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headed back to court for day two of jacob goodwin’s trial. yesterday’s notes start here:
i believe we’re starting this morning with elmer’s cross examination of deandre harris. i expect this to be long & ugly. see you at the next recess.
breaking for lunch now. defense atty elmer woodard cross examined the victim, deandre harris, for two hours. we’ve heard from an ER nurse and sheriff brown. prosecution has two more witnesses, one they say will be brief and one much longer.
i reckon @ianshapira believes me now — i warned him last night that elmer wouldn’t make this brief.
elmer is very fixated on the idea that DH exaggerated his injuries somehow, repeatedly citing the list of injuries he included on his gofundme. at one point he showed DH a zoomed in picture from immediately after the assault in an effort to prove he didn’t have a skinned knee.
buddy, abrasions on his knees aren’t the issue here. your client isn’t charged with giving him some scrapes. he’s charged with felony malicious wounding for delivering the kicks the jury can see on the video.
deandre held up incredibly under two hours of badgering from this aggressive old fool. he’s strong. it’s clear that being forced to watch his own assault again & again & again is distressing. at one point they played a 3 second clip of him being struck on loop for about a minute.
elmer also accused deandre of running into the parking garage TOWARD another fight going on, with a man he calls “teal shirt.” (guess why)
e: “you’re running toward that fight with teal shirt.”
dh: “what are you implying?”
e: “you’re not running into the garage to fight?”
dh: “i’m running away.”
“i’d already been hit. i’m just trying to get away.”
dh: “what are you implying?”
e: “you’re not running into the garage to fight?”
dh: “i’m running away.”
“i’d already been hit. i’m just trying to get away.”
surely you’ve all seen the video. he struggles, repeatedly, to get to his feet, to get his balance, to escape the growing number of attackers. at least two members of the jury looked ill watching it. over. and over. and over again.
elmer is doing his client no favors by forcing the jury to watch the violence frame by frame, by harassing an obviously traumatized victim. does he not see their faces? does he realize he’s shooting himself in the foot?
heading back in. prosecution has two more witnesses (not sure who, but i assume detective hickey will be one). i hear the defense will be calling goodwin himself & apparently tyler davis, as well. perhaps others.
saw TWP member johan carollo flash this klan hand symbol at jacob goodwin. cute. 
brief recess. sitting on the courthouse steps, listening to johan loudly say into his phone, “secret klan hand signal? what a joke. communists are so fucking stupid,” as he walked right by me. hi, johan.
the commonwealth rested at 2:20. he judge then heard (and denied) elmer’s motion to strike for 40 minutes.
right when we came back from break, i overheard that they were releasing tyler davis from his subpoena. he will not be testifying this afternoon.
right when we came back from break, i overheard that they were releasing tyler davis from his subpoena. he will not be testifying this afternoon.
i’m not sure how many witnesses the defense plans to call... with davis released, it may just be the defendant. most of the witnesses to the event were participants. god willing this is brief. going just off the faces of the jurors, i’m not sure deliberation will be lengthy.
quick recess after elmer’s questioning of goodwin. we’ll have commonwealth’s cross examination next. elmer says he has no additional witnesses.
i expect the jury instructions to hinge on: concert of action & in the absence of concert of action, whether goodwin’s actions alone meet the threshold for malicious wounding.
the jury is not sympathetic to goodwin or elmer. it’s plain in their faces. but complicated jury instructions could cause them to take a bit longer to reach a verdict.
heading back in for prosecution’s cross of the defendant. then closing & jury instructions. then, god willing, speedy deliberations.
jury’s been sent out to deliberate.
elmer’s closing statement was thirty two minutes long. in that thirty two minutes, he managed to completely & fully alienate the jury.
elmer: “they want to convict this man because he’s a white man and deandre is a black man.”
this is the first time race was mentioned in the trial. it was not well received. antony objected & the judge agreed — “i think this is improper.”
this is the first time race was mentioned in the trial. it was not well received. antony objected & the judge agreed — “i think this is improper.”
the jury has found jacob goodwin guilty of malicious wounding. they have returned to the jury room to deliberate on their sentencing advisement. the sentence is 5-20 years.
they only deliberated on the verdict for an hour and twenty minutes. i don’t expect this to take much longer.
i suspect some of the jurors are pushing hard for the maximum sentence... it’s been about an hour already. i know i haven’t missed it, though — antony & platania are out here getting some air, too.
they do realize they’re only issuing a recommendation, right? the actual sentencing hearing will be later.
heading back in now...
heading back in now...
false alarm! still waiting! an entrepreneurial food truck owner could do a brisk business outside the charlottesville courthouse some nights this summer.
jury recommended ten years & therapeutic services, including “empathy training.”
the court will take their recommendation into consideration at the sentencing hearing on august 23rd.
i’m going home. happy may day.
the court will take their recommendation into consideration at the sentencing hearing on august 23rd.
i’m going home. happy may day.
