s point apparently was that Koki and the other officers are far too big and slow to catch him if he had.

That scene was probably enough to delight the online masses, but Garner heightened the interest by asking Koki in re-direct about his athleticism.

“I would consider myself pretty fast,” Koki testified.

“Do you play sports?” Garner asked.

“I played sports,” Koki answered.

“What sport?” Garner asked.

“I played multiple sports, but my main sport was football at the time,” Koki answered.

“What level of football did you get up to?” Garner asked.

“Division 1,” Koki answered.

“Who’d you play for?” Garner asked.

“I played for UNLV,” Koki answered, referring to the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

“And what position did you play?” Garner asked.

“I play defensive line,” Koki answered.

“How important is d-line? Or how important for a d-lineman is it to be quick?” Garner asked.

“Very important,” Koki answered.

“Thank you. No further questions,” Garner said.

Pathologist, restaurant owner testify as defense witnesses

In addition to himself, Mr. Konig’s defense witnesses were pathologist Jonathan Arden and John Charles “Chuck” Bussler, who owns Fête, a restaurant in Honolulu where Mr. Konig had a dinner reservation the night of March 24, 2025. Otake said the reservation shows Mr. Konig didn’t plan to harm his wife. In many trials I’ve covered, much of Bussler’s testimony would have been shut down as irrelevant, but we saw very few objections in Mr. Konig’s trial.

Arden testified that Ms. Konig’s injuries weren’t as bad as the bleeding indicated and aren’t consistent with being struck multiple times at full force with a lava rock. Garner took an aggressive tone in cross-examination and seemed to be much more effective with Arden than he was with Mr. Konig.

Arden said he doesn’t shape his analysis and opinions to fit someone’s case.

“I tell lots of lawyers that their clients are screwed, and, you know, that’s what happens. Sometimes the truth hurts, but that’s what they get from me,” Arden testified on April 1.

“Dr. Arden, your interest in future business encourages you to ignore the facts that are bad for your conclusion. Isn’t that right?” Garner asked.

“No, not right,” Arden answered.

In re-direct, Otake tried to emphasize that Arden doesn’t need new business.

“I apologize for asking this question, but how old are you, Doctor?” Otake asked.

“No embarrassment," Arden said. “Seventy — well, this month I'll be 72.”

“And you mentioned that you're trying to retire, trying to slow down, right?” Otake asked.

“Trying. Not succeeding so well, but I’m trying,” Arden answered.

“But do you need more work, Doctor?” Otake asked.

“No, I’m turning down plenty of work right now,” Arden answered.

“You’re in a position where you pick and choose the cases you want to work on and the attorneys you want to work with, right?” Otake asked.

“Yes,” Arden answered.

“Are you concerned about getting future business?” Otake asked.

“No, I’m not,” Arden answered.

“As I said, I am currently turning down substantial number of cases that come to me,” Arden answered.

Otake asked, “Is it a goal of your wife and yourself to slow down and enjoy yourself a little more?”

“Yes,” Arden answered.

“Spend time with family, correct?” Otake asked.

“Correct,” Arden answered.

In redirect, Garner displayed his obvious edge over attorneys in mainland states who similarly try to discredit experts.

“Doctor, Hawaii is a good place to slow down with your wife, right?” Garner asked.

“You’re talking about living here?” Arden said.

“Visiting,” Garner said.

“Visiting Hawaii is wonderful,” Arden said.

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“Especially as a reporter in L.A., when you spend a lot of time covering celebrity trials, you spend a lot of time around lawyers. I told someone recently, if you want to be reminded that there are still real normal people in this world, go to jury selection. Look at all the people who come in for juries.”

A jury in Los Angeles on Wednesday said Meta and YouTube should pay $6 million for negligently designing Instagram and YouTube and failing to warn of its potential harm.

The plaintiff is a 20-year-old woman identified in court by the pseudonym Kaley. She began using YouTube when she was 6 and Instagram when was 9, and she claimed their intentionally addictive design harmed her mentally, including giving her social anxiety and depression.

The jury of 12 deliberated eight days and into the ninth day before awarding $3 million in compensatory and saying Meta shared 70 percent of the blame and YouTube 30 percent. They said the companies acted with fraud and malice, which meant they then had to determine what if any in punitive damages to impose.

They heard about an hour of argument from attorneys about punitive damages, then awarded $3 million in punitive damages, with Meta to pay $2.1 million and YouTube to pay $900,000.

Two female jurors disagreed with every aspect of the verdict. Another juror disagreed with the damages award. None spoke to reporters, but their tones during polling indicated they vehemently disagree.

Two jurors — one was the jury foreman — spoke to reporters in the courthouse hallway after the verdict. One, a woman, said Mark Zuckerberg’s testimony “was not, it was — he changed it, and that didn't sit well with us.”

“He’s the guru, so to speak, and he should have really, really known what he was going to say out to us jurors, before he even said anything," the juror said of Zuckerberg.

Parents of children who died because of social media related issues like choking games and sexual exploitation spoke outside the courthouse after the liability verdict.

“We’re all out of words to express what we feel,” said Julianna Arnold, whose 17-year-old daughter, Coco, died from a fentanyl overdose after buying a pill from someone she met through Instagram.

“Being in that courtroom and hearing those answers from the jury … [was] a complete validation of what we’ve been screaming on the top of roofs about for years. This was a conscious decision that they made. It was not an accident. The parents are not to blame, that’s for sure,” Arnold said.

Arnold said their advocacy “is is not over.”

“We know this is a long game. We’re headed to D.C. with the evidence we have in hand and this verdict, and we’re demanding safety protections and legislation to keep kids safe online,” she said. “We don’t want any more hearings. We don’t want any more loopholes in these bills. We don’t want any more of them shielding big tech. Enough is enough. We want them to do their jobs and keep American families safe.”

Plaintiff's attorney Mark Lanier told reporters that in bellwether trials such as this one, “It usually takes the plaintiffs three or four times to figure out how to win these cases. The plaintiffs are supposed to lose the first three or four.”

“We won. And so that’s provocative in what it says to everyone,” said Lanier, who’s based in Houston and is one of the most successful mass torts trial lawyers in the United States.

He said Kaley “feels like she was vindicated because she knows that what happened to her has happened to a host of countless people in her generation.”

One juror told us they “looked at what the average person would make times the rest of the life 40 years” when deciding the $3 million in compensatory.

The foreman said the issues “we were having was really just going through all the evidence. We wanted to make sure we took our time really thorough, going through each and every witness. What is the evidence provided in both directions, and ultimately, where did that lead to.”

The woman said they “all got along very well, even with individuals that didn’t agree with our decision, majority of our decision and we respected that.”

“We were hoping there’d be a trust or something to where this money could go and then little portions. ... We wanted them to feel it. We wanted them to realize that this was not acceptable,” the woman said.

“We also wanted to follow the law and how it was presented to us,” the foreman said.

Meta spokesman Andy Stone posted a statement on X that said the company will appeal.

“We respectfully disagree with the verdict and will appeal. Teen mental health is profoundly complex and cannot be linked to a single app. We will continue to defend ourselves vigorously as every case is different, and we remain confident in our record of protecting teens online.”

The verdict followed a jury in New Mexico on Wednesday imposing a $375 million penalty on Meta for enabling the sexual exploitation of children.

Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Lanier differentiated his case from that case.

“Ours is different, not only in who the plaintiff — we have an individual — but the root of ours is social media addiction, and that’s very different than this exploitation that’s happening on the platforms,” Lanier said.

“We weren’t even allowed to get into content, so we didn’t talk about any of the potential grooming or any of the potential sexploitation issues that are built into the platforms, because that’s content based. We only talked about the features and whether or not the platforms are addictive, and that’s a whole different arena. It’s apples and oranges from New Mexico,” he said.

Meta’s defense team is from Covington & Burling LLP.

In his argument against punitive damages, partner Paul Schmidt reminded jurors that Meta’s “fiercest critic,” former Facebook employee Brian Boland, agreed in his trial testimony that Meta “is not intentionally trying to do wrong.”

YouTube’s defense team is from Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati. Partner Luis Li emphasized in his argument that the company has and continues to implement safety precautions for children

“YouTube has, from the beginning, gone and tried to make its product better and better and better,” Li said.

He told the jury, “Even though I wish that they turned out differently, I want to tell you I respect your word and I respect each and every one of you care and work.”

Lanier emphasized the companies’ huge wealth and told jurors, “I just ask you to please remember what these companies are, because you've got to talk to Meta in Meta money.”

“I promise you waiting on you will be Adam Mosseri, Mark Zuckerberg and a number of others, and their cell phones are turned on because they want to know,” Lanier said.

He didn’t mention that Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Carolyn Kuhl allowed corporate representatives and trial team members to watch the trial remotely from an online stream not available to the public, so Mosseri and Zuckerberg may have watched the verdict publishing live.

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A jury in Adams County, Ohio, on Wednesday rejected defamation and invasion of privacy claims brought against rapper and singer Afroman by sheriff’s officials he’s lampooned since they raided his home in 2022.

The jury of 10 deliberated about six hours before delivering a full defense verdict for the 51-year-old, legal name Joseph Edgar Foreman, after a 2 1/2 day trial that spotlighted the video to his song “Lemon Pound Cake,” which included video footage from the raid of an armed deputy eyeing a lemon pound cake on Afroman’s kitchen counter.

Afroman sang in “Lemon Pound Cake” that the cake “made the sheriff want to put down his gun and cut him a slice.”

“He’s an Adams County sheriff. He’s hungry, and he’s big as hell. He was sniffing for weed, then he smelled another smell,” he sang.

Afroman, whose 2000 smash hit “Because I Got High” solidified his place in music culture history, nicknamed the deputy “Officer Pound Cake.”

He also said he had sex with a sergeant’s wife, and he repeatedly called another deputy a pedophile in obscene terms. He also made misogynistic and profane videos about the only female deputy involved in the search, and he repeatedly called all of them thieves after a search warrant recorded $4,400 seized but the sheriff’s office returned only $4,000.

An investigator with another sheriff’s office concluded the deputy counting the money overcounted $390 that didn’t exist; the investigator testified he couldn’t account for $10 missing from another evidence bag.

Defense lawyer David S. Osborne told jurors in his closing argument that Afroman is a comedian who “exaggerates for the sake of entertainment.” He referenced his client’s flamboyantly patriotic red, white and blue American flag suit.

“Look at that suit. Does this look like a man who thinks that everybody’s going to assume that everything he’s saying is fact?” Osborne said.

Osborne argued Afroman’s comments about the deputies are clearly exaggerated, but he offered another defense for calling the deputies thieves.

“Truth is a defense,” he said.

“That’s why we talked about theft. That’s why we showed all that,” Osborne said. “Because I wanted you to see how the money was handled. There’s a lot of confusion around it, and for that reason.”

Plaintiffs’ lawyer Robert A. Klingler told jurors he believes “a power higher than us that brought you here today to do this job.”

“You are the chosen people to do it. Nobody else is going to do it. There’s not going to be another trial. There’s not going to be a second chance,” said Klingler, who has a civil litigation practice.

Klingler requested $3.9 million and told the jury that his clients will be harmed further if the verdict favors Afroman or doesn’t award a large amount of money.

“A verdict for the plaintiffs will make up in some way for what they’ve been through. A verdict for the plaintiffs will say that we don’t condone, we don’t approve. You can’t get away with what Mr. Foreman has done. Not in this community. Not in this country. That’s not freedom of speech where we live,” Klingler said.

But if a defense verdict or “a verdict with a small amount of money attached to it ... the world is told what he did is okay.”

Klingler said the sheriff’s officials who sued would be “subject to even more ridicule.”

“‘You took him on and you lost. ... See? What he did was fine.’ I don’t have to tell you, you know, that’s not the message we want to send. It’s not the message you want to send,” Klingler told the jury.

Afroman’s only defense witness was the ex-wife of one of the plaintiff deputies, who testified her former husband and his colleagues didn’t take the song literally.

“Were they laughing and joking about it?” Osborne asked.

“Oh yeah, absolutely,” Rhonda Grooms testified Wednesday morning.

Judge Jonathan P. Hein published the verdict Wednesday evening about 6:30 p.m. Eastern Standard Time at the Adams County Courthouse in West Union.

“In all circumstances, the jury finds in favor of the defendant. No plaintiff verdict prevailed. So the matter will be concluded with defense verdicts,” said Hein, a mediator and retired judge from Darke County, Ohio, who was appointed to the case.

Afroman exited the courthouse with his wife, Angie Foreman, and raised his arms to cheers from supporters.

“We did it!” he yelled.

He told reporter Jay Shakur of ABC affiliate WCPO-TV news in Cincinnati, “I didn’t win. America won. America still has freedom of speech. It’s still for the people, by the people.”

“I’m glad, you know, things went my way. But if they would have took it off from me, I was happy about all the love I was getting from everybody after them people kicked my door in,”Afroman tearfully told Shakur, motioning to the crowd of supporters. “When life gives you lemons, you make lemon pound cake.”

A man wearing an American flag bandana who described himself as a supporter of free speech distributed lemon pound cake outside the courthouse while the jury deliberated.

“For me, this isn’t really about Afroman. It’s about free speech. When someone like Afroman stands up for my free speech by using his talents — his musical talents — to fight the corrupt system, we’ve got to come out and support him,” he told Shakur.

Afroman testified he “wasn’t happy” about the search and continues to post about the deputies “because the sheriffs never supposed to have raided my house in the first place.”

“All of this is their fault. If they hadn’t have wrongly raided my house, there would be no lawsuit. I would not know their names. They wouldn’t be on my home surveillance system, and there would be no songs, nothing. My money would still be intact, nothing. So all of this is their fault,” he testified during a 30-minute witness stand appearance on Tuesday.

He said he wanted to use money he makes from his videos and postings to pay the door deputies destroyed “under the circumstance that they shouldn’t have even been there in the first place.”

Klingler ended his exam by asking Afroman, “Is there anything that could change your mind about what you’re doing to these deputies?”

“Is there anything that can change my mind about the fact that they shouldn’t have been at my house in the first place? Is there anything that can change my mind about how my money shouldn’t have been touched in the first place? No,” Afroman answered.

“That’s all the questions I have. Thank you,” Klingler said.

“You’re welcome,” Afroman said.

A kidnapping investigation, then a lawsuit

A judge in August 2022 authorized the Adams County Sheriff’s Office to search Afroman’s property on Russellville Road in rural Adams County, about 50 miles east of Cincinnati. The crimes investigated were drug trafficking and kidnapping, but the deputies and sergeants who searched the property seized only marijuana and cash.

Afroman was not charged with a crime, but five deputies and two sergeants sued him in March 2023 alleging defamation, false light and likeness misappropriation.

Judge Jerry McBride, who had the case before Hein, dismissed the likeness misappropriation claim, which stemmed from Afroman using photos of the officials and surveillance footage of the raid in his videos, but Klingler moved forward with trial on the remaining claims. [This has been corrected; the original article said Hein dismissed the claim.] Ohio courts allow proceedings to be broadcast at the discretion of the judge, and WCPO-TV’s recordings were widely shared on the Internet. (My TikTok and Instagram posts went mega viral and actor Don Cheadle liked one of my Instagram clips of Afroman’s testimony.)

The attention has been so widespread that Adams County Sheriff’s Office officials in Colorado posted a video distinguishing themselves from Ohio’s Adams County in what a sergeant called “a geography lesson.” The video included images of dozens of angry messages people sent the office about Afroman’s lawsuit.

Deputies testify about ongoing harm

Klingler, a licensed attorney in Ohio since 1985, approached most exams by having the deputies confirm they didn’t steal money from Afroman, then questioning them about the harm they feel they’ve suffered from his ridiculing them.

Shawn Cooley, a longtime deputy who retired this year, testified they previously “very seldom” encountered problems when responding to calls at bars but “then he starts calling us thieves on the Internet, starts selling merchandise with our photo on it.”

“So now, when you go into a bar that for a call, you’ve got people in there screaming, ‘Are you gonna steal all of our money?’,” Cooley testified on Monday.

“I had one guy come out of a bedroom after me calling me a thief and wanting to know why I stole Afroman’s money,” he said.

“Based on what you’ve explained and what you’ve been through, do you think some of these people who called you thieves really thought you were?” Klingler asked.

“Absolutely. Absolutely,” Cooley answered.

“Did you receive any phone calls about this?” Klingler asked.

“I would answer the phone at the sheriff’s department because they were overwhelmed. I remember one day there was over 300 calls threatening us, calling us thieves, so we would have to go over and help dispatch because they were overwhelmed. There’s only two dispatchers,” Cooley answered.

Cooley testified his wife and children “couldn’t even go to Walmart. You couldn’t go into a gas station.”

“Around here, my youngest daughter would hear the dogs bark at night and come in my room wake me up, terrified that somebody was there to kill us. Because even though they were young, they’re still on Facebook. They still see this stuff, and it was just one after another,” Cooley said.

Cooley testified he was particularly upset an investigation took him to another sheriff’s office “all the way up to eastern Ohio on the Pennsylvania border, and when I walked into the deputies’ room up there to talk to them, they all knew me. All knew that I’ve been called a thief, Lemon Pound Cake.”

Osborne told Cooley to begin cross-exam, “I’d like to pick right up with this visit to the Pennsylvania border. You said they knew you as Lemon Pound Cake?”

“Yeah. That was what they referred to me as,” Cooley answered.

“They asked you for your autograph, correct?” Osborne asked.

“One of them did, yes,” Cooley answered. Cooley also said he “received hundreds of pound cakes at work.”

“And the context of that name comes from a music video that Mr. Foreman created, correct?” Osborne asked.

“I don’t know where he got it at. You’d have to ask him that question,” Cooley answered.

Osborne played Afroman’s “Lemon Pound Cake” video in the courtroom.

Afterward, he asked Cooley, “You would admit that you with the glasses walking by the lemon pound cake on the counter?”

“Yes,” Cooley answered.

“And that is security footage from the search of Mr. Foreman’s residence?”

“I assume yes,” Cooley answered.

Klingler’s exam of Deputy Lisa Phillips involved playing Afroman’s profane videos about her while she cried on the witness stand.

The videos included sexual innuendo and an apparent artificial intelligence remake of her deposition in which Afroman hugs and comforts her as she weeps. Phillips broke down crying during the exam, and the remainder of her testimony was not recorded.

The deputy repeatedly called a pedophile by Afroman testified he quit his “dream job” at the sheriff’s office because of that and because Afroman called him a thief.

“I dedicated a lot of time over 10 years to Adams County,” Brian Newland testified on Monday.

“You know, whether it was a calling at 1 o’clock in the morning or working 14 hours ... I loved working at the sheriff’s office, but it just got to be so much,” Newland continued.

He said he felt as though people were looking at him when he’d go to Walmart or stop by his children’s games. He wanted to “just spare their embarrassment.”

Newland is the deputy who an investigator concluded overcounted Afroman’s money by $390. He mentioned the internal investigation when testifying about the turmoil he felt at his job.

Klingler pointed out that Afroman posted about Newland being a pedophile using a photo of Newland with a boy he met through a the Shop with a Cop holiday event that pairs law enforcement officers with children of low socioeconomic status.

“What effect did it have on you when you saw these posts that you’re a pedophile?” Klingler asked.

“I was angry, sad, depressed, upset,” Newland answered.

“Why were you sad or upset? ... Isn’t it just somebody exaggerating or making jokes?” Klingler asked.

“No. I didn’t find it funny at all. I work in law enforcement, have kids, have friends, family. I was involved in the schools, and then I’m being blessed all over social media for the entire United States to see that I’m a pedophile,” Newland answered.

“Do your kids friends come to your house and hang out?” Klingler asked.

“They don’t anymore,” Newland answered.

“Did they used to?” Klingler asked.

“They used to have huge slumber parties, especially on the birthdays. They’d have 10 or 11 kids over. And essentially, once this started, it stopped. I don’t recall the last time my daughters have had a friend over, if they’ve had one, ever since then,” Newland answered.

According to multiple news reports, including Hearst affiliate WLWT-TV in Cincinnati, Newland’s brother William Newland was fired from the Peeples Police Department in Ohio in 2021 after he was accused of providing obscene material to juveniles.

Newland told Klingler he doesn’t recall what his brother was charged with but knows it was a misdemeanor.

“Did you have anything to do with that crime?” Klingler asked.

“No, I did not,” Newland answered.

“Have you ever been accused or convicted of pedophilia?” Klingler asked.

“No,” Newland answered.

In cross, Osborne asked Newland if his brother’s crime “involved minor children.”

“I really don’t know anything about the investigation,” Newland answered.

“You don’t know anything about your brother’s crime?” Osborne asked.

“He was charged with just what I’ve seen on jail tracker in the past,” Newland answered.

“So you’re not close to your brother?” Osborne asked.

“I’m not,” Newland answered.

“Are you close to your family?” Osborne asked.

“Yeah, most of my family,” Newland answered.

“Then why not your brother, who’s in law enforcement?” Osborne asked.

“Well, we were both young at the same time, separate parts of the world. We kind of got close again. And then once this, you know, his issues happen, we kind of just drifted apart again,” Newland answered.

Osborne pressed Newland about his testimony that no one called him pedophile before Afroman did.

Newland said the reaction to his brother’s criminal case “was just on a smaller scale.”

“I was asked about it, and then that was it. It wasn’t shared, and I wasn’t put in music videos and everything else because of that reason,” Newland answered.

“But your brother’s criminal charge and everything was in the front page of the local newspaper, correct?” Osborne asked.

“Yep,” Newland answered.

“So everybody in Adams County knew that your brother was charged?” Osborne asked.

“Correct,” Newland answered.

“And so did people treat you differently at that time?” Osborne asked.

“No,” Newland answered.

“Not at all?” Osborne asked.

“No,” Newland answered.

Osborne questioned Sgt. Michael Estep about his wife’s felony theft conviction for stealing from her employer.

“You never had anybody asking about being a thief when your wife was charged with theft?” Osborne asked.

“No,” Estep answered.

Judge Hein interrupted Osborne and said in front of the jury, “Tell me why you would do that to the jury.”

“I’m asking a question that builds on his reputation. He says he has never been called a thief before, yet he keeps saying that everybody treats him differently,” Osborne said.

Osborne said Estep is “opening up the door so that I can ask the question about what’s affecting his reputation.”

Judge Hein told jurors to consider the testimony about Estep’s wife’s theft conviction "so you can see how it does or does not affect him alone.”

“Just don’t get caught up that your spouse’s character is your character, because it’s not,” the judge said.

“So restating the question, Mr. Estep: Your wife did steal from her employer, correct?” Osborne asked.

Estep paused for several seconds before he answered, “Yes.”

“And it was a felony sum of money, correct?” Osborne asked.

“Yes,” Estep answered.

“Which is over $1,000?” Osborne asked.

“Yes,” Estep answered.

“And you were part of the search of Mr. Foreman’s residence, correct?” Osborne asked.

“Yes,” Estep answered.

“Did you ever have any contact with the money?” Osborne asked.

“I noticed money in a coat pocket, and I pointed it out to Detective Newland,” Estep answered.

Estep told Osborne “not that I recall” when he asked if he made a deragory remark about Afroman during the raid, so Osborne showed him footage from the raid in which he said Afroman was a “sex addict.”

“I couldn’t clarify if I heard addict,” Estep said.

Osborne asked an assistant to get Estep “the hearings aids,” then replayed the footage.

“Were you able to hear it that time? Would you agree that you called Mr. Foreman a sex addict?” Osborne asked.

“Yeah,” Estep answered.

“You would agree that this is a public record?” Osborne asked.

“Yes,” Estep answered.

Sgt. Randy Walters’ claims centered on Afroman saying he had sex with Walters’ wife.

He testified on Tuesday that his daughter is “getting hazed and harassed because somebody thinks it’s funny.”

“My wife for 28 years, she didn’t have an affair with Mr. Foreman. She didn’t make my daughter with Mr. Foreman. But now my family has to be harmed because of straight up, 100 percent lies,” Walters testified. “Where in the world is it okay to make something up for fun that’s damaging to others when you know for sure it’s an absolute lie? That’s a problem.”

He said Afroman’s statements are “just fuel to the rage” if deputies try to arrest already “mouthy” people. Adams County is a rural county so deputies “do your paperwork in your car.”

“Well, try to find someplace safe to sit when you’re literally getting death threats because of lies. You’re absolutely in fear for your safety to begin with as a police officer, but now intensify that because somebody is lying about a situation,” Walters testified.

He contrasted Afroman’s treatment of his family to his treatment of Afroman’s family during the search.

“The respect for my family, including my law enforcement family, wasn’t nothing like the respect I gave to his children the night of the raid. I stopped what I was doing when his wife, who I know and have been friendly with for years, as far as being associates, said, ‘Hey … somebody pulled in and they’re scared,’” Walters said.

“I stopped what I did, what I was doing, and went and checked on his kids to make sure they were safe, because that’s a priority to me. But the same respect that was given to his family, he had no regard to mine or me,” he continued.

Walters said his children “came home yesterday because of new posts.”

“It’s affected all of our reputations from a baseless lie till now. We are not thieves. We didn’t steal his money. I never touched his money,” Walters said. “I spoke to him on the phone when he was concerned that he was going to be arrested that night, and apparently, in some way on the phone, he didn’t like my attitude towards not fixing his door. I’m sorry if you felt that I disrespected you.”

In cross, Osborne asked about Afroman’s nicknames for Walters.

“Does anyone believe you’re Beetle Bailey?” Osborne asked.

“Probably not,” Walters answered.

“And when he called you a son of a bitch, that would be an opinion?” Osborne asked.

“I’d say that would be an opinion,” Walters answered.

“Because there’s no way we can prove whether you’re a son of a bitch or not?” Osborne asked.

“Nah, she’s been dead for years,” Walters answered.

“I am sorry about your mother on that, but you would agree, though, that when someone calls someone a son of a bitch, it’s not necessarily a statement of fact. It’s more a statement of opinion or description of a person?” Osborne asked.

“Sure,” Walters answered.

“Same thing with being called. I think it’s Gomer Pyle?” Osborne asked.

“Yes,” Walters answered.

“No one would think you’re Gomer Pyle from the movie?” Osborne asked.

“Obviously, that’s a character in a movie,” Walters answered.

“Yeah. But you’re not that person?” Osborne asked.

“No,” Walters answered.

Walters said Afroman’s vulgar statements about having sex with his wife “caused tremendous pain in my life.”

“So does it paint you in a false light?” Osborne asked.

“Yes, that my wife is cheating on me with Mr. Foreman,” Walters answered.

“But we all know that’s not true, correct?” Osborne asked.

“I don’t know,” Walters answered.

“But you don't know if your wife’s cheating on you or not?” Osborne asked.

“You want to go there?” Walters responded.

“No, I just want to ask that question because you said we don’t know,” Osborne asked.

“I’ve been with that woman since middle school. I would hope she wouldn’t. But you know what? Once somebody puts it out there for their fun and entertainment, it’s out there and it’s a problem,” Walters answered.

Osborne asked Walters if the statement can be verified as true or false, and Walters answered “ask your client,” so Osborne asked Judge Hein to direct Walter to answer the question.

“That you don’t like his answer doesn't mean he didn't answer," Hein said.

Osborne protested but Hein said, “That was his answer. You didn’t like how it came out, but it was his answer. I can’t make him say something else. You can ask him another question.”

Osborne asked if Walters is “claiming that Mr. Foreman saying he had sex with your wife is a private fact about your life?”

“My family is a private part of my life. Him having an affair with my wife would definitely be a private part of my life if that was occurring,” Walters answered.

“And that has affected your reputation?” Osborne asked.

“Yes,” Walters answered.

Judge Hein told jurors that Afroman likely would testify again as his own witness after left the stand on Tuesday, but the only person who ended up testifying for the defense was Grooms’ ex-wife.

After asking about the deputies laughing about “Lemon Pound Cake,” Osborne asked if Afroman’s posts about her ex-husband or the sheriff’s office “affected your life any at all?”

“No,” Rhonda Grooms answered.

Osborne asked if Afroman’s comments had “not a damn thing to do with your relationship between you and Sean and why it came to an end?”

“No, it did not,” Grooms answered.

A teacher, Grooms said when her students said they saw her husband in a video, “I would say, ‘Yeah, that was him,’ and turn around and walk away. I didn’t elaborate on any of thatt … because I didn’t think it was the students business.”

Osborne also questioned Grooms about Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion’s song “Wet A** P****” to drive to reiterate his point that song lyrics shouldn’t be taken literally.

“Do you believe it’s a literal interpretation?” Osborne asked.

“No,” Grooms answered.

“Would you agree it’s derogatory towards women?” Osborne asked.

“No,” Grooms answered.

“Even though it says nasty things about them?” Osborne asked.

“Yeah, no, I mean, it’s the artist’s opinion,” Grooms answered.

Osborne mentioned the song again in his closing, referring to “Carly B” and “Megan Three Stallion.”

“I’m not the audience for that song, and I know that I know nothing in that song, nothing they’re talking about, is true,” Osborne said. He seemed to miss that he was essentially saying he doesn’t believe a woman can be sexually excited.

“Nobody looks at Lil Wayne’s song “Pussy Monster” and says there’s a monster in that song,” Osborne said. “Everybody knows it’s exaggeration for entertainment. Is he commenting on something? Sure, but it’s not fact.”

He told jurors to consider “what rap is, because music does not exist in a vacuum.”

“Music evolves over time. Take a look at jazz. It’s evolved at one time. It was distinct in a certain subculture, and it has now expanded. Rap is the same. Rap started out as a means for people to express social commentary opinions through entertainment. Look at the song by NWA … ‘Fuck The Police.’ I think I said that right,” Osborne said.

Osborne said he went to a comedy show by former Hillsboro, Ohio, Mayor Drew Hastings and some of Hasting’s jokes “like those of Eddie Murphy and Richard Pryor, some of them are not tasteful, but they’re still jokes.”

“They’re not facts, and we know that that’s what a reasonable person listening to that would understand, and that’s the point,” Osborne said.

He emphasized that the seven people suing Afroman are “are public officials.”

“They’re public officials. They’re going to be held to higher standards. Their work is going to be criticized. I mean, that’s just what happens when you’re a public official. No reasonable person would expect a police officer not to be criticized,” Osborne said.

In rebuttal, Klingler emphasized that “WAP” and other songs Osborne mentioned don’t refer to specific people.

“It’s not the same thing,” he said.

Klingler said in his closing that jurors should award Phillips $1.5 million for “what she’s been through for three and a half years and may be going through for who knows.”

Newland deserves “$1 million for what he's been through with his family, the loss of his dream job here in Adams County,” Klingler said.

Walters also deserves $1 million “for what he's been through with the allegations and vile videos about his wife.”

He said Estep and the other three plaintiffs — Shawn Grooms, Cooley and Cooley’s son Justin Cooley, “I’m asking you for a total for all four of them of $400,000, divided among them however you see fit based on their testimony.”

“In this case, there’s no doctor bills, there’s no damaged property. There’s damage to reputation. There’s pain and suffering. There’s public humiliation. There’s everything you saw and heard from these detectives from the witness stand,” Klingler said.

“And the only thing you can do as a jury to decide this case is to render a verdict of money that somehow stands in, somehow represents the harm that these deputy sheriffs have been put through over three and a half years,” Klingler continued. “That’s all you can do. You can’t issue an order that says ‘stop.’ You can’t issue an order that says, you know, ‘say you’re sorry.’ All you can do is issue a verdict for an amount that fairly stands in represents what they’ve been through, what they’ve lost.”

Klingler ended his argument by telling jurors he’s “done what I can” and his clients have “done what they can.”

“They’ve suffered through the publicity. They could have stopped this case at any time, if they would have kowtowed to the pressure public humiliation that Mr. Foreman continued to put them through. But they didn’t. They bravely stood behind their case and their right not to be drug through the mud with lies in the media. They’ve done all they can, and now I am giving their case and this decision to you. It’s out of my hands,” Klingler said.

Klingler has not commented publicly on the verdict.

I discussed the trial on Live Now From Fox

I enjoy appearing on Live Now From Fox because the hosts usually let me go on and on, which gives me plenty of room for important details.

I told host Shawna Khalafi that we should “keep in mind that this is much to the dismay and despair, maybe even, of the sheriff's deputies whose lawyer actually told the jury that he thought they were sent by a higher power.”

“I’m just imagining the sheriff’s deputies sitting there thinking hearing their lawyer talk about how horrible it’s going to be when they lose and then they lose,” I said.

I also noted “that the actual evidence in this was really scarce.”

“We heard testimony about the sheriff's office getting 300 phone calls in a day threatening them, and all these voicemails and all these threats and but we didn't see a lot of actual hard copies of anything,” I said.

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Mark Zuckerberg set the tone for his testimony in a landmark civil trial in Los Angeles last week with his first answer.

In a packed Los Angeles courtroom, the multibillionaire founder of Meta paused and said, “Uh, sure,” when plaintiff’s lawyer Mark Lanier asked, “You and I, and I think everybody, will readily agree that there are vulnerable in this world, fair?”

It began a multi-question point that culminated with Lanier saying if a company knows it does more harm than good, “than that company needs to reexamine its values.”

“Um, I think that’s probably right, yes,” Zuckerberg answered.

The exchange began Zuckerberg’s nearly three-hour direct-examination in a landmark lawsuit alleging Meta’s Instagram and Google’s YouTube substantially contributed to a now-20-year-old California woman’s mental health problems through the intentionally addictive nature of the platforms. The trial is a bellwether that could influence how attorneys approach approximately 1,900 other lawsuits in California state court that have been coordinated into a single case in Los Angeles County Superior Court.

Zuckerberg is the most prolific witness, and the 41-year-old Facebook co-founder made clear in his testimony on Wednesday that he finds the allegations driving the lawsuit, and Lanier’s courtroom approach, wrong and also, simplistic.

He also dismissed Lanier’s suggestion that he’s worried about media coverage of the trial by saying, “This is a court proceeding. This is, like, an important societal institution where we have jury debate and understand and come to judgment on an important question.”

“That has a much higher importance than how the media will report what I say,” he said.

Several parents who are pursuing similar lawsuits watched Zuckerberg testify from the courtroom gallery. They were joined by Matthew Bergman, a Seattle-based lawyer who has hundreds of lawsuits against social media companies and is the original attorney on the case currently on trial.

Judge Carolyn B. Kuhl threatened to ban Bergman from the courthouse last week after he conducted an online interview with the BBC World News despite previously being admonished about electronics restrictions after he took a photo of himself inside the courtroom and posted it online.

During a hearing on Friday, Kuhl allowed Bergman to continue attending the trial but removed him from the steering committee for the coordinated lawsuits, which is a group of appointed attorneys who manage the cases and are entitled to money from verdicts and settlements.

“After I’ve counseled you about not taking photography, you video yourself inside the courthouse. So the problem is, I’m trying to focus on your claims case, and instead, I have to focus on this distraction,” Kuhl said.

The judge told Bergman he should apologize to his co-counsel.

“I feel most bad for your colleagues on the plaintiff’s side,” Kuhl said.

The judge scheduled a hearing on March 23 to determine if Bergman should be held in contempt of the court.

In the courtroom, the face of the case has been Lanier, a nationally prominent lawyer from Houston with a long record of big wins in mass torts.

But Bergman has for several years promoted himself nationally as the face of litigation against social media companies, including through a billboard that likened himself to Saul Goodman, the corrupt fictional lawyer on the television shows “Breaking Bad” and “Better Call Saul” who ends up disbarred and serving an 86-year prison sentence.

Bergman built his practice suing over asbestos-related claims and now operates the Social Media Victims Law Center in Seattle. He told Judge Kuhl in a four-minute mea culpa on Friday that he was so emotional over Zuckerberg’s testimony he wasn’t thinking clearly when he used his phone’s video camera to speak with BBC inside the courthouse.

“The events of Wednesday were so emotionally overcoming for me and those families that I have known for four years that I lost sight of my obligations as an officer of this court. That was inexcusable,” Bergman said.

He said he’s “absolutely appalled at my own conduct,” “deeply ashamed” and “profoundly embarrassed.”

“In a case about tech accountability, the fact that I was not accountable on tech issues in this court is humbling and I am deeply sorry,” Bergman said. He said he hopes the experience “can be a learning experience for me, and I hope that this will be an opportunity for me to reflect deeper how the situation arose and become a better lawyer and person in the future.”

He said he accepts his removal from the steering committed but asked if someone else from his firm can replace him. Kuhl said another attorney from his firm already is on the committee, and that won’t change.

“Your conduct does not implicate her,” Kuhl said.

Bergman spoke to reporters outside the courthouse.

“Wednesday was a very intense day,” Bergman said. Being in court with parents he’s cried and prayed with while Zuckerberg was on the stand “was emotionally overwhelming to me, and resulted in me lapsing from my obligations as an officer in the court.”

Bergman and others have held regular rallies and press conferences outside the courthouse with parents of children who died from drug overdoses or suicides or were harmed through their participation in online trends such as choking games.

Jonathan Haidt, a social psychologist and chair in ethical leadership at New York University, said at a rally outside Los Angeles City Hall last week that

“These trials are going to change the world,” Haidt said.

Haidt wrote on Instagram, “For the first time, tech executives are being forced to answer to the evidence that their social media platforms knowingly harm kids — even as lives are lost.”

Advocates hope the information released through the trial will lead to Congressional inquires and legislative changes, but much of Lanier’s questions to Zuckerberg regarded his testimony to Congress and information that has been public for years.

A direct-exam about credibility, truth and harm

First, I should say it’s an outright miracle I got in the courtroom for Zuckerberg’s testimony.

I have a badge that’s supposed to guarantee me a seat, but I didn’t get into the courthouse until just a few minutes before he got on the stand because there was a long line to go through security, including a jury pool for another case.

The demand for seating for Zuckerberg’s testimony obviously was ferocious, and there didn’t appear to be any space at all when I walked in. The guy in charge of media seating firmly told me there was no space.

Then it’s like a spell was cast over the courtroom because the media people began looking around for a place to fit me in, and they settled on a tiny nook in a back row already packed with reporters.

I squeezed in and realized I was sitting next to NBC Los Angeles reporter Alex Rozier, whom I’ve known since we were reporters in Spokane, Washington, together 15 years ago, and I knew I’d be okay.

Zuckerberg was sworn in just a couple minutes after I walked in. I was outside when he walked in, and I can confirm the moving media mob included the obligatory falling cameraman.

Lanier’s opening sequence included asking Zuckerberg if he agrees one option for vulnerable people is to “prey upon them,” to which Zuckerberg replied, “I guess. I don’t think we should.”

“Amen to that,” said Lanier, who’s also a Christian pastor.

Lanier told Zuckerberg the “road map” for his exam has three stops: “the stop of credibility, the stop of truth and the stop of harm.”

He approached the first by questioning Zuckerberg about his financial stake in Meta, which is roughly 13 percent of its stock shares worth about $200 billion. Zuckerberg said it’s true he makes more money when Meta’s stock value rises, but “it might be worth adding that I have pledged to give almost all of my money to charity.”

“I focus on giving billions of dollars to science, research, knowledge,” Zuckerberg said. “The better that Meta does, the more” he can donate to research.

Lanier referenced a motion in limine from Meta’s lawyers and asked, “Sir are you suggesting we examine your spending habits and what you own?” “I’m not suggesting anything. I’m answering your question about my economic motives” because the more money Meta makes “the more money I will be able to invest in science,” Zuckerberg said, adding that he’s pledged to donate “99 percent” of his wealth.

“Have you signed over your money, sir?” Lanier asked.

Zuckerberg said he believes most of his stock is going to his trust already.

“Now you have absolutely no income from that stock? You have no right to dictate where it goes?” Lanier asked.

“Oh, of course I determine where it goes,” Zuckerberg answered.

Lanier asked if the research Zuckerberg funds includes “the AI and the other things that are related to this,” and Zuckerberg said he doesn’t believe artificial intelligence “is related to this case.”

Judge Kuhl told Lanier to ask the question again “without the AI reference.”

Lanier asked Zuckerberg if it’s fair to say he and his wife determine where the money is invested.

“Yes, for the most part,” Zuckerberg said, though other people have input. He said the money “predominately goes towards scientific research” and another “large amount” goes to education.

“How much have you pledged towards helping with those people who have been hurt by social media?” Lanier asked.

“Uh, that’s not part of the focus of the foundation,” Zuckerberg said.

Lanier told him that wasn’t the question, and he again asked how much he’s pledged toward people harmed by social media.

“I disagree with the characterization of that,” Zuckerberg said.

Lanier asked if he remembered Sen. Josh Hawley asking if he’d give money to “help the victims of social media,” and Zuckerberg said, “I believe he would have asked something like that, but I don’t recall it myself.”

“Well, I’ll ask it of you. Have you?” Lanier said.

Zuckerberg said “no” and again said he disagrees “with the characterization.”

Lanier asked Zuckerberg about him telling podcast host Joe Rogan he has the benefit of “not having to convince the board” of directors not to fire him, and Zuckerberg said “that’s roughly true, although it’s a little more complicated.”

“I think what I told Joe Rogan was a simplified version,” he said. Lanier wanted to play Zuckerberg’s comments to Rogan for the jury, but Meta’s lawyer Paul Schmidt said there was no testimony to impeach and Judge Kuhl agreed.

Zuckerberg said that “being in court now” calls for a more technical explanation. He said it’s “roughly correct” that the board can’t fire him because he has a majority stake so if they tried to, he could elect a new board, “but in practice, the board is independent.”

“Your decisions ultimately determine corporate policy at Meta, true?” Lanier asked.

“Yes,” Zuckerberg answered.

Zuckerberg pushed back when Lanier said he has “extensive media training, true?”

“I’m not sure why you say that,” Zuckerberg answered. He said he’s “sort of well known to be very bad at this.”

Lanier said Zuckerberg works with communications teams who “give you pretty clear instructions on how to be good versus bad.”

Lanier moved into evidence and displayed for the jury a document called “MZ’s comms plan.”

The document instructs Zuckerberg to be “authentic, human, insightful and real” and “not to try hard, not to be fake, robotic, corporate or even cheesy.” Zuckerberg said that was the advice “in general” and said he consistently seeks advice on how to improve.

Lanier displayed an email in which a communications specialist tells Zuckerberg that he should address concerns about social media causing children a “fear of missing out” by mentioning that he “will have two teenage daughters someday, so this will be personal to me, too.”

Lanier said he’s not only trying to become a better person, he’s “trying to further the mission of Meta.”

Zuckerberg said he’s “trying to communicate more clearly.”

“That’s one thing that doesn’t come naturally to me,” he said. “Being able to communicate more clearly is certainly something I’ve had to work on over time.”

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Lanier asked if his preparation was for situations such as “what we’re doing today,” and Zuckerberg said “I don’t consider what we’re doing today to be media.”

That led into a topic that Lanier also pressed heavily with Instagram Head Adam Mosseri during his testimony on Feb. 11: The policy against children under 13 using Instagram and how it’s enforced, or not enforced, and Instagram’s focus, or non-focus, on the time people spend on the platform.

Zuckerberg said he doesn’t remember his “exact words” to Congress claiming a lack of connection between social media and worsening teen mental health, but he said “that is my understanding of the summary of scientific literature.”

Then, about 35 minutes into the exam, Lanier segued from the “credibility” stop on the “road map” he mentioned in the beginning to the “truth” stop by asking Zuckerberg about a 2018 document that said, “We can estimate there were 4 million people under 13 in 2015 on Instagram.”

Zuckerberg testified Wednesday he “generally” thinks there are young people who lie about their age to access Instagram “and we have a bunch of systems” to try to detect them.

“It’s often difficult to determine,” he said.

Lanier pointed out that Instagram didn’t always ask for a user’s birth date when creating an account, including when the plaintiff, who’s identified in court as Kaley G.M., created an account in 2015 when she was 9 years old.

Even with the verification system, “You expect a 9 year old to read all of that fine print? … That’s your basis for swearing under oath to children under the age of 13 not allowed?” Lanier asked.

Zuckerberg said there’s an “important question about enforcement” and again acknowledged “it’s very difficult” to enforce.

Lanier displayed an email chain from 2019 in which an employee said Instagram’s lack of “proactive action on detecting under 13 and detecting under 13 accounts undermines our credibility.”

Zuckerberg testified there was “some debate” about the “private sensitivity of asking users to disclose their birthdates.

“We build more tools and things over time. I always wish that we could have gotten there sooner,” he said. “I think we’re in the right place now, … and I think we’ll continue to add more over time.”

Lanier characterized the questions and answers as them looking “at the truth about whether or not under 13 were on Instagram.” He displayed an email in which a Meta employee attached a presentation with an objective to “unearth digital behavior of eight to 12” year olds “with the ultimate aim of creating opportunity areas that ignite Facebook creativity”, expansion and development.

Zuckerberg pointed out that the presentation wasn’t from Meta and said he didn’t receive the email and said he’s unsure “what the relevance is.”

“You may not see the relevance, but for some people it may be, so let me keep going with that,” Lanier said.

Lanier pointed out that the document quotes a 12-year-old girl as saying she spends a lot of time on instagram.

It “clearly seems to indicate that there’s at least one 12 year old on Instagram,” Lanier said.

Zuckerberg said the company acknowledges “there are people who get around the restrictions.”

Lanier again asked him about his testimony to Congress that no children under 13 see advertising on Instagram because they’re not allowed on Instagram. Zuckerberg said that’s true but told him, “I think you’re mischaracterizing what I said” and “I don’t think this is complicated.”

“It’s been our clear policy that people under the age of 13 are not allowed on our services. And I think I’ve also been consistent that there are people who get around the rules, and we try to take steps to identify them and remove them, and they’re not perfect,” he testified on Wednesday.

Lanier spent the final 20 minutes before the 90-minute noon recess questioning Zuckerberg about whether the company tries to increase the amount of time users spend on Instagram.

“Earlier on in the company, we had goals around this, and then at some point, I decided” not to focus on time but to focus on “utility and value instead.”

“There’s a basic assumption that if you build something valuable, then people will do it more because it’s useful to them,” Zuckerberg said.

“People do things more because they’re addictive, don’t they?” Lanier asked.

“I’m not sure what to say to that,” Zuckerberg answered. “I don’t think that that applies here.”

Lanier displayed a 2015 document that discussed goals for increasing the time spent on Instagram by 12 percent, and Zuckerberg again said that his approach changed over time. Lanier displayed another document from 2021 that celebrated increases in time spend on Instagram, and Zuckerberg differentiated between “goals” and “milestones.”

Lanier finished his exam after the noon recess by asking Zuckerberg about an internal Facebook document that discussed “known negative effects of Facebook and/or social media in general on teens.”

The report said “increased screen time, particularly before bed, is linked to sleep issues, which have long term negative effects on cognitive and physical development.”

“One out of five teens” report “checking social media in the middle of the night. Teens feel enormous pressure to portray their idealized self on social media,” the report said. “Teens take 20 selfies to get to the right one to post.”

Lanier ended his exam by having his co-counsel display a large banner with photos Kaley posted on her Instagram. it stretched about 50 feet across the well of the courtroom, and it stayed displayed for a couple minutes as Lanier questioned Zuckerberg.

“Did you look carefully and see how much time had been spent and how many pictures had been posted by Kaley G.M.?” Lanier asked.

“No,”’ Zuckerberg answered.

“Did you try to analyze whether or not there may have been social harm to her?” Lanier asked.

“Me personally?” Zuckerberg asked.

“Yes, sir,” Lanier answered.

“We have our team and the experts who were involved in this trial, and that was thoroughly done,” he said. He said he saw “some of the photos” but not all.

He also said he’s “not sure that’s accurate” when Lanier said Instagram owns Kaley’s photos.

“Once it’s posted on Instagram, you don’t think those terms and conditions that we were talking about earlier might say something

about that?” Lanier asked.

“I don’t think we own it,” Zuckerberg asked.

Lanier had no more questions.

A cross-exam about growth and change

In cross-exam, Schmidt asked Zuckerberg if it’s important to him that people don’t feel harmed by Instagram.

Zuckerberg said “yes” and again said he wants to build a product thats a good thing and creates value in people’s lives.

“I’m focused on building this company over a very long period of time,” he said. “If you feel like they’re not having a good experience, then why would they use our products over a long period of time?”

“I want to make sure that we can build out this platform and this community over a very long period of time,” Zuckerberg continued. He said he built Meta’s services because this was a thing that I wanted to exist and that I wanted to use.”

“It’s very important to me and I think a lot of people I work with that what we do is something that people get value out of and feel like it’s a positive force in their life,’ Zuckerberg testified.

Schmidt, a partner at Covington & Burling LLP in Los Angeles, asked if wanting people to use Instagram is equivalent to wanting them to use them too much, and Zuckerberg said “No. I mean, I’ve tried to explain a few times” that he wants to build a valuable product, not a harmful one.

“To me, the North Star is making sure that we’re delivering value and that people are having positive experiences,” Zuckerberg said. People will gravitate toward social media if other mediums aren’t improving as quickly, he said, and “TV hasn’t gotten that much better over time, but I think social media has improved quite a bit.”

Schmidt asked if it’s important to him to be “honest and truthful” and Zuckerberg answered, “Always.”

“Ae you aware that Mr. Lanier asked you to testify here in his case?” Schmidt asked.

“Yes,” Zuckerberg answered.

Schmidt then pointed out that Lanier spent the first 30 minutes of the exam questioning Zuckerberg’s credibility.

“Yeah, I guess so,” Zuckerberg answered.

Schmidt asked if he’s “done your best to be truthful” when testifying.

“Yes,” Zuckerberg answered.

I said on KNX News radio during the lunch break that I expected to hear something in Schmidt’s cross about Zuckerberg’s starting theFacebook.com in his Harvard University dorm room, but Schmidt’s wrecked my prediction by telling Zuckerberg, “As I understand it, you started Facebook in college. I’m not going to ask you about that.”

Zuckerberg said he became interested in computers when he was 11 and a friend had one “and I thought it was awesome.” He wasn’t expecting to stay in California when he moved to Silicon Valley to build Facebook, but its popularity grew so much, he never left.

“I didn’t really think that Facebook was going to be a big company. I thought maybe one day I would start a company,” he said.

Facebook’s principles of “helping people express what they care about, helping people stay connected, helping people learn about other people” “are really important things to people.”

Trying to express who we are and talk to people we care about is “a thing that we all spend time doing.”

“So if can you build a tool that helps people do that, that’s a very useful thing,” he said.

Schmidt asked Zuckerberg about Facebook’s early motto, “Move Fast and Break Things.” Zuckerberg said it reflected Facebook’s early development, when he asked engineers “to try to innovate quickly, and when there were errors, we would just fix them. … That actually stopped working as a strategy.”

“I think it’s worth noting that we had a lot of debate around that phrase,” Zuckerberg said.

Schmidt went over an internal document with Zuckerberg that discussed the need to “focus on long-term impact.”

“Put your energy into what you know will have the greatest impact. Do not waste time on minor issues and instead focus on truly big challenges,” the document said.

Schmidt asked how a long-term focus relates to focusing on wellbeing, and Zuckerberg said, “I think we’ve talked about this a few times.” Some people may want to get people to use products in the short term, but Zuckerberg wants to focus on long-term value because “that’s actually the thing that sets us up for success.”

“That’s what I care about it,” Zuckerberg said, calling it a “bad strategy” to do anything else.

“I think becoming too myopic and too focused on the near term is the downfall for a lot of companies,” he said.

Schmidt highlighted the document’s goals to “build awesome things” and “technology that inspires people and revolutionizes.”

“I think the world needs inspiration,” Zuckerberg testified. “there’s a difference between building something that’s good and building something that’s awesome.”

“Something could be both. It can be awesome and good. It can be awesome and not good,” he continued. “I just want our company to push towards building both of those things.”

Zuckerberg also said his company doesn’t make much money from teenage Instagram users.

“The most recent estimate that I saw is less than 1% of revenue is from teens, or something like that,” he said.

Still, Instagram wants teenagers to use the platform, and ensuring they stay means giving them positive experiences, he said.

Schmidt followed up on Zuckerberg’s distinction between “milestones” and “goals” regarding time spent on Instagram.

“There’s a very important difference, which is that we’re not doing these as goals for teams to work on,” he said. He said milestones are “sort of like this gut check at a high level for, like, is the plan for the company tracking in the way that we want.”

After a 15-minute recess, Schmidt questioned Zuckerberg about a written comment he submitted to Congress about the need for a clear age verification system. Zuckerberg testified that phone makers such as Apple could develop a way to inform apps if a user is under 13.

“I think that doing that kind of control at the phone level is a very wise and simple way to do it, rather than having many, many app companies have to go try to build this verification,” Zuckerberg said.

Schmidt also asked Zuckerberg about plastic surgery photo filters on Instagram.

Zuckerberg said he prohibited the filters as “a reasonable precaution” while the company decided how to approach them long term. The final policy allows people outside the company to create the filters for Instagram but does not allow the company to promote them. He said he viewed the debate as “very challenging” and important to people’s freedom to express themselves.

“If people want to express something, and there isn’t evidence that it’s harmful to others, i think we should generally allow it,” he said.

Schmidt displayed an email exchange between Zuckerberg and Apple CEO Tim Cook in February 2018 about working together and “making sure technology improves people’s wellbeing.” Zuckerberg told Cook he wanted to reduce the time people spend on our services and make the time that they do spend…a lot better.”

Schmidt asked what he meant when he told Cook they’re “working on ways to encourage healthier technologies.”

“I mean, I think it’s pretty descriptive,” Zuckerberg told his attorney. “I’m basically saying that I care about the wellbeing of communities and kids who are using the services. We are trying to make sure that what we do improves wellbeing.”

Schmidt ended his exam by asking Zuckerberg why he’s stayed with Facebook and Instagram for so long.

Um, I really care about the stuff that we’re building,” he said. He said he believes “giving people broadly the ability to express themselves” and “learn about the world around them” are “important things.”

Re-direct and re-cross

In re-direct, Lanier pressed Zuckerberg about Instagram having goals for the amount of time users spend on the platform.

“Yeah, I think I’ve been clear today that we used to have goals on this, and then we changed our view,” Zuckerberg testified.

Zuckerberg again differentiated between goals and “milestones” company executives discussed in 2022, which caused Lanier to say, “I’m trying to ask very direct questions and you caused me to deviate. So now we need to talk about the difference between milestones and goals.”

“All of your family of apps had milestones that were set down as something to be accomplished in the future, and that dates from 2022 doesn’t it?” Lanier asked.

“Yeah,” Zuckerberg answered.

Lanier questioned Zuckerberg about an email he also questioned Mosseri about last week, from an employee who opposed allowing plastic surgery filters and cited her own teen daughters’ experiences with body dysmorphia. Zuckerberg said the decisions are “complicated,” and he isn’t surprised people disagree. He said he feels the current policy is “more than moderate” by not allowing the filters to be created or promoted by Instagram but allowing third-party creators to create them.

Lanier continued to question him, and Zuckerberg said he didn’t feel as though the evidence about potential harm from the filters was “clear enough to support limiting people’s discretion.”

He said the issue was “clearly debated” heavily within the company.

In re-cross, he said that time spent on Instagram, while no longer a goal, still “is the easiest way to measure engagements.” The company looks at it when considering how to better people’s experiences.

“I think we’ve just gotten more mature on these issues,” Zuckerberg said.

Schmidt pointed out a line in the document that said, “Young people will quickly point out the positive role Instagram plays in their personal and social lives.”

Lanier got a final chance to question Zuckerberg about exhibits Schmidt entered as evidence in recross, and he had Zuckerberg read the percentages of teenage users who’ve incorporated the safety measures on Instagram such as night mode and take a break notifications. Most were in the low single digits.

Judge says no A.I. glasses in court

Arguably the most interesting moment on Wednesday did not occur during Zuckerberg’s testimony but when Judge Kuhl warned the courtroom not to wear glasses with facial recognition capabilities in the courtroom.

She said if anyone wore glasses with artificial intelligence that recorded jurors, they must delete it and if they don’t, they’ll be held in contempt of court.

She did not direct her comments to anyone specifically, but Lanier told me after court that his team alerted the judge after someone told them Zuckerberg’s bodyguards were wearing Meta facial recognition glasses.

Previous articles:

Feb. 13 Instagram head Adam Mosseri testifies in child social media addiction trial in Los Angeles

Feb. 10 Meta and Google begin trial in lawsuit over child addiction and mental health claims

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An 18-year-old North Carolina man who killed five people when he was 15 was sentenced to life in prison without parole on Friday, and the two-week hearing was video recorded and streamed live online. It offered a rare look at the life of a mass murderer and the juvenile detention center where he’s currently incarcerated.

Austin Thompson was a high school sophomore with a 3.8 grade point average when he shot and stabbed his 16-year-old brother in their parents’ home in Raleigh on Oct. 13, 2022, then went outside and fatally shot four people and injured two others.

Killed were Nicole Connors, 52; Susan Karnatz, 49; Mary Beth Marshall, 35; and Gabriel Torres, 29, a Raleigh police officer who was on his way to work. Officer Casey Clark and Connors’ friend Marcille “Lynn” Gardner were seriously injured.

Thompson was hospitalized after he shot himself in the forehead as police approached him. He sustained a traumatic brain injury but recovered well enough to become the first at his juvenile detention center to earn his high school diploma. He pleaded guilty on Jan. 21 to all charges, including five counts of first-degree murder and two counts of attempted murder.

Judge Paul C. Ridgeway in North Carolina’s 10th Judicial District in Raleigh presided over a seven-day sentencing hearing pursuant to a state law enacted after the U.S. Supreme Court in 2012 ruled unconstitutional any sentencing statute that mandates life in prison without parole for people who commit homicide under the age of 18.

North Carolina lawmakers changed state sentencing requirements for homicides committed by juveniles to require consideration of youthfulness and other factors before imposing a life sentence.

The judge heard testimony from 39 people and said Friday he “concludes that the answer to the issue before the court at this hearing is, ‘Yes. Austin Thompson is the rare offender whose crime reflects irreparable corruption.’”

The evidence reflects “a defendant who, for many months, and certainly several months prior to committing murder, fantasized, researched and planned his criminal acts and his escape,” Ridgeway said.

“On the day he committed the murders, he confirmed his sanity, his culpability and his lack of regret in a written note,” Ridgeway said. He said Thompson “was a highly intelligent and inquisitive person.”

“He suffered no apparent mental health defects, no developmental disabilities, no health issues,” Ridgeway said.

Ridgeway, a judge since 2007, sentenced Thompson to five consecutive life terms with no parole for the murders and two additional sentences of 157 months to 201 months each — approximately 13 years to 17 years — for the attempted murders.

Before he did, Ridgeway shared “a bit that I learned about each one of the victims.”

The judge described Thompson’s brother, James Roger Thompson, as an honor student with a 4.12 grade point average who was “saving money from his odd jobs for a car and college.” He was an “all-around athlete” who “excelled in team sports.”

“A good son, couldn’t ask for anything better,” Ridgeway said.

Connors and Gardner were the first people Thompson shot after he left his parents’ home. They were sitting on Connors’ porch with their dogs when Thompson walked by and opened fire.

Gardner survived, and Ridgeway said she “sat on the witness stand and said that God has given her the grace to forgive the young man that shot her.”

“That reflects a beautiful soul,” the judge said.

He cited testimony from Connors’ widower, Tracey Howard.

“Nicole. What struck me was she was loved so fiercely by her husband that the defendant’s actions have broken him. He doesn’t enjoy things like he used to. He feels socially awkward. He doesn’t like to go anywhere because he feels guilty about having fun without his wife,” Ridgeway said, his voice breaking with emotion.

Ridgeway described Torres as “a former U.S. Marine, Raleigh police officer, a really great husband and father.”

“Gabe’s daughter knows her father only through photos, videos and a cut-out pillow with his image on it,” Ridgeway said.

After killing Torres, Thompson moved to a greenway along the Neuse River, where he fatally shot Karnatz as she jogged.

Ridgeway said Karnatz was “a runner, marathoner, ultra marathoner, mother of Max, Oliver and Everett.”

“Every day, when her husband, Tom, wakes up, he realizes his wife is not there laying beside him, and that makes that day hard, and he knows that that will be his experience every day for the rest of his life,” Ridgway said.

Thompson fatally shot Marshall as she walked her dog on the same greenway.

Ridgeway said he loves a family member’s “description of Mary Beth as the home entertainment system of their family: singing loudly, off-key silly jokes.”

“And I really like this description she had of ‘laughter that can only be described as what sunshine sounds like,’” the judge said.

Before deputies took Thompson out of the courtroom, his lawyer Kellie Mannette told Ridgeway, “The defense enters notice of appeal and requests that the appellate defender’s office be appointed,” and the judge did so.

Mannette and her co-counsel Deonte Thomas, Wake County’s chief public defender, argued Thompson’s prescription anti-acne medication for causing a psychotic “depersonalization” that was exasperated by his devotion to playing first-person shooter video games such as “Call of Duty.”

“We look at the video and see him act this way at 5:30 in the afternoon, without a care to cover his face, without a care to run and hide, acting like he was a character in one of those shooter games that he plays,” Thomas told Ridgeway before the defense began calling witnesses on Feb. 10. “He was under the throes of this depersonalization caused by minocycline, and he can’t understand it.”

Ridgeway, however, noted that Thompson researched violence and mass shootings before he was prescribed minocycline, which “has been widely used and prescribed for over 50 years.”

Based on testimony from two defense expert witnesses, “the risk of dissociation side effects from minocycline is infinitesimally rare in the 55-year history of the widespread usage of drug,” Ridgeway said.

“Moreover, neither expert was aware of any connection between dissociation attributed to minocycline in any violence, homicide or criminal conduct,” Ridgeway said.

‘There were no signs at all’

Thompson left a note in his bedroom that he apparently wrote after he killed his brother. It began, “The reason I did this is because I hate humans. They are destroying the planet / Earth.”

“I don’t have a goal. I’m not suicidal. Death is like sleep. That’s why I don’t care if I die. I have never been bullied or anything. Bye, Dad. I don’t like you, Mom. Every other family member is good,” he wrote.

He also wrote, “I am not mental,” and he said he killed his brother with a .22 he stole from a Cabela’s sporting goods store. “I killed James because he would get in my way,” he wrote.

He scrawled, “James dead inside, don’t look” in a corner and tore it off and placed it in front of the door to the bathroom where his brother lay dead.

His father, Alan Thompson, testified he later learned he’d called his son shortly after he’d murdered his other son, not knowing what had happened, and asked if he needed anything from the grocery store. He’d called his older son first, but he didn’t answer “and I was a little ticked off at James, because very rarely did I have to call or text him, and he didn’t answer his phone.”

“So I called Austin, and Austin answered the phone, and I told him, ‘I’m going to the grocery store to pick up two gallons of milk. Do you need anything?’ And in a regular, calm voice, he said, ‘No.’ He said, ‘I’m good,” Thompson testified on Feb. 5.

Thompson said an investigator asked him to sign a waiver so police could access his son’s medical records, and “I said, ‘I’ll sign anything you want. You got to make me a promise.’ I said, ‘You promise me you find out why he did this.’ And he said, ‘I will.’”

Thompson, now 62, pleaded guilty in September 2024 to misdemeanor failure to store a firearm to protect a minor. He received one year of unsupervised probation and a 45-day suspended jail sentence.

Regarding the firearms in his home, Thompson testified that “as most people know I have had 11 taken out of the house.” Police also seized a disassembled gun that “I was going to give him, Austin, for Christmas so he could use it when we went duck hunting.”

Thompson taught his sons to use firearms while hunting. He said he had “on the surface it would seem like it’s a lot” of ammunition in his home because he stocked up during the Covid-19 pandemic because the price was rising and it was hard to find.

“I raised my sons the same way that I was raised. Yeah, you know, firearm safety,.” he testified. “Then on top of that, a lot of folks might not know that above age 12, you can be in possession of a long rifle. And so if I’m not home, or Elise is not home, I would hope that they will be able to protect themselves if someone came to the house.”

Asked about his relationship with his son, he said, “Well, I don’t expect people to understand this, but I,” and began to cry.

“I love my two sons, and I always love my two sons, but, uh, but my relationship with Austin has changed because of what he did. My whole life has changed," Thompson continued.

“When James died, part of me died. And with Austin, I mean, I still love him, but I just don’t understand why. The problem I have, I can’t put two and two together. The person I raised and the person who did these things? I can’t put them together. … There were no signs. … That’s the scary part. There were no signs at all.”

Elise Thompson, testified on Feb. 4 that she saw no warning signs and did not know of her son’s dark Internet browsing history and his Google searches about violence.

“They were really good kids. They were at home, at school, at Sunday school, they, as far as I know, they never even handed in a late assignment ever to school,” she said.

She said his rampage “was a complete shock. There were no no different moods, no different behavior, nothing.”

“Understanding that this is likely a parent’s worst nightmare, is there anything that you can think of that looking back, you feel like maybe you should have noticed or seen?” Wake County Assistant District Attorney Patrick Latour asked.

“No. … I’ve run through that almost every day since the tragedy, and I, I don't remember seeing any issues at all, or mood swings or anything like that. He was just normal,” she said.

She read aloud a letter she wrote that said, “To know that my son, who I carried for nine months, caused all of this heartache and tragedy, is still a complete shock.”

“Austin was a happy kid. He was an honor roll student who never caused any trouble, problems at school or Sunday school. He was a great kid and a great brother and a great son. What he did makes no sense to me,” she said.

She read aloud a message directly to her son.

“Austin, I know you did this, and I also know as your mom, this wasn’t anything you had in you. You and James were great babies, kids and teens. You and James were our world. I miss you both every day. I can’t imagine a day there will ever be where I don’t miss you,” she said.

Thompson testified again on Feb. 10 as a defense witness.

She recalled the first time she saw him in the hospital after the shooting as “really traumatic.”

”I remember looking to my side and saying to the nurse, ‘Oh, you can just tell me where he is. That’s fine.’ And I remember her going, ‘He’s right there’ with her hand. … What I remember happened was I went, ‘Oh, my baby.’ And I tried to cover my mouth because I started to scream,” Thompson said.

In cross-exam, Latour questioned Thompson about her current relationship with her son and the items she sends him in custody.

“You’ve been there with him every step of the way that you were allowed to since then. Correct?” Latour asked.

“Yes, that’s true,” Thompson answered.

“And you intend to continue that. Is that fair?” Latour asked.

“Yes. I want to stay in his life,” Thompson said.

Thompson said she mails him humor books like “you might be a redneck if,” and then “a couple of them are the funny things that kids say.”

She also mails him Darwin Awards books “which is like stupid ways that people have passed away,” and she sends him crime novels by James Patterson, John Grisham and Tom Clancy books, and the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series.

Latour asked if she was “aware of his interest in or any interest that he may have had in violence or these mass shootings or other types of weapons?”

”No, not at all. If I did, of course, I would try and, you know, find a specialist of some kind,” she said.

“And he didn’t share this portion of his life with you?” Latour asked.

“No,” Thompson answered.

In direct, Mannette asked Thompson, “how have your dreams for Austin changed?”

“They’re gone. He did this horrible crime, and he has to pay for this crime, and I just hope that after the, I believe someone told me 40-year sentence, that hopefully he can be reevaluated and have a mental analysis with another neurologist and whatever else needs to be done to see if he can be go back into society if he’s capable of doing that,” Thompson said.

Austin Thompson did not appear to show emotion during any witness’ testimony, but Thomas told Judge Ridgeway on Feb. 10, “Austin sits here in ways that you cannot see, shaking and quivering and fully remorseful for his actions of that day.”

He also appeared to show no emotion during emotional victim impact statements, including one from Torres’ widow, Jasmine Torres, that included a recorded message from their daughter, Layla Torres.

“My daughter is now five. She only knows her daddy through photos and videos and my recounting of his life with us. By the time she was two and a half, she knew her way through a sea of tombstones and could get to her daddy’s resting place without my help,” Torres said.

Judge Ridgeway heard other wrenching testimony from family members of other victims, and he heard testimony from several of Thompson’s teachers, from his kindergarten teacher to several of his teachers at Knightdale High School.

Laura Wright, a career development coordinator who taught Thompson in a computer design course, said he “constantly” played first-person shooter video games in class because he and other students knew how to breach the school’s Internet security to access them. After Austin was was arrested, Wright reflected on a comic strip he’d drawn as an assignment that depicted a hero turning into a villain and killing people.

Teacher Madeline Solock also testified that Thompson frequently played shooter video games in her class, and she said she’s strictly banned the games since his arrest.

“All my students now will tell you it's one of my four non-negotiables. I’m very, very strict on it. I get really emotional when I see it, just because it reminds me,” Solock said.

Investigators used location information from Thompson’s cellphone to make a video showing his movements, and they compiled a spreadsheet showing his Google searches, which included “Kid kills his brother and parents”, “Do most people scream after being stabbed in the neck?”, “The Anarchist Cookbook”, “How fast does a .22 have to go to penetrate a skull?” and “How many years is a life sentence?”

Clark, the police officer who was shot, testified about getting shot and about how his injury and his career ending has affected him and his family.

“My wife specifically has a lot of trauma from this,” he said, choking up.

“Instead of the happy-go-lucky woman that I married, where she was able to walk down the street, not stress … now, she evaluates everyone as a threat. She has a lot more fear than she used to,” said Clark, who now sells real estate in Michigan.

He said his four-year-old son asks “is that because you were shot?” when he reaches for his leg, and he knows he’ll eventually have to tell the boy exactly what happened.

“It’s gonna come up. It’s public record. The video of me getting shot is on YouTube,” Clark testified.

Clark said “just walking through woods” has become stressful.

“It was pleasant, peaceful. Now I’m evaluating, looking for a threat, looking for the shooter that's in the woods,” he said.

Clark urged Judge Ridgeway not to grant the possibility of parole.

“I wanted to point out that this is what a 15 year old could do with minimal life experience and ability. I don’t want to see what a grown adult that had decades of time to plan the next assault. I am asking you to give him life without parole,” Clark said.

The shooting and Thompson’s arrest was followed in real time on social media the night it all happened, and many asked why police managed to arrest Thompson alive. The sentencing hearing provided a lot of details: Raleigh police testified about tracking and capturing Thompson, including now-retired Sgt. David McDonald, who led the special operations unit and was with Clark when Thompson shot him.

The final prosecution witness was Karie Gibson, a unit chief in the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Unit who testified over the defense’s objection.

Gibson testified about her expertise in targeted violence and the pathway to violence. She detailed the stages: grievance, violent ideation, research and planning, preparation, breach and attack.

“A lot of times when we're looking at these cases, it's very specific to that offender,” Gibson said. “In order for someone to be successful with predatory violence, they need to progress from considering, planning and preparing without anybody knowing about it. So what we find as part of this is that as someone is progressing on the pathway, it's very important they keep that quiet.”

She said it’s “probably only around 10 to 13 percent where you have a primary family member that could be a victim.”

An in-custody baptism and high school graduation

Thompson’s defense witnesses included several teachers as well as employees from the the Cumberland Regional Juvenile Detention Center in Fayetteville, where he was incarcerated after he left the hospital. The juvenile detention witness said at the beginning of their testimony that they were under order to breach confidentiality to discuss Thompson.

Thompson earned his center’s top-ranked gold status in six weeks, and he was the first teen ever at the center to earn his high school diploma.

Other teenagers detained at the center helped conduct the ceremony, which was a traditional graduation with a cap and gown, “pomp and circumstance” and a speech from “a local resident who was a previously adjudicated youth,” said Casey Corey, the director of education for North Carolina’s 14 juvenile detention centers.

“It’s so important so that kids see the progression that you can make ... once you’re in that particular setting. That there are opportunities — if you take those opportunities — in the community for you to be successful,” Corey said.

Thomas asked if Corey wants the teens in the center with Thompson to aspire to graduate like he did.

“Absolutely, absolutely, absolutely,” Corey said.

Phyllis Jones, the retired juvenile justice school principal, testified that Thompson was “very humble” at his graduation.

“He was very thankful that he finished his coursework. He was excited that his parents were there, and other family and friends, people from the central office of … the Department of Juvenile Justice,” Jones said.

“He was always very interested in his education. Of course, there were courses that he took that he really didn't like, but he understood that he had to have that credit, and he worked hard. He did his best in all the subjects that he took,” Jones said.

Darcy Ross, a behavioral specialist at Cumberland, testified Thompson is allowed at a tablet at times in his room “and there’s movies on there, so he can watch movies.”

“He plays his Nintendo Switch, listens to music, reads books, and then, you know, of course, rec time he’ll come out or go play basketball when they go outside,” Ross said. She said he sometimes gets “really upset” and mutters under his breath, and sometimes when playing basketball “with the kids, he’d hit one of them in the shins with the basketball. Had to be redirected for that.”

Judge Ridgeway also heard testimony about Thompson’s getting baptized in custody.

Volunteer chaplain Robert Fermanides said it “was different than most baptisms.”

“We were limited. I did ask if we could do more than a sprinkling with a bottle of water, and that didn’t work out,” he said.

Fermanides described Thompson as “very fun, loving, genuine, jovial ... maybe I would say a little self protected.” He said his favorite thing about Thompson is “he’s an overcomer” and “that he’s very genuine.”

In cross-exam, Latour asked Fermanides, “Are you able to tell us what your favorite thing about Nicole Connors, Gabriel Torres, James Thompson, Susan Karnatz and Mary Marshall was?”

Fermanides appeared taken aback by the question.

“Am I able to? Absolutely not,” Fermanides said.

“Because those are the people that he killed,” Latour said.

“Sir, I don’t, I don’t watch the media on these students, because I have one job, and so I’m assuming, and I’m very sensitive to the to those folks, you just call their names out. That hurts my heart,” Fermanides said. (None of the victims was a student except Thompson’s brother.)

“I guess my point, sir, is you never got to meet those people, right?” Latour asked.

“Correct, yes, sir,” Fermanides answered.

No expert evaluated Thompson for prosecutors, but two evaluated him for the defense: Psychiatrist George Patrick Corvin and psychologist Jennifer Sapia.

Corvin said “to the extent” that Thompson “has some memories of what occurred that day, there are concerns that those memories may be secondarily obtained through a process called provoked confabulation.” He referred to Thompson today as “Austin 2.0.”

“For some time after he woke up from this injury, he had no real independent recollection of what had occurred. Over time, he has come to have fairly detailed recollection of what the events were that occurred, but during that same period of time, he had been reviewing discovery materials describing what occurred in detail,” Corvin testified on Feb. 10.

He said Thompson’s note made no sense, and “at first I was fairly confident that a sort of typical motivating factor would emerge. It did not.”

Both Sapia and Corvin commented on the speed of Thompson’s recovery from his brain injury. Sapia that his IQ has increased from 73 to 91 but “the significance, though, of his traumatic brain injury that has been described as catastrophic and irreparable, that will always play a role in his development or lack thereof.”

Thompson’s lawyer asked Sapia, “Would it be possible that Austin can’t or hasn't articulated a reason for this because he doesn’t know how?”

“I guess anything is possible,” Sapia testified. She said he “did write reasons in that note.”

“When I asked him about that. he doesn’t recall writing the notes and said, you know, doesn’t know what those notes mean,” Sapia said.

Another defense expert, Maher Noureddine, testified that Thompson’s metabolism may have aided in his acne medication’s harmful affects on him.

Mannette told Ridgeway in her 40-minute summation on Feb. 12 that Thompson “is different from an adult.”

“Austin is different from another child. Austin is different from a stereotypical mass shooter,” Mannette said. Society is angry about mass shootings, “but we have nowhere to put that anger other than in the mass shooters themselves, because nobody is doing anything systemically.”

“Now I am not saying that mass shooters are not to blame. I’m not saying that Austin Thompson isn’t to blame,” Mannette said. “But I am saying that we focus our energy and attention on them in a way that makes us want to say that they fit this mold, and they are like this, and they always proceed in this way with these signs, because it makes us feel safe that while we might be touched by the violence of mass shooting, we aren’t going to have a mass shooter in our family.”

Latour said in his 90-minute summation that Thompson “put on this brilliant disguise for everybody around him, because he was a smart guy. He is a smart guy. He knew he better not put make this public, because somebody’s going to try and stop me.”

“He was smart enough to bypass computer systems to get to the games while he's in school. He is able to essentially fend for themselves for several hours a day. We let 15 year olds drive cars and learn how to drive cars for a reason. He’s not a 10 year old that we’re talking about here. He’s a 15-year-old young man at this point who is on the mature end,” Latour said.

Judge Ridgeway addressed Noureddine’s testimony in his ruling.

“He undertook to answer the question of whether defendant’s ability to metabolize minocycline could have been altered by his genetic background and consequently increase his risk of experiencing side effects,” Ridgeway said on Friday. “His experiment did not prove his hypothesis, but in fact, proved the opposite. After extracting defendant’s DNA and having it forensically analyzed, Dr. Noureddine found … no scientific evidence of genetic inability to metabolize minocycline.”

The judge said Thompson’s Internet search history foreshadowed his violence, including researching whether “someone can talk if their voice box is cut out. Do most people scream after being stabbed in the neck? Can you hear someone shoot a 22 inside their home? How fast does a 22 have to go to penetrate a skull?”

“After seven months of researching Eric Rudolph, who was a mass murderer, who committed acts of terror and evaded capture for many months by hiding in the woods, defendant on Oct. 13, packed a survival bag and headed into the deep woods after committing mass murder,” Ridgeway said.

“After researching the lethality of double-aught buckshot … on Oct. 13, defendant chose that as his instrument of murder,” Ridgeway said.

“After researching the weight of 100 shells, shotgun shells, on Oct. 13, defendant packed approximately 100 shotgun shells to carry with him for his escape,” Ridgeway said.

“After researching whether one could hear a 22 fired inside his house, on Oct. 13, defendant shot his brother with a 22 inside their house,” Ridgeway said.

After researching whether someone could talk if their voice box is cut and whether a person screams when stabbed in the neck, on Oct. 13, defendant stabbed his brother in the neck over 50 times, and a reasonable inference from the evidence is that he attempted to cut James’s voice box out,” Ridgeway said.

“After researching mass shooters who hate humans and humans destroying the planet, on Oct. 13, defendant wrote a note he left after murdering James, saying defendant hated humans because they were destroying the planet,” Ridgeway said.

“This lengthy period of premeditation and deliberation, when coupled with the pure malice displayed towards his random and innocent victims, are compelling findings that support the conclusion, or a conclusion, that Austin Thompson is one of those rare juvenile offenders whose crime reflect irreparable corruption,” the judge continued.

Ridgeway is a graduate of Campbell University School of Law who “has presided in courts in over 40 counties in North Carolina, and has been appointed by the Chief Justice to adjudicate exceptional and complex commercial and constitutional matters throughout the State,” according to his Campbell University adjunct faculty page.

The video of him sentencing Thompson drew large views on all social media platforms, including from many who praised his decision. Many also were touched by his tribute to the victims.

“Judge had me crying for these people I have never met. Thank you judge for giving these people the justice they deserve,” someone wrote on X.

Meanwhile, trial began Monday for a man whose son killed four people at Apalachee High School in Winder, Georgia, on Sept. 4, 2024.

Colin Gray's son, Colt Gray, is awaiting trial on 55 charges, including counts of murder and aggravated assault.

The father’s charges include involuntary manslaughter, second-degree murder and cruelty to children. Prosecutors say he gave his son the rifle used in the shooting as a Christmas gift, despite being told by law enforcement to keep guns away from him.

The victims were Mason Schermerhorn, 14; Christian Angulo, 14; Richard Aspinwall, 39 and a math teacher and defensive coordinator for the school’s football team; and Cristina Irimie, 53 and a math teacher. Eight students and one teacher were injured.

The trial was moved from Barrow County to the Hall County Courthouse in Gainesville because of extensive pretrial publicity in Barrow County. Nicholas Primm, the chief judge in Georgia’s Piedmont Judicial Circuit, is presiding.

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I spoke with The Wrap about what it’s like to cover the landmark social media addiction trial. Media Editor Michael Calderone’s article published today. I’m back at the courthouse this afternoon for the end of Stanford Universitry professor Anna Lembke’s testimony.

The leader of Instagram this week walked back statements he made in 2020 about the addictiveness of social media after confronted with them by a plaintiff’s lawyer in a landmark child addiction trial in Los Angeles.

“I think it’s important to differentiate between clinical addiction and chronic use,” Adam Mosseri told plaintiff’s lawyer Mark Lanier.

He said Lanier used the word addiction “cavalierly,” and he disagreed with Lanier’s statement, “There’s such a thing as being addicted to a social media platform.” Mosseri said he doesn’t believe chronic use “is the same as clinical addiction.”

Lanier soon revealed that the statement was made by Mosseri himself, taken from a 2020 podcast interview, and he asked if he agrees “There’s such a thing as being addicted to a social media platform.”

“I disagree. I’m sure I said it, but I think it’s important to differentiate between clinical addiction and chronic use,” he said. Mosseri said he believes it’s possible to use social media “more than you feel good about.”

Mosseri testified in Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Carolyn B. Kuhl’s courtroom on Wednesday for the entire third day of trial in a lawsuit against Meta and Google that alleges Instagram and YouTube are intentionally addictive and harmed a now 20-year-old woman’s mental health beginning in her young childhood.

The public gallery included several parents of young people who died in tragedies linked to social media such as suicides because of bullying and sexual abuse and fatal overdoses on drugs bought from people they met online. Some stayed on the courthouse steps overnight to secure one of the 15 public seats. (The court has since implemented a lottery system.)

When the jury was out of the courtroom for a recess, Judge Kuhl admonished the gallery not to react to or speak during testimony.

“Mr. Lanier is perfectly capable of conducting cross-examination of witnesses,” said Kuhl, who has been a judge since 1995.

She said the jury’s verdict must be based on the evidence “not based on someone’s views of that evidence.”

Victoria Hinks, whose daughter Alexandra “Owl” Hinks committed suicide last year, told reporters she couldn’t help but cry during Mosseri’s testimony.

“Crying is involuntary. I wasn’t hysterical, but tears came out of my eyes when I sat there and looked at him up on the stand saying … they didn’t approve filters for things that could only be done with makeup and not surgery, because I know that that was not what my daughter experienced,” Hinks said.

Mosseri’s answers were “a lot of fluff pieces” and “some of it just seemed very condescending.”

“Our children were the first guinea pigs in this cohort of this social media experiment, and they were collateral damage,” Hinks said.

Mosseri’s testimony came after jurors spent Tuesday hearing from Anna Lembke, a Stanford University professor and addiction expert who testified about the addictive nature of social media platforms.

“It essentially drugifies human connection,” Lembke said.

Lembke continued testifying on Friday; Judge Kuhl allowed Mosseri to testify before she finished because of his schedule.

‘That sounds like problematic use’

Lanier, a Houston, Texas-based mass torts lawyer, used an aggressive tone from the beginning of Mosseri’s examination. He pushed back when Mosseri said he wasn’t an expert on legal techniques after Lanier asked if he knew he’d been called as an adverse witness, which entitles Lanier to ask him leading questions like in a cross-examination.

“I’m happy to answer any and all questions,” Mosseri said.

“Well, you’ve given a deposition before? Haven’t you?” Lanier asked.

Mosseri said he had but he didn’t know how many times.

Lanier also was skeptical when Mosseri said his job title is “head of Instagram.”

“If we look it up on the corporate tree, it says, head?” Lanier asked.

“I think so,” Mosseri answered.

Lanier then began asking Mosseri if he agreed with a series of statements.

Mosseri hesitated to agree with the first, that “Instagram should do everything it can to keep people safe, especially minors,” instead only saying he agrees they should try to keep “everyone” safe. He soon relented and said, “I agree with the statement.”

Mosseri also didn’t agree when Lanier said “problematic use of Instagram is real,” saying instead that Instagram uses the phrase “problematic use” to refer to people who spend more time on Instagram “than they feel good about.”

Mosseri agreed it’s possible for someone to use Instagram too much but emphasized “it depends on the person.”

That’s when Lanier told him the statements presented to him were his own.

Mosseri said he’s “sure” he said during the 2020 podcast interview what Lanier repeated on Wednesday: “there’s such a thing as being addicted to a social media platform.” But he testified he disagrees with the statement now.

Mosseri said he believes it’s possible to use social media “more than you feel good about.”

Mosseri said he has someone “very close in my life” who has a “very serious clinical addiction” and he believes it’s a serious issue that shouldn’t be taken lightly.

“Are you suggesting we are taking the word addiction lightly?” Lanier asked.

“I’m not suggesting that at all,” Mosseri answered.

Lanier said “please understand we’re sorry” that Mosseri knows someone who has an addiction, “but that does not qualify you to make decisions with what’s clinical addiction and what’s not, does it?”

Mosseri said he’s not trying to present himself as a clinical expert.

Lanier asked if he was “careful” with his words when he said “problematic use” and “There’s such a thing as being addicted.”

“No, clearly I wasn’t being careful with my words,” Mosseri testified.

Lanier later asked Mosseri if he knows the plaintiff, who’s identified in court as Kaley G.M., once used Instagram for 16 hours in one day.

“I did not know that,” Mosseri testified.

“That’s problematic use, isn’t it?” Lanier asked.

“That sounds like problematic use,” Mosseri answered.

‘Move fast and break things’

Lanier moved into questions about Mosseri’s multimillion dollar compensation after getting him to agree that child safety is more important “than the money you make.”

Mosseri testified he earns $900,000 annually with a possible bonus of up to half that, but his major earnings come through equity stock payments every three months that can total upwards of $10 million each year.

“Sometimes upwards of $20 million?” Lanier asked.

“Uh, I believe so,” Mosseri answered.

Lanier asked if he’s made $45 million to $50 million in “the last five years or so” and Mosseri answered, “I would estimate around there.”

Mosseri testified that protecting minors is “good for business and profit” and Instagram should focus on the “long-term health and wellbeing” of everyone who uses it.

“So sometimes you think it’s appropriate for the company to profit now and test later, as opposed to always testing first and protecting minors?” Lanier asked.

“Sometimes neither of those doors are appropriate options,” Mosseri answered. “This is an oversimplification of our options.”

Lanier continued presenting Mosseri with options he called “doors,” and asking him which he’d choose, including “do we move fast, deal with the damage later, or do we measure the risk and make sure our top priority is protecting minors?”

Mosseri said the second option is best because moving too quickly can result in mistakes that must be corrected, which led to Lanier asking about a slogan “up in Silicon Valley about moving fast or something?”

Mosseri said “that was on the wall in the very early days”

“What did it say?” Lanier asked.

“It said ‘move fast and break things,’” Mosseri answered. Mosseri said Facebook “moved away from it very consciously,” and he’s not trying to justify the slogan and he “doesn’t particularly like the slogan.”

He said “it’s important to remember the context” in which the slogan existed: Facebook was trying to surpass other websites like MySpace and Friendster.

“This is a bad slogan when you’re dealing with mental health of minors, true?” Lanier asked.

Mosseri said yes and the slogan “wasn’t appropriate then.” Lanier asked if he’s heard Meta founder Mark Zuckerberg say it and Mosseri answered, “Not that I can recall.”

‘a trade off between safety and speech’

Lanier used the compensation and company slogan questions as a lead in to questions about Instagram filters that can alter a photo of someone to add cosmetic affects, which Mosseri said was a “big debate” within Instagram.

Lanier displayed an email chain in which an Instagram employees seeks support for a policy change “to disallow effects that mimic plastic surgery.”

“In practice, we had trouble defining that,” Mosseri said, because the line between makeup affects and plastic surgery is “thin.”

In the email chain, Andrew Bosworth, now Meta’s chief technology officer, said he mentioned the filter ban to Zuckerberg “and he might want to review before implementing.”

“He’s concerned about whether we have good enough data that this represents real harm,” Bosworth wrote.

Another employee said a “blanket ban” on plastic surgery filters “is going to hurt us in the competitive marketplace.”

Mosseri testified that Instagram doesn’t “make money from filters.” He said the issue is not “about revenue” but “about businesses” and wanting “to be relevant.”

An employee mentioned a “PR fire” related to the filters, and Lanier asked Mosseri if it was actually “a mental health fire.”

Mosseri said he thinks Lanier is asking if mental heath is more important than PR, and he agrees it is.

The employee also said, “We’re talking about actively encouraging young girls into body dysmorphia.” Lanier emphasized Instagram banned plastic surgery filters for a couple months, then rescinded it when “you decided that it was hurting your business.” He noted the discussion was around the time of plaintiff Kaley G.M.’s 14th birthday.

Mosseri said in the email chain that he was “more focused on the effects than the stakeholders but appreciate that both are important.”

Mosseri said he meant “the effects on people’s wellbeing.” “There’s always a trade off between safety and speech,” Mosseri said. “We’re trying to be as safe but also censor as little as possible.”

Lanier said Instagram “reversed” the ban, but Mosseri said they “evolved our policy.”

Lanier pointed out that now-former Instagram employee Nick Clegg said reversing the ban would be unwise because“we would rightly be accused of putting growth over responsibility.”

“Reputationally, it would be a very regressive step indeed. We’ll be heavily attached, both in the press and by interest groups concerned about the wellbeing of adolescents, especially teenage girls,” Clegg wrote.

At that point, Lanier said: Instagram had two choices: continue the ban until they have more data, or lift the ban. One employee listed a con of lifting the ban at the risk to wellbeing, but Mosseri still said then that he wanted to lift it.

Mosseri testified on Wednesday that they still didn’t allow the filters to be recommended to users.

Lanier highlighted an email in which an employee said she disagreed with the decision and said she knows that as the other of two teen girls, “the pressure on them and their peers coming through social media is intense with respect to body image.”

After the lunch recess, Lanier questioned Mosseri about employee Kyle Andrews saying that a survey asked about emotional impact “but I was told I need to delete that data. We can’t analyze it. We’re not allowed to ask about emotion in surveys anymore.”

Mosseri testified on Wednesday, “you definitely are allowed to ask about emotions.”

“I don’t know if we analyzed it or not, but I think he’s mistaken about deleting the data,” Mosseri said.

Lanier also questioned Mosseri about a report he released the day before he testified to Congress in 2021 about Instagram’s safety measures, and it cited research that said it’s unclear how “digital nudges” about content “might be designed to combat social media addiction.”

The research said “210 million people are suffering from social media addiction.” It also said, “The design of social media platforms is intentionally engineered to be addictive and exploit vulnerabilities in human psychology.”

“Do you really agree with that?” Lanier asked.

“No, I don’t,” Mosseri answered.

‘figure out the right balance’

In cross, Mosseri told Phyllis A. Jones of Covington & Burling LLP that he’s stayed with Facebook, now Meta, for nearly 18 years because the company “seems like a major opportunity to make people’s lives better on a daily basis.”

Mosseri, a New York native and New York University graduate, said he started working for Facebook in 2008 and eventually moved “out west.” He said the company employs people “who I feel like I learn from on a daily basis.”

He said Instagram “makes less money from teens” than any other demographic because teens “don’t click on ads very much” and don’t spend as much.

He said he disagrees with the idea that Instagram chooses profit over safety.

“I disagree with that premise. I really don’t think it’s good for the business over the long run, to do anything” that harms people, he said.

Jones asked Mosseri if he’s made decisions that prioritize wellbeing over growth, and he answered “yes.”

“We’re always trying to figure out the right balance,” he testified.

Jones displayed an email exchange in which Mosseri updated Zuckerberg on personnel shifts at Instagram, telling him he’d moved people off the growth team to fund other projects, including, he testified, “wellbeing.”

Jones also went over with Mosseri the current police on filters, which prohibits “effects that change people’s facial structure in a way that must be achieved by plastic surgery” and Instagrams efforts to identify third-party filters that violate the policy.

She addressed Lanier’s questions about Instagram’s own report citing research on addictiveness by asking Mosseri about its specific findings.

Does the study “establish anything with respect to whether young people are addicted or not to Instagram?” Jones asked.

“No,” Mosseri answered. He said the survey was intended to see if people are spending more time on Instagram than they’re comfortable.

Mosseri said he’s “always trying to think about the long term,” which includes “evolving our safety tools to address new risks as the world changes.”

Jones spent much of her exam questioning Mosseri about features such allowing parents “to see how much time that their children were spending on Instagram and set a bunch of boundaries.” Jones displayed an Instagram internal example page on the courtroom overhead as Mosseri discussed different features.

In re-direct, Lanier addressed Mosseri’s testimony about moving employees from grown to wellbeing by questioning him, “Do you recall anyone being upset because you weren’t taking care of wellbeing the way you should?”

There’s always criticism,” Mosseri said. He said an email exchange between employees shows, “They clearly think I could do a better job. That’s fair.”

Lanier asked if he sees that Instagram still does harm despite “grand aspirations.”

Mosseri said he’s “always looking for room to improve.”

Lanier cited studies about teens who use Instagram 10 or more hours a week being more likely to be unhappy, and Mosseri said it could be an example of “selection bias.”

“it could be that people who are less happy are more likely to use social media,” Mosseri said.

Lanier asked if Instagram has ever warned parents of its risk.

“We have done a lot to help parents and educators and counselors and teachers get materials to understand about the risks of social media,” Mosseri testified.

I’ll have another article next week after Zuckerberg testifies that will include details from Lembke’s testimony.

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The first trial in a wave of lawsuits alleging social media companies intentionally addict children opened Monday in Los Angeles with one of the most successful mass torts lawyers in the United States telling a jury that his case is “as easy as A-B-C.”

“Addicting brains and children. I’m going to show you evidence that these companies built machines designed to addict the brains of children, and they did it on purpose,” said Mark Lanier, a Houston, Texas-based attorney who tries major product defect lawsuits and other mass torts across the country.

Lanier is suing Google and Meta Platforms, on behalf of a now-20-year-old woman who claims Google’s YouTube and Meta’s Instagram were so addicting they caused severe mental disorders. SnapChat settled on Jan. 21, and TikTok settled on Jan. 27 shortly before jury selection began.

The lawsuit is among thousands of personal injury lawsuits against the companies that have been coordinated into mass tort proceedings in California state and federal courts. The trial before Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Carolyn Kuhl is considered a bellwether trial that could influence how lawyers approach the other lawsuits.

The plaintiff is identified in court by the pseudonym and initials Kaley G.M. She’ll testify as a key witness, but Lanier told the jury on Monday that “as her lawyer, I’ve made the decision to keep her out of this courtroom until the moment she has to testify” so she doesn’t hear her traumas recounted in testimony.”

Kaley “is now easily overwhelmed and the part of a mind that filters out noise and stress, you will hear evidence it was devastated by the defendant’s machine,” Lanier said. “To ask her to sit here for weeks and listen to people talk about her descent would be like asking someone with a broken leg to run a marathon. We’re here to seek justice, not to cause her more harm.”

Kaley appeared briefly in the courtroom after the noon recess as Lanier told the jury “you’ll get to hear from her when she comes to testify.”

“You will enjoy getting to meet her and getting to know her, but I am going to continue to ask that she stay outside the courtroom while we talk about her and her life and what all happened,” Lanier said.

Lanier told the jury Kaley got involved in the litigation “because her mom was pushing her” as she “recognized that this was important ligation, and it would be important for Kaley’s future.”

“You’re going to hear from Kaley that she didn’t really want to do this, in part because she didn’t want him to take them to take down her sites. She was nervous over losing her accounts.”

Lanier tried to get ahead of Kaley’s family problems by telling jurors early in his opening that the companies targeted “a child named Kaley, and now in this courtroom, I suspect they’re going to target her again, blaming her for what they did to her.”

He said later that Kaley had problems at home, including a mother who “couldn’t manage to control” her and said “some things she shouldn’t have” and “thumped her on the head.” Lanier told jurors the thump was “not in any ‘ go to the police’ way, but, you know, like ‘Hey, cmon, kid.’”

“I’m not condoning that. I’m just trying to make sure that it’s in perspective,” Lanier said. “Kaley’s in a tough situation, and what these apps have been designed to do is to exploit people who are in that tough situation.”

Meta’s lawyer Paul Schmidt disputed Lanier’s description of the mother’s abuse by showing jurors quotes from Kaley’s meetings with a therapist in which she said her mother hit her in her head and called her stupid

“You were told that when she was hit it was ‘hey, c’mon kid,’” said Schmidt, a partner at Covington & Burling LLP. “That is not how she perceived it. That’s not how she wrote about it in real time. That’s not how she talked with therapists about it.”

Google’s lawyer Luis Li of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati will give his opening statement Tuesday morning.

The first witness will be Anna Lembke, a Stanford University psychiatrist and addiction medicine expert who was Lanier’s addiction expert in the landmark trial against opioid manufacturers in Cleveland, Ohio, in 2021.

‘That’s not using an app. That’s being in prison.’

Lanier is trying the case with his daughters, Rachel Lanier and Sarah Lanier, as well as Rahul Ravipudi of Panish | Shea | Ravipudi LLP.

Ravipudi’s law partner Brian Panish, a prominent plaintiff’s lawyer who works with Lanier, was in the gallery for the beginning of openings.

Lanier is known for incorporating demonstratives into his courtroom presentations, and he had several on Monday: the three A B C children’s blocks, a hammer, a case of eggs that he said were de-yolked, a miniature model of a red Ferrari and a small slot machine.

He told the jury the case “is about two of the richest corporations who have engineered addiction.”

“I’m going to show you evidence that these companies built machines designed to addict the brains of children, and they did it on purpose,” Lanier said. “I’ll give you evidence on why a child like Kaley couldn’t just put it down, no matter how much she wanted to.”

The evidence includes “internal documents that people don’t generally get to see” and include emails from Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and YouTube executives that discuss “the manipulation matrix.”

“You’ll see in their own words, engineered addiction,” Lanier said.

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Lanier said Kaley began using YouTube when she was six years old and Instagram when she was 9 years old after her mother gave her a phone without it but she downloaded it anyway. The longest time she spent on Instagram in one day was 16.2 hours on March 15, 2022.

“That’s not using an app. That’s being in prison,” Lanier said.

He differentiated social media applications or “apps” from books and newspapers telling jurors to “Imagine a slot machine that fits into your pocket.”

“Every time she swipes, she’s gambling,” Lanier said. And it’s “not for mental stimulation. You’ll hear the scientists say it’s for a dopamine hit.”’

Lanier later held up a hammer and told jurors, “A tool is something you put down when you’re through with it.”

“But that’s not the way it is with these apps. These apps aren’t tools,” Lanier said.

He said children seek “social validation” from Instagram “all the while scrolling through an endless feed of other people’s filtered lives.” YouTube “plays the next video before you can decide to stop” using an algorithm, which Lanier described as “a computer set of rules that learns what keeps you watching and feeds you more of it, whether you search for it or not.”

Lanier displayed an internal document from YouTube in 2011 that said “the goal is not viewership, it’s viewer addiction.”

“That’s their word. It’s not mine. It’s not some lawyer trying to make them sound bad,” Lanier said.

Instagram and YouTube are free for users, and the company makes money by selling advertisers access to its users.

YouTube values viewership because “they sell advertising.”

“When Kaley puts the phone down, the cash register stops ringing,” Lanier said.

Lanier showed jurors a message Zuckerberg wrote in 2015 about hoping to increase revenue by increasing time spent on the app by 12 percent.

“He wants to reverse the teen trend, because not as many teens are spending as much time as they had hoped,” Lanier said.

Lanier should another meta document that said, “If we want to win big with teens, we must bring them in at 9, 10.”

“You’re going to hear evidence that their public policy said no one under 13 should be on this, but their internal strategy says we need to bring them in,” Lanier said. “Why target the 9, 10, 11, 12 -year old? Because they did the math.”

Lanier displayed YouTube documents that discuss the need for YouTube to serve as “a digital babysitter.”

“Parents don’t want to monitor content. They want to trust that they can leave their child on their own with the app to safely and independently be entertained,” the document said.

Lanier called it an example of the “attention economy.”

“They can sell the attention of people to others,” he said.

Lanier said children develop a chemical addiction to the validation they receive from the app because of the dopamine involved, which exploits people in more difficult situations who are more prone to addiction.

Lanier displayed another exhibit in which an expert told them that “receiving a like or a positive comment on social media releases dopamine. That’s why these apps are so addictive.”

“They knew that for a child, social validation isn’t just nice, it’s a biological necessity,” Lanier said. “They turned the need for friendship into a chemical delivery system.“

He displayed a document from December 2018 in which Instagram officials listed a weakness as, “There are no products or programs to push back” on the link between the app and “loneliness, eating disorders and poor sense of self worth.”

In another document, an Instagram employee said, “If we’re committed to the well being of individuals, we need to alert people to the effect that the product has has on their brain.”

In another document, an Instagram official wrote that he was told to delete data regarding the app’s “emotional impact.”

In another document, an Instagram employee wrote, “Someone just said to me, ‘if the results are bad and we don’t publish and they leave, isn’t it going to look like tobacco companies doing research knowing cigs were bad and then keeping that information to themselves.’”

Lanier showed jurors emails in which an employee said he told Instagram Head Adam Mosseri that Instagram “was affecting dopamine and that we were basically pushers” and Mosseri “freaked out when I talked about dopamine in my teen fundamental lead review.”

“But it is undeniable. It’s biological. It’s psychological truth,” the employee wrote. Mosseri is expected to testify on Wednesday, and Zuckerberg is to testify next week. YouTube CEO Neal Mohan also will testify.

Lanier told the jury, “These companies aren’t totally made up of deranged freakos” which prompted Schmidt to stand and tell Judge Kuhl that was “argument” and not a proper way “to talk about anyone.”

The judge agreed, and Lanier withdrew the statement.

Near the end of his opening, Lanier showed jurors a case of eggs and said an “eggshell plaintiff” is a plaintiff who you take how they are.

“People who are fragile. People who have trauma. You don’t mock them for it. You don’t take advantage of them for they’re the most likely to get addicted,” Lanier said.

But Google and Meta “didn’t use the data to protect these kids. They used it to ensure their algorithm never let them go.”

“They knew the parents stood no chance. Their own researchers found that corrective supervision made no difference,” he said.

Lanier showed jurors a miniature red Ferrari identified areas of the brain that seek rewards and validation and said the prefrontal cortex is like the brakes.

“The defendants knew the engine was roaring. They knew the brakes didn’t work,” Lanier said.

Lanier ended by returning to Kaley and her family and telling the jury he wants them “to hear about the struggles in school.”

“I want you to hear about the fragile home. I want you to hear about her mom being overwhelmed and having three kids at home,” Lanier said. He motioned to his wife in the galley and said “we had five kids at home, two parents, and it was chaos there, too.”

Defense focuses on plaintiff’s therapy records

Schmidt missed the end of jury selection after he apparently became ill, and Monday was his first day back in the courtroom.

He had a big gash and bump on his head, and he told the jury he wished he had a better story. Instead, all that happened is he got dizzy and fell over and sustained “a bad concussion.”

He considered trying to conceal his wound with makeup so he wouldn’t distract the jury, because “this isn’t about me.” He decided not to because “we’ll have distractions. There’ll be various distractions in the course of the trial.”

“We believe that we will focus on what matters in this case, the facts, the evidence and the proof in this case. And that’s really why I’m most glad to be back here instead of being at home or someplace else,” Schmidt said.

Schmidt told jurors the key issue before them is deciding whether social media caused Kaley’s mental health problems.

“It’s not about whether social media is or is not a good thing,” he said.

Schmidt played an excerpt from Kaley’s therapist’s deposition in which the therapist said Kaley didn’t talk much about social media when discussing her troubles. Another therapist said if Kaley had said Instagram was an issue, she would have tried to address it.

Schmidt displayed many quotes from Kaley’s therapy sessions about her abusive mother and suicidal thoughts on the courtroom overhead projector without reading them aloud.

He described other records about the mother experiencing domestic violence when Kaley was three years old, feeling abandoned by her father after her parents divorced. Kaley told therapists her mother wouldn’t talk to her for days on end and would sometimes refuse to pick her up from school.

When she was 16, Kaley told her therapist she wants her mother to stop saying hurtful things to her “and yelling at me.” She also said her mom “makes me want to kill myself”

“Those are really hard here. I recognize that,” Schmidt told the jury. “They’re really important in a case when you’re being asked to asses what caused her mental health struggles.”

Schmidt referenced a line in therapy notes that says Kaley dealt with a cyberbullying issue by “turning her phone off and stopping looking at posts.”

Schmidt discussed Kaley’s medical history and therapy records for about 40 minutes before moving into the apparent defense theory that Kaley’s social media use was actually good for her.

He highlighted how her therapist asked where she has a place “to be seen” and Kaley answered, “my social media pages.”

“This is an Instagram post from her in 2020 talking about her video edits: ‘I’m sorry, my posts have been kind of sad. This is how I express myself. This is how I go through my feelings. Sorry. A lot of my edits have been sad lately, going through hell, and that’s my small way of coping.”

Schmidt said jurors will hear the term “well being” a lot through trial because “that’s a term that people are going to use to try to make Instagram better.” He said the company “conducts research, supports users, acts on that research and is constantly adapting.”

“We wanted to understand Instagram’s role, for better or worse .. in order to prioritize mental health and well being issues,” Schmidt read from a document.

The company in 2018 wanted to better understand the behavior of “high-time spent users” because they “are potential candidates for products that aim to help habitual or problematic usage.”

Schmidt discussed features on Instagram such as the ability to set reminders about time usage and ended by telling jurors he believes they’ll hear more from Zuckerberg and Mooseri before they hear anything specific about Kaley. He again highlighted the main question for the jury: “Is Instagram a substantial factor in Kaley’s mental health struggles?”

“Here’s the critical language in this instruction: Conduct is not a substantial factor in causing harm if the same harm would have occurred without that conduct,” Schmidt said.

He said jurors must consider, “if you put the Instagram away and everything else becomes the same …would she still be struggling with the same things?”

‘It’s not the whole truth.’

Lanier told reporters outside the courthouse that Schmidt’s opening presented an incomplete picture. He also disputed that Kaley’s mother contributed to her mental health problems by pointing out that Kaley still lives with her mother.

“I think that the picture painted of Kaley and her mom is unfortunate,” Lanier said. “I’ll bet there aren’t any cherries left in the supermarket tonight because they picked them all as they went through those records. It’s not the whole truth.”

Lanier said he introduced Kaley during his opening because, “I think the jury needs to see her.”

“I think they need to know that she’s not just here, but to know what she looks like,” he said. He said Kaley “will be here each day” but not in the courtroom.

“It’s just nobody should have to sit there and listen to a one sided presentation of your life that doesn’t accurately reflect your life,” Lanier said.

Lanier said he’s tried other cases without a plaintiff in court each day.

“I’ve had a brain-damaged plaintiff who was in the hospital and wasn’t able to be present. I’ve had mesothelioma victims who weren’t able to leave because they couldn’t leave their bedside. It’s not that unusual,” Lanier said.

Jury seated after ‘Batson challenge’ threat

I caught the final 90 minutes of voir dire last Friday, and Lanier backed off on using a strike on a Black woman after defense counsel told him they’d challenge the strike under Batson v. Kentucky, the 1986 U.S. Supreme Court case that said a preemptory challenge against a potential juror cannot be used only because of race.

“Never had a Batson challenge in my life,” Lanier said.

Judge Kuhl told Lanier the state has been “very much focused on this issue of implicit bias” which becomes an issue of “how it looks.” She said the stae “just in the past two years has really ramped things up.”

She told Lanier “not think this is to call you out as being discriminatory, for considering striking this person.”

Lanier decided not to use the strike, and the woman was sworn in as one of six alternate jurors.

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Journalist Don Lemon was released from federal custody in Los Angeles on Friday following his first court appearance on charges that stemming from his coverage of a Jan. 18 protest at a Minnesota church where a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent is a pastor.

Lemon, 59, is charged in a grand jury indictment with two crimes: interfering with the free exercise of religious beliefs and conspiracy against right of religious freedom at place of worship.

Federal agents arrested him at hotel in Beverly Hills early Friday. Georgia Ellyse Fort, a journalist in Minnesota, also was arrested on Friday. She was released from custody after appearing in Minneapolis federal court.

Lemon walked out of the Edward R. Roybal Federal Building and U.S. Courthouse in downtown Los Angeles about 3:25 p.m. with his husband, Tim Malone, after U.S. Magistrate Judge Patricia Donahue ordered him released on his own recognizance.

He spoke briefly to a huge crowd of media and supporters.

“I have spent my entire career covering the news. I will not stop now. In fact, there is no more important time then right now — this very moment — for a free and independent media that shines a light on the truth and holds those in power accountable. Again, I will not stop now. I will not stop ever,” said Lemon, who was fired from CNN in 2023 and now hosts a show on YouTube.

“Last night, the DOJ sent a team of federal agents to arrest me in the middle of the night for something that I’ve been doing for the last 30 years, and that is covering the news,” Lemon said. “The First Amendment of the Constitution protects that work for me and for countless of other journalists who do what I do. I stand with all of them, and I will not be silenced. I look forward to my day in court. Thank you. All of you.”

Lemon went live on YouTube after court.

I attended Lemon’s court appearance along with dozens of other people, including Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass.

Bill Essayli, the top federal prosecutor in the Central District of California, was joined at the prosecutor’s table by Assistant U.S. Attorney Alexander Robbins.

The 12-page indictment lists Attorney General Pamela Bondi and Harmeet Dhillon, the assistant attorney general leading the Civil Rights Division, as well as Jesus A. Osete, a principal deputy assistant attorney general in the Civil Rights Division.

Robert J. Keenan, a longtime federal prosecutor in Santa Ana, California, who is now an acting deputy assistant attorney general in the Civil Rights Division, also is named, as is Orlando B. Sonza, Civil Rights Division counsel.

Essayli and Robbins didn’t object to Lemon being released from custody, but they asked Judge Donahue to impose release restrictions against the recommendation of U.S. District Court’s pretrial services, which said Lemon didn’t need any.

Robbins said Lemon should be restricted from traveling outside of New York and Minnesota. He was mentioning another restriction when Judge Donahue asked, “Why?”

“I’m happy to back up,” Robbins told the judge before saying that Lemon is charged with “a very serious felony” so restrictions “that apply to almost any other felony defendant would be appropriate.”

Robbins said Lemon should have no contact with victims or his alleged co-conspirators and he should surrender his passport and post a $100,000 bond.

Lemon’s lawyer Marilyn Bednarski agreed Lemon should be restricted from contacting witnesses or co-defendants but said no travel restrictions are needed.

She said Lemon graduated from journalism school in 1996 and “has been a journalist ever since. That’s what he does.” He’s not a flight risk or danger to the community,

“He’s one of the most well-known figures in the world,” Bednarski said. “He’s readily recognizable.”

Bednarski said Lemon has a trip to France planned in June and has no international ties such as family or property that make him a risk not to return to the United States.

“He is committed to fighting this case. He’s not going anywhere,” said Bednarksi, who is with McLane Bednarski & Litt, LLP in Los Angeles.

Robbins didn’t object to Lemon traveling to France but asked that he be restricted from traveling without permission from pre-trial services.

Robbins cited paragraphs in the indictment that he sided with illustrate the seriousness of the case. One says Lemon “told his livestream audience about congregants leaving the Church and about a ‘young man’ who LEMON could see was ‘frightened,’ ‘scared,’ and ‘crying’ and LEMON observed that the congregants’ reactions were understandable because the experience was’ traumatic and uncomfortable,’ which he said was the purpose.”

“These are relevant to which condition?” Donahue asked.

Robbins said they show Lemon’s potential danger to the community. He said restrictions are necessary to ensure Lemon “doesn’t commit similar acts” or “feel emboldened to commit similar acts.”

Bednarski responded that Lemon has no history of violence and the idea that he’s a danger is not justifiable.”

The core issue in the case appears to be whether “obstruction [was] a matter of legitimate First Amendment protest activity” or did it cross the line, Bednarksi said. She called the allegations against Lemon “vague.”

Bednarski also said she didn’t have a copy of the indictment — “if it was emailed while I was in lockup, I don’t have it” — and said something about bringing the person who wrote the affidavit into court so she could cross-examine him, but that didn’t happen.

Judge Donahue imposed the following restrictions:

• Lemon must obtain court permission for international travel, except for an already planned trip to France in June.

• He is barred from contacting any known victims, witnesses, or co-defendants in the case.

Legal Affairs and Trials with Meghann Cuniff is a reader-supported project that utilizes my 20 years of reporting experience in traditional media to bring you in-depth news about major legal issues. If you want to support my work, consider upgrading to a paid subscription.

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The indictment comes after U.S. Magistrate Judge Douglas L. Micko in Minneapolis refused to sign a criminal complaint or arrest warrant for Lemon on Jan. 22. Micko found there was probable cause for only three defendants.

Daniel Rosen, the U.S. attorney in Minnesota, asked Chief Judge Patrick J. Schiltz for another judge to review Micko’s decision.

The DOJ then filed a 13-page emergency petition with the 8th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.

Schiltz told the 8th Circuit he learned of the filing when he received an email about an order sealing the case and inviting him to respond to the petition.

“The United States did not have courtesy to tell me that they would be filing such a petition, nor did the United States serve the petition on me,” the judge wrote. “I am unable to access nay documents…because, at the request of the United Staes, the case is sealed — apparently even for me. So I have been given about two-and-one-half hours to respond to a mandamus petition that I have no read and cannot read.”

He said the request to review Micko’s decision “is unheard of in our district, or, as best as I can tell, any other district in the Eighth Circuit.”

“I have surveyed all of our judges—some whom have been judges in our District for over 40 years—and no one can remember the government asking a district judge to review a magistrate judge’s denial of an arrest warrant,” Schiltz said.

Judges Jane L. Kelly, L. Steven Grasz and Jonathan A. Kobes rejected the petition on Jan. 23.

Grasz said in a concurrence that the affidavit “clearly establish probable cause for all five arrest warrants” but “the government has failed to establish that it has no other adequate means of obtaining the requested relief.”

That means turned out to be a grand jury.

The charges:

Count One: Conspiracy Against Rights | Statute: 18 U.S.C. § 241

The defendants allegedly conspired to “injure, oppress, threaten, and intimidate” clergy, staff, and congregants to prevent them from freely exercising their First Amendment right to religious freedom at a place of worship.

The indictment alleges the group organized an operation called “Operation Pullup” to disrupt the church service because they believed it was harboring a “Director of ICE”. Activities included holding a pre-operation briefing, entering the church in “waves” to avoid detection, and interrupting the service with chants and shouting.

Count Two: Interference with Right of Religious Freedom | Statute: 18 U.S.C. §§ 248(a)(2), (b) and 18 U.S.C. § 2(a) (Aiding and Abetting)

The defendants are accused of using force, threats of force, and physical obstruction to intentionally intimidate and interfere with individuals lawfully exercising religious freedom.

The indictment notes that this conduct resulted in bodily injury to one of the congregants. Specific acts alleged include blocking aisles, yelling at children, and obstructing parents as they tried to retrieve children from the church’s childcare area.

Lemon and Fort are two of nine defendants charged in the case. Two have not been publicly identified in court documents. The others are Nekima Valdez Levy-Armstrong, Chauntyll Louisa Allen, William Scott Kelly, Jamael Lydell Lundy and Trahern Jeen Crews.

The allegations:

Levy-Armstrong:

• Organized the operation targeting the church, dubbed “Operation Pullup,” and promoted it on Instagram

• Led a pre-operation briefing

• Directed a “first wave” of agitators to enter the church in an undercover capacity, positioning themselves around the sanctuary without wearing “activist-identifying” clothing

• Interrupted the pastor’s sermon with loud declarations about the church harboring a “Director of ICE”

• Stood in front of a minivan full of children as it prepared to depart the church

Allen:

• Co-organized “Operation Pullup” and promoted it on her Instagram account

• Led chants during the pre-operation briefing (e.g., “ICE out of Minnesota”) and directed the group to stay “bumper-to-bumper” while traveling to the church

• Led the “second wave” of agitators into the church

• Joined in various chants, such as “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot!,” while gesturing in a manner perceived by some congregants as aggressive or hostile

Lemon

• Livestreamed the event on “The Don Lemon Show,” where he said he was with an organization gearing up for a “resistance” operation

• Stepped away so his mic would not record planning details

• Approached the pastor and asked him questions

• Posted himself at the main door of the church, and asked exiting congregants about immigration policy

Kelly

• Disrupted the service by chanting, “This ain’t God’s house. This is the house of the devil”

• Approached a congregant with children to demand why she was not supportive of the takeover; screamed “Nazi” in congregants’ faces and told child congregants their parents were going to “burn in hell”

• Walked in front of a minivan full of children and yelled at the occupants as they attempted to leave

Fort

• Attended the pre-operation briefing

• Joined other defendants in physically occupying the main aisle and rows of chairs

• Stood in front of a departing minivan full of children while conducting an interview with Armstrong

Lundy

• Participated in the takeover by standing in the main aisle

• Participated loudly in chants, including those stating the targeted ICE agent must be “Out! Out!,” while punching his fist in the air

Crews

• Attended the pre-operation briefing and traveled with the group to the church

• Stood in and around the main aisle and participated in chants

Mayor Bass spoke outside the courthouse after the hearing, which was scheduled for 1:30 p.m. but didn’t begin until about 2:25 p.m.

Bass said she’s “not a lawyer, but I will tell you … what they described as his crime, from my perspective, a layperson’s perspective, was the work of a reporter.”

“He went into the church along with the protesters. He covered the story. He listened to what the people said who were in the church. That is his crime. It made no sense to me,” Bass said. She said if she were on the other side “I would be embarrassed by that court proceeding that actually wanted to limit his movements so he could not go anywhere except for Minnesota to New York, a journalist who travels the country.”

“We have seen people being snatched off our street, and now all of you are at risk. And this is just unacceptable. This assault on our democracy has got to end, and you all journalists play such a critical role,” Bass said. She said she’s “going to fight every day for your ability to tell the truth, for your ability to cover this story and any other story.”

“We have to draw the line in the sand and say we will not allow for the dismantling of our democracy,” Bass said.

As I reported on the website formerly known as Twitter, a courthouse source told me Bass was on her way and her chief of staff had been told that the police officers with her can’t have their guns in the courthouse.

Actress Jane Fonda also showed up outside the courthouse but did not go inside. She told media she represents the Committee for the First Amendment, “which is made up of about 3,000 members of the entertainment industry.”

“The arrest of Don Lemon, doing his journalistic duty, is one page more out of an authoritarian playbook, and we say enough is enough. We have to fight to protect our rights. Many of our fathers and grandfathers fought and died for these rights, and we are not ready to sit and be quiet. We have to speak up. Every American who believes in our Constitution has to speak up,” Fonda said.

“This is how autocrats act. We can’t fall for it. We have to speak up. When a red line is crossed like this, we cannot be silent,” Fonda said, adding, “They arrested the wrong Don.”

Court documents:

Jan. 29 indictment

Jan. 23 Judge Schiltz’s letter

Jan. 23 8th Circuit judgment

8th Circuit emergency petition

In case you missed it, I appeared on Lemon’s show last year:

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An appellate court in Florida this week removed a judge from a high-profile murder case after a defense lawyer complained of “hostile comments” and “obvious bias.”

Alicia LaToya Andrews’ lawyer plans to seek a new trial after Florida’s 2nd District Court of Appeal agreed that Judge Michelle Sisco shouldn’t sentence Andrews for her manslaughter conviction over the fatal shooting of rapper Charles “Julio Foolio” Jones in Tampa in June 2024.

Jeremy McLymont, founder of AsiliA Law Firm, P.A in Miami, told me the appellate court made “the right decision.”

“Everyone is entitled to a fair trial, including Ms. Andrews. We are convinced that a new trial should and will be granted after some litigation at the trial and or appellate level,” said McLymont, a former assistant public defender in Miami-Dade County whose other clients include Milagro Cooper, the online commentator sued for defamation by rapper Megan Thee Stallion.

Andrews’ trial was streamed online, and McLymont included with his petition 16 videos clips as exhibits. He told me the recordings “helped immensely.”

“You could never capture the mannerisms, the tone etc. through a transcript,” McLymont said. “It would have been harder with a transcript, but it has been done before.”

Sisco is a former assistant Florida state attorney with the Hillsborough County State Attorney’s Office who has been a judge since 2002. She earned her law degree from the University of Florida College of Law in 1991.

The order from the three-judge panel deemed McLymont’s petition to disqualify her from Andrews’ case “legally sufficient” and ordered Christopher C. Sabella, the chief judge of Florida’s 13th Judicial Circuit where Sisco presides, to appoint a new judge “immediately.”

The three-sentence order does not explain the judges’ reasoning, but McLymont’s 18-page petition argued the judge abandoned “cold neutrality” and “did everything in its power to ensure that Ms. Andrews was convicted” by humiliating defense counsel in front of the jury, assisting prosecutors, treating defense witnesses more harshly than prosecution witnesses and pressuring the defense to hurry its case presentation.

“Ms. Andrews maintains that she has a reasonable fear that the trial court has abandoned its role to be an impartial arbiter,” McLymont wrote. “Ms. Andrews’ fear is confirmed by thousands of people who watched the trial online.”

Andrews, who will be 23 next week, is the first of five defendants to be tried for Jones’ murder. Her boyfriend, Isaiah Chance, is in jail awaiting trial with codefendants Sean Gathright, Rashad Murphy and Davion Murphy. Prosecutors did not seek the death penalty against her like they are against the four men.

Surveillance videos show three gunmen — whom prosecutors allege are Gathright and the Murphy cousins — ambush Jones with two AR-style rifles and Glock 19 as he sat in his Dodge Charger outside a hotel near the University of South Florida early on June 23, 2024. Chance and Andrews were nearby in the same parking lot. Prosecutors in trial argued she helped plan Jones’ murder, including following him as he celebrated his 26th birthday in the hours before he died.

Jones was prominent in Jacksonville in drill rap, a subgenre of hip-hop music, and his music videos showed him celebrating the murders of rivals by pouring champagne on their graves. He was shot several times in Houston, Texas, in July 2023, and testimony in Andrews’ trial indicated the same firearm that injured him then was used to murder him a year later.

A jury on Oct. 31 acquitted Andrews of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit first-degree murder but convicted her of manslaughter, which was a lesser included charge to murder.

Judge Sisco scheduled her sentencing for Dec. 8 and declined to stay it before she rejected McLymont’s disqualification motion. The appellate court, however, on Dec. 5 granted McLymont’s request to stay sentencing and gave prosecutors 30 days to “show cause” for why Sisco shouldn’t be removed.

Judges Robert Morris, Daniel H. Sleet and Suzanne Labrit granted the petition on Tuesday (Jan. 27).

Petition details judge’s comments and ‘coaching’

McLymont’s video exhibits included Judge Sisco not allowing cross-examination about a firearm’s safety mechanism and allowing prosecutors’ “hostile and prejudicial commentary” toward him and his co-counsel.

In one exhibit, the judge accused defense counsel of “lying and falsely asserting” that the lead detective watched the case online when McLymont had only said he wanted to ask the detective if he had.

McLymont also cited the judge’s response when he inquired in front of the jury about her reason for sustaining an objection. McLymont had asked Detective Juan Ramos of the Tampa Police Department, “It’s not that you didn’t have a way to verify—it’s that you just didn’t try to do it?”

McLymont told Sisco, “I don’t even understand the objection for ‘argumentative’ on cross” and, as the recusal petition describes it, “she dismissed counsel outright, took off her glasses, sat up in her chair and snarled ‘Well, I understand it, and I sustained the objection.’”

McLymont’s recusal petition said Sisco’s “public rebuke served only to belittle Defense Counsel and reinforce to the jury that the court disapproved of his questioning, which was by no means improper.”

“Florida courts have repeatedly recognized that a judge’s visible hostility toward counsel, especially before the jury, justifies disqualification,” McLymont wrote.

I included the exchange in a clip about McLymont pushing back on Judge Sisco sustaining objections, and it drew a large number of views on Instagram from lawyers who debated in the comments who was correct.

McLymont also cited Judge Sisco’s admonishment of his co-counsel Yselly Herrera when she “attempted to speak on behalf of the defense.” Sisco told Herrera, “I didn’t ask you to talk” and told her she needed permission to speak.

“The trial court never required the State to ask for permission to speak, or interject, or voice their opinions throughout the course of the trial,” McLymont said. “The trial court was merely taking its frustrations out on the Defense and attempting to humiliate Ms. Herrera in public.”

McLymont’s petition also said Sisco sought to humiliate defense by challenging his “competency and integrity” when he sought to admit evidence through a flash drive.

The judge said he couldn’t introduce it as evidence then “instead of acknowledging her mistake, the trial court searched for other reasons to challenge the admission of the evidence.”

The petition quoted Sisco asking McLymont, “What else is on the flash drive?” and said the judge “continued challenging counsel’s integrity in front of the jury by telling the State that they needed to look at the flash drive before it went back to the jury to make sure there was nothing on the flash drive that should not be on the flash drive.”

“Throughout the trial, the State introduced several items of digital evidence in the form of a compact disc ‘CD’. The trial court never challenged the State’s integrity and trustworthiness, or its ability to introduce such evidence,” McLymont wrote.

Judge Sisco also interrupted McLymont’s closing argument and said testimony he was referencing should have been objected to because it’s irrelevant, which McLymont’s petition said left “the jury with the impression that Defense Counsel was making improper arguments.”

“The trial court’s repeated comments, coaching-style interventions, and directives to the State demonstrate exactly the type of judicial participation Florida courts have found incompatible with due process,” McLymont wrote. “The trial court’s conduct conveyed distrust of Defense Counsel, suggested impropriety where none existed, and unmistakably signaled alignment with the prosecution.”

McLymont argued the judge also unfairly allowed prosecution witnesses to testify without their faces being shown on camera while not allowing defense witnesses to do so. He also cited her comments to a witness who refused to identify people in a photograph she said weren’t involved in the case. The judge told the witness, “You’re refusing to give their names? You’re under oath to tell the truth.”

“When the witness reiterated that these individuals were unrelated to the case, the trial court retorted, ‘Well I guess you’re the judge now.’ The witness explained that the witnesses ‘were not involved in this’ and the trial court in a sarcastic and demeaning tone said, ‘uh-huh,’” according to the petition.

Judge Sisco also sustained a hearsay objection when the witness said she’d been advised not to identify certain people, then told her, “Nope, nope, nope. I sustained the objection. You can’t answer it. You’re not actually the judge in here … you need to do what I tell you to do.”

“Instead of politely explaining to the witness what it means to sustain an objection, the trial court chastised the witness in front of the jury. This unnecessary and demeaning exchange again signaled to the jury that the witness was defiant or untruthful,” McLymont wrote.

McLymont also cited Judge Sisco’s comments to the jury about the length of the trial. She said during the prosecution’s case in chief that the jury would get the case by the end of the week, which McLymont argued “compressed or curtailed the Defense’s presentation of evidence.”

McLymont said the judge pressured him to rush his cross-exam of the lead detective, and her “comments and conduct made clear that it intended to end the trial regardless of whether the Defense had sufficient opportunity to call witnesses, conduct examinations, or introduce evidence.”

The petition cited a 1986 Florida Supreme Court case, Fischer v. Knuck, that said a judge should be disqualified if their heavier causes a reasonable fear of impartiality, including through pressured or uneven trial management.

“Here, the court’s assurances to the jury, coupled with its repeated efforts to hasten the proceedings while the Defense had yet to begin its case, created the unmistakable impression that the outcome of the trial was being prioritized over the process. This further supports the conclusion that the court’s actions, viewed cumulatively, justify disqualification,” McLymont wrote.

Opposition argues the judge was correct

In response, Florida Assistant State Attorney General William Shelhart argued McLymont raised only four examples that “do not demonstrate judicial bias” but rather “reflect the appropriate expertise of the court’s discretion and authority.”

He said the examples are:

1. “the court sustaining the State’s objection to a question posed by the defense during its cross-examination of the FDLE analyst and declining a request for a sidebar to discuss further”

2. “the court’s handling of the defense request to introduce photographs via a flash drive”

3. “the court assuring the jury that they would have the case by Friday, October 31, 2025, as discussed during voir dire”

4. “the court asking the defense to fast forward the previously published-in-full one hour and twenty-two minute interrogation video to the portion pertinent to the defense cross-examination”

The first complaint “merely takes issue with an adverse ruling,” and Shelhart said the judge was correct that McLymont’s question was irrelevant and right to address him in open court. While the witness discussed firearm safety in direct-exam, “this statement related to the handling of the murder weapon in a crowded courtroom and was made to ensure court personnel and the public that the firearm could not be discharged.”

Regarding Sisco’s comments about the false drive, Shelhart said the judge“correctly confirmed that during deliberation the jury would only have access to evidence admitted at trial.” Sisco “reasonably questioned why the defense presented the photographs on a flash drive when they were easily capable of being printed and admitted into evidence in their physical form.”

“This inquiry was a proper exercise of a legitimate judicial function,” Shelhart wrote.

Shelhart said McLymont’s final two complaints about Judge Sisco rushing the trial “both have to do with respecting the time of the court, the parties to the proceeding, and the empaneled jurors.”

McLymont replied that his petition raised four issues with Judge Sisco and cited 14 examples, not merely four examples as Shelhart said.

“The State failed to respond to three of the four issues raised by Ms. Andrews. Instead, the State created its own arguments for Ms. Andrews and responded to those arguments,” McLymont wrote.

The Florida appellate justices who granted McLymont’s petition cited a 2001 case, Franco v. State, in which a Florida 4th District Court of Appeal panel reversed a trial judge’s decision not to disqualify himself from a murder case and said his “facial gestures and conduct exhibited a lack of control and lack of judicial temperament.”

“A trial court’s prejudice against an attorney may be grounds for disqualification when such prejudice is of a degree that it adversely effects the litigant,” the judges said then.

Andrews’ case had not yet been assigned to another judge as of late Wednesday.

You can watch videos from Andrews’ trial on my YouTube channel.

Court documents:

Dec. 4 disqualification petition

Jan. 5 state’s response

Jan. 20 reply to response

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A jury in Corpus Christi, Texas, on Wednesday acquitted former Uvalde school police officer Adrian Gonzales of criminal charges for his response to a gunman who went on to murder 21 people inside an elementary school.

Jurors deliberated about seven hours before finding Gonzales not guilty of all 29 counts of child endangerment or abandonment. He appeared to be trying not to cry as he hugged his attorneys.

He told reporters he wanted to “start by thanking God for this, my family, my wife and these guys right here,” referring to his attorneys.

“He put them in my path, you know, and I’m just thankful for that,” Gonzales said

“Anything you want to say to the families?” a reporter asked.

“No. Not right now,” Gonzales said.

Jesse Rizo, whose 9-year-old niece, Jackie Cazares, was among the 19 children murdered, told reporters that “faith is fractured, but you never lose faith.”

“You don’t lose faith because these children that are no longer with us that are at the cemetery, they can’t speak for themselves. We speak for them. We fight to the end. And as hard as it is, you know they deserve it,” Rizo said.

“The teachers — Irma [Garcia], Eva [Mireles] — they had nothing on them, except for valor, except for courage, and they fought to the end. They pushed back hard. They gave their life," Rizo said.

He mentioned “those poor little survivors that have to live with the nightmare” and said he wonders how some of the responders “look at themselves in the mirror.”

“The man let me down. You can’t paint the an image and portray him as some kind of hero,” Rizo said.

He said he was “very hopeful” for a guilty verdict.

”We have children at stake, absolutely innocent children that did everything that they were trained to do, hide, turn the lights off, but the officer that was trained ... to go towards the shooter, to listen for the gunshot. And what does he do? Sit back ... for a minute and change while the massacre continues to happen,” Rizo said.

Brett Cross, whose 10-year-old son, Uziyah Garcia, was murdered, said he “can't tell what's going to happen, but we’ve got to get it right.”

“If not for us, if not for our kids, I just want people to start acting for their own,” Cross said.

“Why is your presence here at the courthouse important?" a reporter asked.

“Because I made a promise to my son that I would never stop fighting,” Cross said. “This country, the state, already made a liar out of me once when I swore to him that I would never let anything bad happen to him ... The city, the school, the state, the gun industry, they all made liars out of me. Nothing will make a liar out of me when it comes to fighting for my son.”

Gonzales was charged with a crime for each of the 19 children who were murdered and 10 who were injured alongside two teachers on May 24, 2022, in a fourth grade classroom building at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, about 85 miles west of San Antonio.

Prosecutor Bill Turner told jurors in his closing argument that their verdict “will set the bar for law enforcement in these situations: if it’s appropriate to stand outside hearing the 100 shots while children are being slaughtered.”

“That is your decision to tell the state of Texas,” Turner said. “And by the same token, if that is not appropriate, if that is not how we expect officers that are charged with the duty of protecting children to act, that will also go out from this court.”

The doors to the classrooms were unlocked when the gunman entered because of school-issued magnet meant to halt locks and allow uninterrupted entries and exits from students and staff. Teacher Mercedes Salas, however, testified that she didn’t use a magnet and instead always kept her door locked. She heard the gunman, who was a former student, pound on her door before he went to the other classrooms and opened fire.

Turner distinguished the unlocked doors from Gonzales’ conduct because no children were in “imminent danger” when teachers decided to leave the doors unlocked.

“That failing to act — failing to lock the doors — did not happen as the gunman was firing guns. The children weren’t in imminent danger, immediate,” Turner said.

Turner said two groups have a duty to protect children under the Texas statute criminalizing child endangerment or abandonment: parents and police officers.

“The charge in this case is that these 29 children were in danger. Not just danger, but imminent, immediate, close-at-hand danger, and that there was a man who had a duty to act, who failed to act,” Turner said.

In trial, Gonzales’ lawyers at LaHood Norton Goss Law Group, PLLC, in San Antonio said he responded as best he could based on the information he had at the time. They tried to refute prosecutors’ argument that he missed a chance to stop the gunman from going into the school, and they compared his actions to the actions of other officers who have not been charged with crimes.

They called two defense witnesses after prosecutors rested their case on Tuesday: Guillermo “Willie” Cantu, a retired special weapons and tactics officer with the San Antonio Police Department who defended Gonzales’ actions, and Claudia Rodriguez, a secretary at a funeral home across from the school who testified about the gunman hiding between cars in the school parking lot. Jurors saw surveillance video, and Rodriguez testified the gunman was ducked down reloading and not visible to Gonzales.

Gonzales’ attorney Jason Goss said during the post-verdict press conference late Wednesday that the situation is “obviously very emotional” for Gonzales. The “wall of people” in front of him “has been reporting ever since Adrian was charged that he failed to do his duty, because that’s what the prosecutors charged.”

“And the evidence showed that that wasn’t true,” Goss said.

Goss didn’t dispute that Gonzales owed a duty to the children.

“Of course there is. He was doing his duty. He was running to the danger. He was driving right in there,” Goss said.

Prosecutors “just ignore all of his actions because they’re trying to pretzel it, massage it, get it in there, do anything that they can to get the conviction.”

Goss, who split the defense argument with Nico LaHood, told jurors that Gonzales “was trying” and was one of the first five officers inside the school. He was there when the gunman fired through a classroom door and shot two officers, and he drove toward the danger searching for the gun before he went into the school.

The jury’s verdict “is not going to make [law enforcement] perfect the next time,” Goss said. “It’s not going to make them not make mistakes. It’s not going to make them not interpret things differently, strangely, weirdly based on their own experiences.”

He called it “one of the most horrible things that’s ever happened in this state that those kids are not served.”

“The memory of those children, that I agree should be honored, is not honored by an injustice in their name,” Goss said.

LaHood followed Goss’ 37-minute argument with a 43-minute argument that included him honoring the Lady Justice allegorical persona and her scales of justice.

“These scales say, ‘I don’t care about those cameras.’ These scales say, ‘I don’t care about the false narrative that’s been out there.’ These scales say, ‘I don’t care about all the resources of the government.’ The scales even say it doesn’t even matter what the judge thinks,” LaHood said. “The scale says … we have to balance all that out, look at everything and come find this concept called justice. And I love it. I love her.”

He compared Gonzales’ actions to the actions of other officers and said if Gonzales and the four officers he was with first “hadn’t contained the shooter, he could have done the same thing to the whole school. Think about that.”

LaHood told jurors that prosecutors are trying to serve them “a coward sandwich” they want them to believe is made by Gonzales, but that is surrounded by slices of bravery.

“You have this coward sandwich, but you have bravery and bravery around it. The bravery of driving into trouble, thinking there was a shooter,” LaHood said.

LaHood echoed Goss’ argument that Gonzales’ prosecution could deter law enforcement from taking future action.

“That’s not the message that needs to be sent. They need training. They need good training. They need proper training. They need resources. They need help from those schools to work with them in conjunction,” LaHood said.

LaHood said prosecutors want jurors “to ignore that Adrian drove into danger.”

“Remember that sandwich? They’re gonna say, ‘Yeah, okay, the bread, the bread is fine, but the coward sandwich is full in the middle’, and then, ‘yeah, I understand the bread at the end is bravery, but we just want you to focus on what’s in the middle,’” LaHood said.

He said it’s “like an Oreo.”

“They want you to have the coward cream in the middle,” LaHood said.

Rizo, whose niece was killed, referenced LaHood’s metaphor when talking to reporters after the acquittal. He said his message for Gonzales is “don’t be fooled by your attorney.”

“Your attorney can talk about sandwiches. Sandwich of coward, that there’s something on the outside and the bread? It’s insulting, to be honest with you,” Rizo said.

LaHood said at the press conference that he understands victims’ families are upset.

“I’ve been praying for them. We pray for them. We’re sorry that they feel that way. We understand that their separation from their loved one is going to be felt as long as they walk on this earth,” LaHood said. “We don’t ignore that. We acknowledge that. We’re just going to continue to pray for them. So I’m very sorry that they feel that way.”

LaHood said jurors told the defense team after the verdict that they saw “gaps in the evidence.”

“They appreciated us bringing out those gaps. They considered everything. They were very diligent. They worked very hard back there. They were very mindful and deliberate,” LaHood said.

“We felt Adrian was innocent from the beginning. When we analyzed the situation, we knew it was going to be a challenging case because of the emotions, the sheer emotions behind it, and those precious babies being taken from those families,” LaHood continued.

Christina Mitchell, the district attorney for Uvalde and Real counties in Texas, began her 17-minute rebuttal by defending her decision to prosecute Gonzales. She referenced other investigations into the police response to the shooting.

“The easiest thing would have been me to do what all those did, which is say, don't blame us. Blame somebody else, or everybody’s to blame, therefore you can’t hold anybody responsible. That would have been the easiest thing,” Mitchell said. But, “I’ve never bowed to political pressure, and that’s not what this case is about.”

Mitchell said she wants to send a message “that when you are a peace officer for a school district, and you raise your right hand and say, ‘I am going to be a peace officer’ … you’re going to be held responsible. You’re going to be held to that duty.”

“We are basically teaching these kids, and the kids in room 111 and room 112 were taught, to practice for their impending death. You don’t cry and you don’t scream, but we’re going to teach you what you do when a monster makes his way into the school. We’re going to have you rehearse your own death,” Mitchell continued. “But yet, we have active shooter training that says to go to the fire, that the defendant taught, but we’re going to ignore that, because on any given day, if he says, ‘not my day,’ we’re supposed to just look the other way.”

She ended her rebuttal by telling the jury, “We cannot let 19 children die in vain and another 10 to suffer. They’re going to be that - suffering for a long time. On behalf of those 19 children, I respectfully request that after your deliberations, that you return a verdict of guilty.”

Highlighting the differences in state’ judicial systems, Brian Gurwitz, a criminal defense attorney in Orange County, California, commented on my Facebook clip of Mitchell, “I don’t know about Texas, but it would be clear prosecutorial misconduct to argue that a reason for the jury to vote guilty is to ‘send a message’ to other officers.”

Pete Arredondo, Gonzales’ boss at the Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District Police District, is awaiting trial on 10 counts of child endangerment or abandonment. While the case against Gonzales alleged he endangered all 29 children, the case against Arredondo says his decisions prolonged the danger and suffering of the 10 injured children.

You can read about the testimony from all witnesses in my previous articles:

The victims were:

• Uziyah Garcia, 10

• Eliahna Amyah Garcia, 9

• Xavier Lopez, 10

• Amerie Jo Garza, 10

• Jose Manuel Flores Jr., 10

• Alithia Ramirez, 10

• Annabell Guadalupe Rodriguez, 10

• Eliahna A. Torres, 10

• Jacklyn “Jackie” Cazares, 9

• Jayce Carmelo Luevanos, 10

• Jailah Nicole Silguero, 10

• Makenna Lee Elrod, 10

• Layla Salazar, 11

• Maranda Mathis, 11

• Nevaeh Bravo, 10

• Tess Marie Mata, 10

• Rojelio Torres, 10

• Maite Yuleana Rodriguez, 10

• Alexandria “Lexi” Aniyah Rubio, 10

• Eva Mireles, 44

• Irma Garcia, 48

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The second week of trial in the child endangerment case against former Uvalde, Texas, school police officer included testimony from teachers and parents as well as a former police sergeant who said he ignored a request from an officer for “permission to fire.”

Daniel Coronado testified he didn’t answer because he doesn’t know why an officer would think he needed to seek permission to use deadly force.

“When that request came to you, did that seem odd to you?” Prosecutor Bill Turner asked in direct-examination.

“It did seem odd to me, yes, sir,” answered Coronado, who’s retired from the Uvalde Police Department.

“Explain that to the jury,” Turner said.

“Well, typically, when you’re being shot at … if you do see an individual with a gun, I’ve never been asked or have ever heard of anyone asking for permission to fire,” Coronado testified. “I don’t know what he was thinking or what, why he said that.”

Coronado said he couldn’t see Officer Juan Saucedo’s “backdrop,” and Turner asked, “Would it have been irresponsible for you to give him direction not knowing the specifics of his backdrop?”

“Yeah, absolutely,” Coronado answered.

Coronado said it happened “within one or two or three seconds.”

“I was trying to comprehend what was going on. I was getting a lot of information. I was trying to determine where this guy was. And in the middle of all that, he says, ‘I think I see him. Permission to fire.’ … Then at that point that I heard the individuals yelling, ‘He’s going towards the school.’ and I left and drove towards the front of the school. Does that make sense?” Coronado testified.

“Yes, sir,” said Turner, a longtime district attorney in Brazos County, Texas, who was appointed to the investigation into the police response to the May 2022 mass shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde.

Turner and Christina Mitchell, the district attorney for Uvalde and Real counties, are prosecuting Adrian Gonzales, a former officer with the Uvalde school district police department, as well as Pete Arredondo, the former school police chief who is scheduled for trial after Gonzales.

Gonzales is charged with 29 counts of child endangerment or abandonment under Texas state law, one count for each of the 19 children who were murdered and 10 who were injured by the 18-year-old gunman, who was killed when law enforcement eventually breached a classroom door. Arredondo is charged with 10 counts, one for each injured child.

The prosecution argues that because Gonzales was one of the first officers at the school and heard the gunman firing outside, his failure to follow active shooter training, which calls for immediate engagement, endangered each child in the two adjoining classrooms where the victims were shot. The case against Arredondo alleges his decisions as incident commander prolonged the danger for the children who survived the gunfire and were calling for help.

In trial, Gonzales’ lawyers have said he responded as best he could based on the information he had at the time. They’re trying to refute prosecutors’ argument that he missed a chance to stop the gunman from going into the school, and they’re comparing his actions to the actions of other officers such as Coronado, who has not been charged with a crime.

In cross-examination last week, Coronado told Gonzales’ lawyer Nico LaHood he doesn’t know who Officer Saucedo saw “or what he saw” before Saucedo asked permission to fire. Coronado also testified he “never saw anyone that was a suspect.”

“I never saw anyone with a gun. I never saw him enter the school. I never saw any of that,” Coronado said.

On Friday, LaHood questioned Lt. Nick Hill of the Texas Department of Public Safety about Coronado ignoring Saucedo’s “permission to fire” request. Hill testified that while Texas law doesn’t require law enforcement officials to seek permission from another officer or supervisor before using force, “departmental policies may be different.”

Hill testified about an animated map of the school that depicts the gunman’s movements as well as the movements of law enforcement, which jurors saw during his direct-exam.

When LaHood questioned him about it in cross, Hill said “it’s possible” that Gonzales didn’t know the gunman had entered the building. (Jurors, though, heard testimony earlier in the week from a former school aide who said she told Gonzales the gunman needed to be stopped before he went into the building and pointed him out, but Gonzales “did nothing.”)

LaHood continued: “Somebody not Adrian said, ‘I think he made it in the building,’ and you know that was Coronado, right?”

“Yes,” Hill answered.

“And so as that’s happening, even though there’s knowledge that this shooter made into the building, these three officers do not pursue the shooter,” LaHood said.

“They all three relocate to the other intersection. They do not pursue the shooter, not through the west door,” Hill testified. Pointing at the map of the school, Hill said the officers, “with Sgt. Coronado leading, follow and drive up here and take up different positions.”

Hill said Gonzales heard the initial shots because he “gets on the radio and says, ‘Shots fired.’”

“He has now clarified he heard something. He understands that shots are being fired because he put it out over the radio,” Hill testified.

LaHood questioned Hill for about 2 1/2 hours on Friday and will continue Tuesday.

Based in San Antonio, the former elected district attorney of Bexar County took an aggressive tone with Hill as he questioned him about the actions — or inactions — of others and the idea that Gonzales should have been able to discern the direction of the gunfire despite possible gunshot echoes.

Hill testified he’s determined the location of echoing gunfire several times in his career, and LaHood said, “I don’t know if anybody believes you.” Turner objected and LaHood said, “He’s right. I sustain myself.”

LaHood referenced a street on a map of the school and an officer standing around when he told Hill, “You can smile all you want. He’s standing around, right? What was funny about what I said right there? Why did you smile?”

Judge Sid Harle sustained Turner’s argumentative objection, but Hill still answered, “I was merely just licking my lips because my mouth is dry.”

“Okay, get some water, please. You have a lot of water there,” LaHood said.

Judge Harle sustained Turner’s objection “to the sidebar comment.”

LaHood and Hill disagreed on whether Coronado and the two officers were driving away or repositioning themselves as a tactical decision.

Hill testified he can’t say if their actions were helping the children.

“Hold on. Look at this jury. Tell them you can’t answer that question,” LaHood said. “You can’t answer that question? Whether them driving away was helping those children? Answer that question.”

Hill said Sgt. Coronado said “I think” the gunman made into the building so “it’s possible when he gets here, he doesn’t see the shooter and is letting him know ‘I don’t see them on that side of the building, and he may have made it into the building.’”

“But these guys don’t run to the building. They drive around it, right?” LaHood asked.

“They move to another area,” Hill began before LaHood interjected and referenced Hill’s testimony about locating echoing gunfire.

“You have great hearing. You can tell where gunfire is. Listen to my question,” LaHood said.

Turner objected to the question as argumentative, and LaHood said “sustained” before Judge Harle did.

“I’m sorry, judge,” LaHood said.

Week 2 witnesses:

In addition to Coronado and Hill, the witnesses who testified in the second week of trial were:

Terry Snyder, a ranger with the Texas Department of Public Safety since 1998 who was assigned to help identify and mark the bodies of victims.

Scott Swick, a ranger who searched classroom 112, which connected to 111. Those are the classrooms where the victims were killed. Jurors saw photos from the classroom during his testimony; most weren’t shown on the live stream because they show blood or are otherwise too graphic. Evidence in the room indicated the gunman reloaded at least once: Swick testified more than 30 bullet casings were recovered, “which would indicate to me that a magazine had been changed in the room.”

Roberto Montalvo Jr., a ranger who went to the hospital where some victims. Two of the 19 children were hospitalized before they were pronounced dead. Montalvo also returned to the school one week after the shooting to collect additional prices of evidence, including a Hellfire trigger snap-on device and two spent cartridge casings. He returned again a week later to “collect two spent cartridge casings on the outside of the west side of the building of Robb Elementary, and some projectile fragments now were in room that came from room 111.”

Turner’s direct-exam was about 13 minutes, but Montalvo’s testimony took about 75 minutes because Gonzales’ lawyer Jason Goss asked many questions about the gunman’s movements and the location of shell casings

In re-direct, Montalvo testified that the “ideal situation” for Gonzales based on his training would be to “isolate the individual to a certain part of the building, or to even isolate him to outside the building and have the shooting outside.”

“You have any indication that he isolated, distracted, or neutralized the gunman?” Turner asked.

“In this case, it doesn’t appear like that,” Montalvo answered.

Arnulfo Reyes, a fourth grade teacher who was shot and injured before the gunman shot his students.

None of Reyes’ students survived, but he lived by playing dead, surviving his initial gunshot wounds and a gunshot wound to his back that the murderer inflicted near the end of the carnage.

Reyes said he was grading papers as students watched a movie when he heard loud sounds in the adjoining room 112 and saw pieces of the wall “or some objects flying.” His students moved to hide under tables “and I got off from my my desk area and was going around to hide from view.”

“That is when I looked at my door, and that’s where I saw him,” Reyes testified.

“What did you see?” Turner asked.

“A black shadow,” Reyes answered.

“And what was the black shadow doing?” Turner asked.

“The black shadow was holding a gun. And I know that he was holding a gun because I just saw the fire come out of the gun,” Reyes answered.

Reyes said the gunman shot one of his arms “and that’s when I fell to the ground.”

“And then after I fell on to the ground, he came around and he shot the kids,” Reyes testified.

Reyes testified he heard a voice in room 112 say, “Officer, come in here. We’re in here,” and the gunman “walks over there, and then I heard more shooting.”

“And did you hear that voice again?” Turner asked.

“No,” Reyes answered.

The gunman approached him again as he pretended to be dead and “tried to taunt me” when “he got some of my blood and splashed it on my face,” Reyes testified.

He said he doesn’t know how long it took for police to remove him from the classroom but “it felt like forever.”

When he heard them approaching he prayed and “just, you know, I gave myself to the Lord and just closed my eyes real tight and just waited for for everything to be over,” Reyes testified.

Turner ended his exam by displaying the school photographs of each child was killed or injured and having Reyes state their names and whether they survived.

Jimmy Klaevemann, a retired electronics technician and security coordinator for the Uvalde school district who testified about the school’s surveillance system. He confirmed the cameras’ functionality on May 24, 2022, and said all footage was provided to investigators.

Elsa Avila, a fourth grade teacher who was shot and injured but survived along with each of her students, who were not physically injured.

She realized something was wrong when one of her students told her another teacher’s students were screaming and running into their classroom. She closed the classroom door and turned off the lights, “but as soon as we started moving, we heard shots. We heard loud, loud shots.”

“They knew that it was, you know, a real thing. … It was not a drill, that it was something real, because they could hear the shots being fired,” Avila testified.

Avila realized she was shot because “I put my hand on my side, and I saw blood.”

“When I took my hand away, I saw blood, so I knew that I had been shot,” she testified. “I fell to the floor, and we kept hearing the shots. They were just going like that, just one after the other, one after the other, and it would stop.”

“I texted my principal. I texted the counselor. I texted some of my teacher friends on a teacher group that we had to let them know. You know, I’m shot. I need help. Send help.”

She said “it seemed forever” before police “busted through the windows” and said, “police, we’re here to help you.”

“The glass flew everywhere, and the students let out a collective cry. … I mean, they all just cried at the same time because they’d been holding it in for so long. And some of them ran, ran to the window right away.”

Avila testified she was “trying to hold in the pain.”

“I was in so much pain towards the end there. My body was .. going into shock, because my legs were already starting to shake, my whole body was starting to shake. … I kept praying, God, please don’t let me die,” she said, crying. She wept as she said she couldn’t help her students or comfort them and she was worried she’d “die in front of them.”

She said she was “very very proud of them becuase they did everything they were supposed to do.”

“They took care of each other. They tried to take care of me,” Avila said. She retired after the shooting, but she returned to the classroom this year after counseling and therapy because she missed it so much.

“Thank God I’m back in the classroom,” she said.

Erin Robin, a second-grade teacher who testified about hiding with her students after she heard from a school aide who “was very panicked” and said, “There’s a man with a gun.” She “made sure that the door was shut and locked” by removing a magnet that she and other teachers used to keep the door unlocked at all times “because kids go in and out to the bathroom all day long, or people, counselors.”

Her students “got underneath the table” and she “sat down beside them.” At one point she looked out a window and saw an officer, apparently Gonzales, at his police car.

“My first thought was ‘the good guys are here. The police are here. We’re going to be okay,” Robin said. She said she told her students, “It’s going to be okay. The police are here.”

Joe Vasquez, a deputy with the sheriff’s office in Zavala County, Texas, who was off duty when he went to the school after hearing about the gunman. His daughter, Ava, attended the school, and Vasquez didn’t know where she was when he linked up with other officers and entered the school, eventually joining the team that breached the classroom door and killed the gunman.

“I thought they were going to have some kind of equipment to breach the door, which they didn’t. I remember asking about a sledgehammer,” Vasquez testified.

He said it dark and “hard to see” when he heard “ a door creak open in front.”

“And then the shooting starts,” Vasquez testified. “I could hear the shots coming. I’m carrying my rifle left handed so I can’t even pick it up because we’re so close together. Eventually, I transitioned to the right, fire a couple rounds and it jams.”

After the gunfire ends, “in front of me, there’s someone with long hair, face down.”

“I thought it was a teacher at first because he had long hair. They flip him over, and I could tell it was the shooter. He’s in all black,” Vasquez testified.

He said he realized his daughter wasn’t in the classroom when he saw a boy and realized he was older than her. He eventually found his daughter at the Civic Center. He initially didn’t see her and “it feels everything leaves in my body, and then out of nowhere, she like appears, and I hug her.”

“We go towards a back wall, and then a teacher, but I don’t know if it was a teacher, but she kicks me out of there because I have a rifle,” Vasquez testified.

LaHood’s cross-examination focused on the danger law enforcement faced and the concept of a fatal funnel, which is a law enforcement term for a narrow, exposed space that heightens the potential for a deadly attack.

A fatal funnel is “where you’re gonna die at the door,” Vasquez testified. In the Uvalde shooting, two officers were shot as they tried to approach the classroom with three other officers, including Gonzales.

If the threat has a high-powered rifle and ammo, “it doesn’t matter if there’s 1,000 officers on that side, right? I mean, if you have enough rounds, they’re just going to pick them off as they come in, correct?” LaHood asked.

“Yes,” Vasquez answered.

After Vasquez’s testimony while the jury was still seated, Velma Lisa Duran, the sister of slain teacher Irma Garcia, stood in the galley and that her sister “went into the fatal funnel.”

“You know who went into the fatal funnel? My sister went into the fatal funnel!” Duran yelled.

“She went into the fatal funnel! She did it! Not you, bastard!” she continued as deputies removed her from the courtroom. Judge Harle said she’s prohibited from reentering the courtroom for the remainder of trial. He also instructed jurors to disregard her comments.

Garcia, 48, was in her 23rd year of teaching and was co-teaching a fourth grade class with Eva Mireles, who also was murdered. Garcia’s husband, Joe, died of a heart attack two days after she was killed.

Teresa Zamarripa, an office manager at Southwest Texas College Law Enforcement Academy who testified about Gonzales’ training and his work teaching classes about how to response to active shooters.

Gonzales completed an eight-hour training course on active shooters in December 2021. He also has 60 hours of training in special weapons and tactics.

Ricardo Guajardo, a Texas ranger who interviewed Gonzales one day after the shooting. Turner played video fo the interview in direct-exam and paused periodically to ask Guajardo questions.

Gonzales told Guajardo he tried to console his colleague Officer Ruben Ruiz, who was married to Mireles and said she’d called and told him she was dying inside her classroom.

“I went and checked on Officer Ruben Ruiz, because he told us that his wife called him, Ms. Mireles, and that she, she was hit, and she, she was dying,” Gonzales, dressed in his school district police uniform, told Guajardo.

“You went to go check on, check on him?” Guajardo asked.

“He was sitting in there with lieutenant. I was trying to, you know, calm him down,” Gonzales said. “He wanted to go in ... after he received that phone call, so they actually had to take his gun away and sit him down.”

Gonzales told Guajardo at the end of the interview, “Now that I can sit back, I went tunnel vision.”

“It'‘s just the adrenaline rush going and, you know, shots fired and stuff like that. So it was just, you know, because on the radio it said there was a lady shot in the head on Dia Street, which is two blocks down,” Gonzales said. The woman was the gunman’s grandmother, whom he shot before he went to the school.

Melodye Flores, a school district aide who testified she told Gonzales about the gunman before he entered the building but Gonzales “did nothing.” Turner mentioned Flores expected testimony in his openings statement.

In direct-exam with Turner on Wednesday (Jan. 14), Flores described her efforts to ensure students were safe, including running outside to gather students and teachers and attempting to lock doors. She saw the shooter near the fourth-grade building and heard gunshots.

She told Gonzales that the gunman “needed to get stopped before he went into the fourth grade. That we needed just to stop him.”

“He did nothing,” Flores answered.

Flores said she “just kept pointing.”

“He’s going in there. He’s going to the fourth grade building,” she recalled saying.

“And how many times did you say that?” Turner asked.

“I would say a couple of times,” Flores testified.

Cherie Hauptmeier, a doctor who treated children at Uvalde Memorial Hospital and testified about their injuries, including significant shrapnel and gunshot wounds. She explained the triage process and the prioritization of victims in critical condition. She said she learned of the shooting when she received a text message sent to all physicians asking them to report to the emergency room immediately.

Jamie Torres, whose daughter, Chloe, is one of the 10 children who made it out of the classrooms alive but injured.

Torres testified she received a text message from the school about a lockdown before she learned the situation was much more serious. She saw her daughter “after she came home from the hospital, because I was out of town” and she “had bullet fragments in her forehead and in her left thigh” that remain today.

“She gets headaches frequently, and then in her leg, if she walks kind of far, sometimes she'll say that she has to stop because her leg was hurt,” Torres testified.

Jennifer Haby, a licensed counselor at the Bluebonnet Children’s Advocacy in Hondo, Texas, who was deemed a court-qualified expert on post-traumatic stress disorder. She testified PTSD and how to treat it.

Michael Witzgall, retired law enforcement and military instructor who taught a course with Gonzales on how to respond to active shooters. Witzgall, who was a member of the U.S. Marine Corps' elite reconnaissance unit, testified as a court-qualified expert in law enforcement training and procedures.

“When there’s an active shooter, we cannot sit around and wait. And most of law enforcement from the day you are in the academy, they tell you, never do anything by yourself. … Yet, in an active shooter situation, because of the lethality, the nature of the whole thing we have to act, which can mean acting completely and wholly alone.”

Christopher Salinas, whose son Samuel survived the shooting with a gunshot wound to his left thigh. The boy has shrapnel and bullet fragments in his right thigh that severely limits his activities.

“He can walk very limited. He has pain all the time on his right thigh, so he puts more weight on his left,” Salinas testified. “He complains a lot of pain through any exercise, activities, walking, running. He’ll do it, but then the next day, he can’t get up or walk or anything, because the pain is so severe for him.”

He said his son’s trauma is provoke by “popping sounds, slamming doors, loud arguments … violence on TV, things of that nature.” He also doesn’t like the color red because “I think it’s just a picture of what he saw.”

Salinas said the boy has disassociated from some family members and grown particularly attached to his oldest brother.

“Now, Mr. Salinas, is the child that you picked it from the hospital on May 24 the same child that was taken to school that day?” Mitchell asked.

“No,” Salinas answered.

Mercedes Salas, who taught the gunman when he was in fourth grade and heard him pound on her locked door as she hid with her students.

Salas testified she ensured her door was locked after she heard gunshots. (She didn’t use a magnet to stop the lock like other teachers.) She told her students to hide quietly and pray.

“My kids were sitting down, except for one student. One student was standing … and I grabbed him, and I just went down with him like that. And as soon as I did that, I heard a gunshot inside the, in the hallway.”

“When I heard the gunshot in the hallway, I immediately texted my my family and I said, ‘Gunshots in the hallway. Pray for us,’” Salas testified.

Before the gunfire in the nearby classrooms, “I heard pounding like if somebody was pounding on my door, like the rattle of my doorknob.”

“I started praying. I was talking to God like, ‘Protect my door.’ And after that, then I heard a lot of gunshots,” she said. “I heard kids screaming. When they screamed, I heard the gunshots then I didn’t hear them anymore, so I knew something happened to them.

“What did you tell your children to do at this point?” Mitchell asked.

“I just told them to keep on praying,” she said.

Salas, who also goes by Ellis, recalled how one boy showed her a pair of scisssors as they hid from the gunman.

“One of my students said, ‘Mrs. Ellis,’ .... I looked, and he had a pair of scissors. I didn’t tell him to put them away, because those scissors made him feel safe,” she testified.

Salas said she was the last person to leave the classroom because “when my last kiddo got out, I turned back and I started walking back to my classroom … because I had to make sure nobody stayed frozen.”

Salas said her students “were so brave being so close to danger. They listened to my instructions to survive. I was very proud of them.”

Ruby Gonzales, an officer with the Uvalde Police Department who was working for the school district police department when the shooting occurred. Gonzalez testified she took a course that Gonzales co-taught on how to respond to active shooters.

She went into the fourth grade building but not the hallway because “just the amount of police cars and things that I saw outside, I felt like if I was to have gone in there, I would have just taken up more space.”

Gonzalez said another officer told her to help keep parents and neighbors “at a safe distance.”

“Did that take a significant number of officers to do crowd control?” Turner asked.

“Yes, sir,” Gonzalez answered.

“And you joined in on that?” Turner asked.

“Yes, sir,” Gonzalez answered.

She testified in cross-exam that she heard Sgt. Coronado, not Gonzales, say shots fired, but she corrected herself in re-direct.

“And who was it that you heard say ‘shots fired’?” Turner asked.

“This time, Officer Adrian Gonzales,” Gonzalez answered.

“Not Coronado, but Adrian Gonzales?” Turner asked.

“Yes, sir, absolutely,” Gonzalez answered.

LaHood followed up in re-cross.

“So when I was asking that question, you were mistaken. I was right when I said it was Mr. Gonzales, right?” LaHood asked.

“Yes,” Gonzalez answered.

Myra Landry, a 911 communication supervisor at the Uvalde Police Department who testified about the dispatch, which handles calls for 17 agencies, and responding to a subpoena for all 911 and dispatch calls related to the shooting.

Cody Allen, a Texas ranger who testified about an animated map reconstruction of the school and everyone’s movements.

Allen provided specific measurements from the school, including a 46-yard walkway to the south door and a 66-yard distance from the patrol car to the south door.

Allen testified on Friday before Hill. Coronado testified all of Thursday.

LaHood will continue cross-examining Hill on Tuesday at 9 a.m. at the Nueces County Courthouse in Corpus Christie, Texas. That’s central time.

I’ll stream live on my YouTube channel (see below) and post full testimony videos and highlight clips on YouTube, TikTok, Instagram and Facebook.

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Trial is underway in Texas for a former school police officer accused of child endangerment over his slow response to a mass shooting at an elementary school that killed 19 children and two adults in 2022.

Prosecutors say Adrian Gonzales ignored his training when he didn’t try to stop the gunman, who was in a classroom for 77 minutes before rangers with the Texas Department of Publicity Safety shot and killed him.

Gonzales is charged with 29 counts of child endangerment or abandonment under Texas state law, one count for each child who was murdered and one for each who was injured but survived.

He is the second law enforcement officer in recent years to be prosecuted for his response to a deadly school shooting. In 2023, a jury in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, acquitted former Broward County Deputy Scot Peterson of all 11 charges, including child neglect, for his inaction when a gunman killed 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland in 2018.

Pete Arredondo, who was chief of the Uvalde, Texas, school district police department that employed Gonzales, is charged with 10 counts for the injured children and is awaiting trial.

Prosecutors have emphasized the bravery of teachers and other witnesses while trying to establish Gonzales’ knowledge of the gunman’s movements after he crashed his truck into a culvert near the school and fired shots at a pastor who tried to help him.

“We’re not asking Adrian Gonzales to commit suicide. He has been trained to go to the corner of a building and distract, delay and impede the gunman while help is arriving, but Adrian Gonzales does nothing more,” Prosecutor Bill Turner said in his Jan. 6 opening statement.

Turner told jurors that teacher Stephanie Hale heard the gunfire while on the playground on the south side of the school.

“She heard the fire and it didn’t make her incapable of action. She protected the kids. She got them to safety. They went into the classrooms. They did as they’ve been trained,” Turner said.

Hale testified last week, but Judge Sid Harle ordered jurors to disregard her testimony because prosecutors didn’t disclose her pre-trial statements about seeing a man with long clothes wearing black and holding a gun when she was outside.

She testified she saw “the dirt cloud up, kind of coming towards us.”

“And then as we were all running into the classroom, I saw the, I don’t know what to call him, horrible person, walking,” she said.

She paused and Turner said, “Just take your time. We can hold on.”

Hale paused again then continued, “walking towards the doors. He had black, all back, long hair and a gun.”

Defense lawyer Jason Goss pointed out in cross-examination that Hale didn’t say this during a recorded interview with an investigator four days after the massacre.

“If you had told the ranger at the time that your husband was the one that told you there was an active shooter, could your memory have just been different?” Goss asked.

“I guess maybe?” Hale answered.

Hale said she believes she told the ranger she saw clouds of dust on the schoolyard “because I remember telling my family what had happened that day.”

“Anybody who goes through a traumatic event remembers differently at different times,” Goss said. “You would agree, though, that that would be a significant fact?’

“Yes,” Hale answered.

Hale testified she told prosecutors about seeing the gunman and seeing a dirt cloud on the playground, and Goss turned to the judge.

“Alright, Your Honor…We have never gotten any notice from the prosecution. … That is clearly, clearly, clearly an inconsistent statement,” he said. “And so if she did report these things to the prosecution, we were entitled to that to prepare for this. And this is a trial by ambush.”

Christina Mitchell, the district attorney for Uvalde and Real counties, told Goss, “You know, you’re getting very nitpicky” and essentially said she was distracted while preparing witnesses.

“Let me tell you something. When we were practicing witnesses, I was running a law office, and so I was in and out of interviews,” Mitchell said. “So I can’t say that he said that, and I like, ‘Oh my God,’ you know? It wasn’t that type of reaction for me. So that’s the best I can say.”

Judge Harle canceled trial on Wednesday and held a hearing with the attorneys.

He declined to declare a mistrial but said he’d strike Hale’s testimony from the record and tell jurors to disregard it. Goss, however, said he wanted to try to “unring the bell” first by cross-examining Hale further, including playing for the jury the recording of her law enforcement interview.

Hale returned to the witness stand on Thursday for about an hour as Goss played her law enforcement interview and confirmed she didn’t say anything about seeing the gunman when she was on the playground.

Hale told the ranger that some students weren’t taking the threat seriously and thought it was “just another bailout,” referring to a undocumented immigrants jumping out of a vehicle together and causing nearby schools to lockdown. Hale told the ranger her husband texted her about an active shooter.

Hale testified she was “still in shock” when she spoke to the ranger. “You could hear it in my voice,” she said.

After Hale finished testifying, Goss asked Judge Harle to instruct the jury to disregard everything she said.

The failure to turn over ... that specific piece of critical evidence has put us into a disadvantage with this witness,” Goss said.

Turner, the retired district attorney in Texas’ Brazos County who was appointed to the Uvalde investigation, said the failure to disclose Hale’s statements about seeing the gunman wearing black were “improper.” But, Turner said, “It has all been cured through cross examination. He’s pointed out that she didn’t say it originally.”

The judge disagreed.

“I don’t think I have any choice having denied the mistrial, other than to craft a remedy that will protect the due process rights and hopefully avoid any appellate review that would result in this case being reversed,” Harle said.

Harle told Hale he was striking her testimony and she may hear about it from others, “but I want to emphasize to you, you did absolutely nothing wrong.”

The judge recalled his own traumatic experience when a drunken driver struck him and his wife and the judge was hospitalized for two months.

“Apparently, they almost lost me in the emergency room but revived me. And I remember that event very clearly, that truck coming at us and trying to get out of the way, but every time I think about it, it’s a little different, and that’s because of stress and trauma,” Harle said.

“So nothing about this is on you,” the judge continued. “We appreciate your bravery that day, and we appreciate your testimony and being brave enough to come in here, and you are excused with our thanks. Take care.”

Harle has been a judge for nearly 40 years. He’s serving his third term as presiding judge of the 4th Administrative Judicial Region in San Antonio after Texas Gov. Greg Abbott appointed him again in September 2025.

He previously was a judge in Texas’ 226th Judicial District Court in Bexar County, which includes San Antonio, for 30 years. He has a bachelor’s degree from the University of Texas at Austin, and he earned his juris doctor from St. Mary’s University School of Law.

My clip of the judge speaking to Hale has at least 2 million views across social media. You can find full testimony videos on my YouTube channel and Facebook page, and you can find short clips of big moments there and on TikTok and Instagram.

They other witnesses who testified last week were:

Gilbert Limones, a full-time pastor who works part-time at a funeral home across from the school. He saw the gunman, 18-year-old Salvador Rolando Ramos, crash his truck, and he called 911 and ran to help before realizing he was armed.

Limones grew emotional as he recalled seeing the gunman shoot at children.

“I just remember him going to the classrooms, and he started shooting in window by window until he got to the door,” Limones testified.

Limones called 911 again and was on the phone with a dispatcher when he “heard the shooting inside the classroom.” He testified he was “begging 911 to please get officers out there.”

After his second call to 911, he phoned his mother.

“I said, ‘Mom, please get into prayers, that someone’s shooting at the children here at the school,’” Limones said.

Jurors heard Limones’ 911 calls during his testimony on Jan. 6.

Jason Shannon, a ranger with the Texas Department of Public Safety who was among the first rangers to arrive at the school. He helped secure the crime scene and identify evidence, including spent shell casings and magazines.

Shannon photographed the gunman’s 2008 Ford F-150, which he testified contained 13 magazines, each holding 20-30 rounds, and live and spent .223 caliber casings from a semi-automatic weapon.

Jurors during Shannon's testimony saw several photos from inside and around the shooter's truck.

Justin Duck, a captain with the Texas Department of Public Safety, who processed the gunman’s truck for evidence the next morning. His team recovered a duffel bag with a rifle and six loaded magazines, as well as four spent casings.

Jose Hill, a Uvalde resident who lives near the school and about heard gunshots the day of the shooting that he first mistook for construction noise. He realized it was gunfire while in his bathroom, and he looked out his second-floor window and saw someone walking into the school. He took a short video on his phone, which was not shown during his testimony but will apparently be presented to jurors later in trial.

Emilia “Amy” Franco Marin, who was an afterschool program coordinator and testified about her harrowing fear as she hid under her desk after calling 911.

“The shots wouldn’t stop. They were just going round after round,” she testified.

“I thought, ‘He’s gonna kill me. He’s gonna kill me. He’s gonna kill me. I’m gonna die. I’m gonna die.’ ... I’m looking at the floor and I’m thinking, ‘I'll tackle him from his ankles and knock him down with my shoulder.’”

”And then I said, ‘Get up on the counter. When he comes in, jump him in the back, poke his eyes out, take the gun away from him.’”

”So you were anticipating how you would confront the shooter if you came into the room?” Martinez asked.

”Yes, ma’am,” Marin answered.

“The feeling of that type of fear is something that only someone can understand who'‘sbeen through a mass shooting. You won’t understand if you haven’t experienced it, and I don’t wish it on anybody,” Marin testified.

Lynn Deming, who hid in her classroom with her fourth grade students as the gunman shot children in class down the hall. She was hit with “a piece of shrapnel or debris or something” when the gunman fired through the window, and she testified on Thursday she worried she’d “put the kids in the worst place.”

“Because he was shooting through the window and the kids were directly across, and I thought I made the worst mistake I had ever made,” Deming testified.

She told her students to pray and repeatedly told them she loved them.

“I wanted to tell them it would be okay, but I wasn’t sure, and I just wanted the last thing they heard was that somebody loved them,” Deming testified. “I think I said it a million times.”

Deming transferred schools after the shooting so she could continue teaching the children who were with her that day. The district didn’t have a fifth grade teaching spot, so she took a sixth grade spot so she would teach them the next year.

“What is your opinion of those students that were there with you?” Mitchell asked.

“They are the strongest, bravest people on this earth, on this whole earth,” Deming answered.

“And why is that?” Mitchell asked.

“They were just so brave. They did everything perfect that day, and I just am so thankful I got to be a tiny part of their life,” Deming answered.

Nicole Ogburn, a special education teacher who testified she saw the gunman outside the school with “a backpack and a gun pointed towards the playground and pavilion area.” She urged children to hide and said she saw “two little boys that were actually sitting by the door, and I said, ‘No, get over here. Get over here.’”

Huy Nguyễn, an FBI agent in San Antonio who helped process shell casings and other evidence outside the school. Jurors saw many photos that were entered as evidence.

Cross-examination focused on the location of shell casings and projectiles and what they indicate about the location of the gunman.

Nguyen testified he didn’t find “any evidence of any shells being fired over here to the south of the building.”

Kevin Wright, a ranger with the Texas Department of Public Safety who testified about helping children get out of the building then gathering evidence from four or five classrooms over the next few days.

”My primary assignment was to identify where bullet defects were in the windows coming into the classrooms and try to trace as best as possible the flight path, the trajectory of bullets that came in.” Wright testified.

“There were many of them,” Wright said of the bullets. “Many of the bullets went through glass. Some of them had gone through the actual steel window frame. Once they perforated through the glass with a window frame, they came into the classroom and hit several other objects, whether it was desks, books, ceiling tiles, the wall on the opposite side of the room, just anything, anything in its path was, could and did get hit.”

Jurors saw photos from the bullet-riddled classrooms.

Wright’s cross-exam wasn’t as helpful as Nguyen’s for refuting testimony that the gunman was seen on the south side of the school. Wright testified that casings wouldn’t “necessarily” fall there.

“Again, there’s going to be variables on where the person was standing, how the weapon was held,” Wright testified.

“Even if they they weren't being shot at, it's reasonable they could have thought they were being shot at because of the echo?” Gonzales’ lawyer Nico LaHood asked.

“I guess that’s a possibility,” Wright answered.

Juan Torrez, who investigated four mass shootings in his career as a ranger with the Texas Department of Public Safety: Uvalde in 2022, the Southern Springs shooting in 2016, shootings in Odessa and at a Walmart in El Paso in 2019.

“So mass shootings have become part of law enforcement? Turner asked.

Torerz didn’t answer because Judge Harle sustained Goss’ objection to “any mention of any other shootings or anything like that.”

The photos that were entered as evidence during Torrez’s testimony did not include photos of the children, but they still were so graphic that Judge Harle warned the courtroom gallery before the testimony began.

“Ladies and gentlemen who are in the gallery, you know, we’re very sensitive to the nature of this case, the emotional nature, the tragic nature of it,” Harle said.

“I want to forewarn you, these photographs are going to be shocking and gruesome, and if anybody wants to step out, you are welcome to step out,” he continued. “But we cannot have any displays in front of the jury. So I’m forewarning you, these are not going to be pleasant to look at, and I’m sorry you’re going to have to look at them just like I had to. But if you want to step out, you are welcome to.”

Jurors have not seen autopsy photos of the children, but they might. Judge Harle before trial denied a defense motion in limine to exclude the photos as being more prejudicial than probative.

“I’ve seen a lot of autopsy photographs. These are horrendous, not so much by the nature of the injuries, but by virtue of the ages of the victims and the innocence of the victims,”the judge said.

Still, the judge said he believes “the probative does outweigh the prejudicial” but I am not admitting the photographs at this time.”

“There are several that I may sustain an objection to, and they will not go to the jury,” Harle said.

Prosecutors had not yet tried to admit any as evidence as of the end of court on Friday.

Gary Phillips, the deputy chief medical examiner in Bexar County who testified about the children’s gunshot wounds and causes of death.

Phillips did not conduct the autopsies, but he’s conducted more than 500 of his own since 2020, and he reviewed the autopsies in the Uvalde case so he could testify in trial.

He identified many injuries, such as gunshot wounds to the brain, lungs and spinal cord, and he discussed the presence of soot and powder tattooing, which indicate close-range firing.

His testimony was disturbing and horrifying, but we as a society cannot ignore or gloss over what happened to these children.

Judge Harle ordered the exhibits sealed from public view.

Brent Barina, a ranger lieutenant with the Texas Department of Public Safety who testified that by the time he was in classroom 111, only the gunman’s body remained. He also testified about the location of the children’s bodies, including a cluster “in the northwest corner of the room” that included one adult.

In cross, LaHood suggested “accidental discharge” could explain the location of some bullet casings.

“If somebody is intending to shoot this side of the building and they had poor trigger discipline and an evil intent to hurt people … they could get over anxious, and they could accidentally discharge up as they’re coming across,” LaHood said.

Jennifer Garcia, whose 9-year-old daughter Eliahna Amyah Garcia was murdered. She was the final witness on Friday and the first parent to testify.

She said Eliahna “wanted to come home” after the school’s awards ceremony, “but I told her no, to stay in school” because the parents had chipped in for the teacher to buy pizza for the students.

“So I told her no, that she didn’t need to come home, for her to stay at school, and that I would pick her up later,” Garcia testified.

She rushed to the school when she learned of the shooting, barefoot and holding her baby and “asking where my daughter was.

“We couldn’t find her. Kids were just running everywhere,” she said.

Goss had no questions in cross-exam and instead told her, “Ms. Garcia, I’m just, I’m so sorry for your loss. That’s terrible. And I just, I pray to God for His peace for you and your family.”

Goss took a similar approach in his cross of the medical examiner.

“I hate to see you here, but I do appreciate what you did to document what that monster did to those children,” Goss said.

The victims were:

• Uziyah Garcia, 10

• Eliahna Amyah Garcia, 9

• Xavier Lopez, 10

• Amerie Jo Garza, 10

• Jose Manuel Flores Jr., 10

• Alithia Ramirez, 10

• Annabell Guadalupe Rodriguez, 10

• Eliahna A. Torres, 10

• Jacklyn “Jackie” Cazares, 9

• Jayce Carmelo Luevanos, 10

• Jailah Nicole Silguero, 10

• Makenna Lee Elrod, 10

• Layla Salazar, 11

• Maranda Mathis, 11

• Nevaeh Bravo, 10

• Tess Marie Mata, 10

• Rojelio Torres, 10

• Maite Yuleana Rodriguez, 10

• Alexandria “Lexi” Aniyah Rubio, 10

• Eva Mireles, 44

• Irma Garcia, 48

Testimony continues Monday at the Nueces County Courthouse in Corpus Christie, where the trial was moved because of extensive pretrial publicty in Uvalde County.

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A murder-for-hire case against a prominent rap artist could begin in late April after a judge on Wednesday rejected a motion to dismiss the case or recuse the entire Los Angeles federal bench because death threats against the bail hearing judge weren’t disclosed to defense attorneys for several months.

“There is just absolutely no basis for this motion. Just none. Absolutely none,” U.S. District Judge Michael W. Fitzgerald said.

Durk “Lil Durk” Banks’ lawyers asked for an evidentiary hearing about their request for dismissal or for Fitzgerald to disqualify the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles from the prosecution as well as all judges in the Central District of California.

They also opposed three codefendants’ agreement with prosecutors to delay the trial from Jan. 21 to May 4, which Fitzgerald said was partly helped by his decision to schedule trial to begin either April 21 or April 28.

Their evidentiary hearing request was based on what they alleged was the “concealment” of four threatening voicemails U.S. Magistrate Judge Patricia Donahue received in February and one Assistant U.S. Attorney Ian Yanniello received in April.

Donahue’s name was publicly associated with Banks’ case because she denied Banks bail in December 2024. After the threats, she again denied Banks bail on May 8.

Prosecutors told Banks’ lawyers of the threats on Oct. 1 when discussing pre-trial motions, and they cited them in a request for an anonymous jury.

The lead FBI agent in the murder-for-hire investigation investigated the threats, and the U.S. Marshals Service contacted Donahue’s chambers and the prosecutors’ office.

Banks’ lawyer Drew Findling of Atlanta said in court Wednesday that on his team, “nobody has heard of a case where there was apparently a death threat to a sitting judge and the government does not turn around and tell counsel, you should know before this goes forward that this took place.”

Findling questioned whether prosecutors believed the threats would help ensure Donahue didn’t grant Banks bail during the second hearing.

“That lingering question will haunt this case like the proverbial Sword of Damocles unless we have that evidentiary hearing,” said Findling, who represents Banks with his law partner Marissa Goldberg, as well as Jonathan Brayman of Breen & Pugh in Chicago and Christy O’Connor, a solo practitioner in Los Angeles.

Yanneillo called the motion “stunning in respect to its factual inaccuracy” and “stunning in the extraordinary relief it seeks.”

“Any claim that the government tactically withheld this information is false,” Yanneillo said. “There was no conversation about whether to produce or not produce this information before we all decided it became relevant.”

Yanniello said “anybody who’s worked for a judge” or in public service knows “these things happen far too often.” The idea that somebody “would be impartial based on an anonymous call” is wrong, he said.

Findling’s motion says prosecutors had “ex parte communications” with judges about the threats when the marshals were the ones who actually discussed the threats with them.

“It’s a fantastical statement, and it just infects their entire motion, and it’s categorically wrong, and they haven’t retracted it,” Yanniello said.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Daniel H. Weiner said prosecutors didn’t cite the threats in their request for an anonymous jury because they believe they’re credible; they cited them because they demonstrated “that the publicity in this case has already garnered outside spectators who attempt to influence the proceeding.”

“That’s why they became relevant. They were not relevant before that, and the government stands by that analysis,” Weiner said.

Weiner said the defense is basically saying they “didn’t have the opportunity to file a frivolous recusal motion in May that, as this court recognized, would have been rejected out of hand by Judge Donahue.”

O’Connor began her argument by acknowledging “the tone of Mr. Weiner’s argument” then telling Judge Fitzgerald, “I understand that this motion is upsetting to the government.”

“The allegations and the questions that we raise, I think, are properly submitted,” she said.

But Judge Fitzgerald agreed the motion had no merit and said, “There has been zero prejudice whatsoever.”

“It cannot possibly have affected Judge Donahue or me or any other judge that some hothead who has an interest in the music industry did something stupid,” he said.

The judge said threats are “regrettably something that happens” and no one suggested Banks had anything to do with the voicemails to Donahue or Yanneillo.

“It’s seldom that I have such a different view of a request, which clearly the defense cares very much about and takes very seriously,” said Fitzgerald, a 2012 Barack Obama appointee.

He said an evidentiary hearing “would inevitably result in a probing of work product” regarding prosecutors, and “legally, there’s nothing that has happened here which could possibly” justify a hearing.

The threats were “none of your business … until the government decided that it wanted to have used them for a purpose in court.”

“You think it would have been more professional to have received notice of this. Whether or not that’s true, that is simply not a basis to recuse anyone,” Fitzgerald.

Fitzgerald has not yet ruled on prosecutors’ request to impanel a jury anonymously, but he said he’ll likely allow the identities of the jurors to be known only to attorneys.

Charges stem from fatal LA shooting in 2022

Banks — who’s 33, based in Chicago and won a Grammy in 2024 for his song “All My Life” — has been in jail since October 2024, accused of offering a bounty for the murder of rapper Tyquian Terrel “Quando Rondo” Bowman after Bowman’s associate shot and killed Banks friend at an Atlanta nightclub on Nov. 6, 2020.

The indictment alleges Banks and codefendants Kavon London Grant, Keith Jones, Deandre Dontrell Wilson, Asa “Boogie” Houston and David Brian Lindsey traveled from Chicago to Los Angeles in August 2022.

Jones and Grant were not in court on Wednesday and have not joined in the pre-trial motions like the other defendants.

According to the indictment, Houston was driving an Infiniti with Jones, Lindsey and an unnamed coconspirator inside when Jones, Lindsey and the other man jumped out with guns and opened fire on Bowman’s black Escalade at a gas station on Beverly Boulevard.

The gunfire killed Bowman’s cousin Saviay’a Robinson.

The indictment includes surveillance images of the pursuit and shooting:

In the Jan. 5 stipulation to continue the trial, prosecutors acknowledged the case’s complexity.

“Due to the nature of the prosecution and the number of defendants, including the charges in the indictment and the voluminous discovery, this case is so unusual and so complex that it is unreasonable to expect adequate preparation for pretrial proceedings or for the trial itself within the Speedy Trial Act time limits,” they wrote.

Prosecutors won’t use murder for hire as crime of violence

Banks and his codefendants are charged with one count of conspiracy, one count of use of interstate facilities to commit murder-for-hire resulting in death, and one count of using, carrying, and discharging firearms and a machine gun and possession of such firearms in furtherance of a crime of violence resulting in death.

Judge Fitzgerald is considering a motion to dismiss the fourth count that argues the two crimes prosecutors used as predicates — murder for hire and stalking — aren’t crimes of violence under federal law. Prosecutors in response said they would no longer use murder for hire as a basis for the charge but said the charge still was supported by the stalking statute regarding “fear of death or serious injury.”

The 5th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruled on Dec. 10 that cyberstalking resulting in death is not a crime of violence under federal law when it is based on inflicting emotional distress.

The ruling reversed a Northern District of Texas ruling and noted that jurors were not instructed to indicate which element they found — emotional distress versus reasonable fear of death/injury - when they decided the charge. Prosecutors had cited the case when opposing dismissal, and defense lawyers argued the 5th Circuit ruling supports their dismissal request.

But the 5th Circuit didn’t address whether the fear of death or injury offense qualifies as a crime of violence, and prosecutors argued Judge Fitzgerald still can find that it is.

The judge said Wednesday that the 5th Circuit, which is based in Texas, “has regrettably chosen not to answer the question that would have most definitively been helpful.”

Defense argues indictment is too vague

Banks’ lawyers also asked Judge Fitzgerald to dismiss the indictment for vagueness or to order prosecutors to issue a “bill of particulars” that better details the allegations.

The judge during a Nov. 18 hearing “encouraged the government to just provide anything it had and be as specific as possible” to try to moot the motion. Yanneillo said Wednesday the defense’s requests essentially amount to “a draft of what the government’s closing argument would be.”

“We are not required to provide that,” he said.

Fitzgerald told prosecutors to “respond in writing” by the Feb. 9 hearing and he’ll consider the motion then.

Wilson also has a pending motion to sever his trial from his codefendants. His lawyer, Craig Harbaugh, filed it under seal. The judge said he may consider that motion on Feb. 9, too.

Also pending is a sealed motion from Banks’ lawyers to exclude proposed evidence prosecutors want to use under Rule 404(b) of the Federal Rules of Evidence. Wilson has joined in the motion.

Harbaugh said Wednesday that prosecutors have identified four songs by Wilson they want to use as evidence, which he’ll oppose in another motion.

Hearing set on Banks’ solitary confinement

Judge Fitzgerald also scheduled a status conference for Feb. 9 regarding Banks’ incarceration in Los Angeles Metropolitan Detention Center’s Segregated Housing Unit, where he’s been held in solitary confinement since Aug. 29 because of “an allegation that he was in possession of an unauthorized Apple Watch.”

His lawyers said in a Jan. 7 filing they’ve “received conflicting explanations for his extended SHU detention without process.”

“For example, in October, an attorney for MDC told us that Mr. Banks’ high-profile/celebrity status is not the cause of his SHU detention. Then on December 22, the Warden represented to us that ‘[Mr. Banks’] presence in the general population poses a threat to the security and orderly running of the institution due to the high profile nature of Mr. Banks’ pending criminal case and possible violation of BOP’s disciplinary program,’” they wrote.

O’Connor said in court that Banks is alone in his cell 24 hours a day” and gets “a little bit of yard time Monday through Wednesday.”

“And so you can understand what that does to a person,” she said.

She visits him to discuss the case and “also just to keep him well to the extent I can.”

“And at times, I felt that we’re in some kind of dystopian alternate system where people don’t have rights, where people don’t have process. You have speedy trial rights when it comes to trial. But the spirit of that is really not being honored in this circumstance,” O’Connor said.

Another inmate found with an Apple Watch the same time as Banks “has been back in general population since October.”

“I’ve been doing this for 20 years. I’ve never seen somebody confined to the SHU as punishment for longer than 90 days,” O’Connor said.

Fitzgerald said he can’t “tell the warden how to run the Metropolitan Detention Center” but said because Banks is in the custody of the U.S. Marshals Service, he has some authority, so he’ll discuss the issue more at the Feb. 9 status conference. He said he can contact the Bureau of Prisons’ regional counsel to determine “exactly what the concerns are … and we can figure out what’s going on here.”

Banks’ status conference on Feb. 9 is scheduled for 10:30 a.m. The other hearing is at 1:30 p.m.

Court documents:

Jan. 6 request for status hearing on Banks’ solitary confinement

count four:

Jan. 5 reply to supplment

Dec. 16 supplement

Nov. 10 reply in support

Oct. 27 opposition

Oct. 6 motion to dismiss

death threats

Dec. 22 reply in support

Dec. 8 opposition

Nov. 13 declaration

Nov. 13 motion to disqualify

vagueness

Nov. 10 reply in support

Oct. 27 opposition

Oct. 6 motion to dismiss

charges

May 1, 2025: 2nd superseding indictment

Oct. 17, 2024 1st indictment

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