I cannot imagine LK successfully suing MB at this point. Civil trials are even more wide ranging than court trials and more reliant on the characters of the partipsnts. The kinds of things LK has already admitted to doing would certainly count against her.
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This is what the summation does at the end of the trial. It is my understanding Ed Bilinkas is a true master at tieing his case all together in a neat little bow for the jury to remember as they retire to the jury room. When he was a prosecutor in NJ he was very well known for spellbinding summation.
The prosecution has very little to put forth in a summation in my mind - no physical evidence to speak of, totally unreliable and contradictory testimony by the two “key” witnesses and that’s about it unless he is going to drop all this surprise evidence LK kept posting about when he closes on Monday.
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Plus the conspiracy/planning texts between JK, LK and RG will be wide open for the jury to hear. They won’t have a favorable judge objecting every few sentences for sidebars to discuss whether evidence of pre-planning the destruction of the defendant is allowable! Planning that apparently began many months before August 7, 2019.
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Civil trials can be either with or without a jury. The juries are smaller. By me you have to pay $70 to get a jury trial for a civil matter.
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It sounded like the prosecutor did not have much left in his pocket, considering that they originally expected to wrap up by Friday afternoon. But we shall see.
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We still haven’t heard from the state’s psychologist. I think that is the last thing pending from them.
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I don’t think they planned on needing 1 1/2 full days for cross on LK.
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I think this link was already posted, but I will post it again in case anyone missed it. It’s the longest discussion so far on Court TV about the witnesses and the impressions they made on the Court TV people. If you scroll down the page, the other videos about the case appear in reverse chronological order mixed in with some videos from other cases. I believe the date on the first one is 3/39/22, which is either a typo or a date I’ve never heard of in my life. Lol.
It’s kind of interesting to watch them in chronological order. In the first few videos, the legal talking heads seemed very skeptical about the case, and they seemed to think it was completely ridiculous and one-sided. Then as the week went on and they got a load of some of the witness testimony, it seemed like they started to change their tune quite a bit. Gee, I wonder why? 
I haven’t found the comparable Law and Crime video clips yet. I would be interested to see if they had a similar reaction throughout the week.
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I watched a court show the other day where the stenographer read back a lengthy stretch of testimony. it reminded me again how much is lost in 'translation (Re My Cousin Vinny) as she had such a pleasant tone as if she was reading a bedtime story to her kids.
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I feel like after this case is over, we should organize a big My Cousin Vinny watch party online so we can appreciate all the legal details so much more.
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Double feature: Pacific Heights and My Cousin Vinny
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LOL see I told y’all that’s the movie to watch. It even helped me when I studied for my clerk test - a test so bound up in legaleeze that we studied 18 months and took at least 1 course each for 6 months 2x week. For the last 6 months I was studying 5 hours a day.
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I don’t think I’ve ever seen Pacific Heights. Is it a scary one? I generally don’t watch scary movies.
If I want to be scared, I watch the news.
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I did notice on Thursday when RG first came in for direct testimony that he physically seemed to acknowledge someone in the gallery - the first of the witnesses to do so while being shown on camera - plus he had glasses in his hand that apparently he forgot on Friday.
It’s at about 0:56 on this:
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It about a couple that take on a tenant . He doesn’t pay, and then when they try to evict he begins manipulating the system and terrorizing them to steal their identities. At some point he shoots the husband and plants a crowbar on him to justify the shooting. All kinds of crazy stuff…
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Oh, I am definitely not watching that one! Lol.
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That’s deliberate. The idea is that reading back the testimony without the tone and gestures of the original keeps the jury focusing on what was said instead of who said it and their tone, etc - implying things that may not be there.
That is why transcripts are never just sent to the jury room - it is a read back or playback in open court, a one-time deal to refresh memory as to what was testified, about a specific subject. That’s so the jury can’t focus on solely a few things they have access to and disregard the rest.
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Sounds like a familiar story.
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Having worked Landlord Tenant I knew of tenants who would present as fine people. He drove a BMW and wore a Rolex. They had a kid and he would act all well off and suave bolla.
They’d get into an apartment and immediately stop paying the rent. They knew it would take time for the courts to evict them so they’d play that game. When they’d finally have to leave they’d trash the place. Like break everything, draw on the walls, clog the pipes, destroy the fridge and oven. This happened with at least 4 landlords that I know of.
The female of the couple had actually been on America’s Most Wanted for parental abduction as a non custodial parent.
One day this nice man came in to do a records check for people who had applied to be new tenants. I took one look at the name and pulled up their records myself. They didn’t get it.
One day I’m going to the bakery in my town and I see him talking like he’s the big cheese to a group of men. So I interrupted him and said “Hey I haven’t seen you around the courthouse for a few weeks. I’m glad you were able to settle all your cases.” And I walked away.
He no longer rents in our area.
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The more I watch, the more I’m starting to think MB might get a not guilty verdict. And it’s not so much that I think the defense is doing a seamless job, but after watching some of the alleged victim’ testimony, I’m starting to increasingly consider that it could have been self defense.
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