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To print article, click Print on your browser's File menu. Go back Posted 2/19/2004 |
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The Martha Chronicles Agonizing pressure on the jury -- to stay awake For every giant flow chart of cell-phone calls that gets the heart racing, there are hours and hours (and hours) of phone logs. Do you think a jury can die of boredom? By M.P. Dunleavey Columnist M.P. Dunleavey is filing periodic reports from the New York trial of multimillionaire businesswoman and style icon Martha Stewart, who is charged along with her former broker, Peter Bacanovic, with obstructing an investigation into her sale of ImClone Systems 02/19/2004 09:46:00 AM ET Send in the clowns. . . . Please. After nearly a month of deliberations, I hereby find the Martha Stewart trial GUILTY of the following charges:
Of course, she said politely for my sake. Im sure its way more interesting when youre actually in court. Er, no. Unlike the O.J. Simpson trial, which served up a daily diet of Courtroom Theater for months and turned trials of the rich and famous into a spectator sport, there's no white Bronco, no bloody glove, no blood at all, in fact. This trial is as bloodless as the prosecutor's allegations: that Martha Stewart and Peter Bacanovic conspired to sell her ImClone shares on Dec. 27, 2001, and then lied about it to investigators.
Tuesdays harrowingly dull testimony by FBI Special Agent Michael Ryan about phone records marked a conspicuous low point in the trial. And Wednesday wasnt much better. They'll need to perform CPR on the jury when it's time for them to deliberate. Flashback to tedious Tuesday While prosecutors engaged in hand-to-hand combat (if only!) on Tuesday with defense lawyers and U.S. District Court Judge Miriam Goldman Cedarbaum about which phone logs would be allowed as evidence, the courtroom seethed with covert acts of rebellion. More Martha Stewart news and commentary on MSN Money
One reporter perused a travel guidebook. Another spread her personal calendar across her lap. Even prosecutor Michael Schacters young son, who sat in the pews with his mother, quickly lost interest in the proceedings and moved on to sucking his thumb and coloring. Several adults watched him enviously when he took his moms hand and left. Snack time. Prosecutors did try to jazz up Tuesdays proceedings. They pitched a big, colorful tent and brought out some clowns. Sorry. Onto the huge courtroom screen, prosecutors projected a big, blue flow chart -- with columns and arrows and little telephone and fax icons -- showing the sequence of phone calls between Merrill Lynch, Peter Bacanovic, Douglas Faneuil, members of the Waksal family and Martha Stewart, on Dec. 27, 2001. It's showtime! I perked up a little, and so did the jury. Compared with some of the fine print wed been reading, these were special effects worthy of "Star Wars." There was nothing new, per se, on the flow chart, which tracked calls between the aforementioned parties starting at 8 a.m. that fateful morning. But it was fascinating to see them all lined up, one after the other, starting with a flurry of calls from the Waksal family to Bacanovics cell phone and Faneuils extensions at Merrill Lynch. (Bacanovic was on vacation in Florida.) But even if you were from Mars and you had never heard of Martha Stewart, ImClone or her alleged partner in crime, Peter Bacanovic, it was apparent something hot was happening. And smack dab in the middle of the Waksals' selling frenzy, which is public record now, are the calls from Martha Stewart. The prosecution suffers a blow I wonder how that struck jurors. Its true that in point of legal fact prosecutors lost ground on Tuesday, when Judge Cedarbaum ruled that they while they could document the occurrence of certain calls, they could not speculate on what was said. Naturally, prosecutors wanted to help the jury leap to a few conclusions: i.e., if there was a call from one of Martha Stewarts lines to one of Peter Bacanovics that they were probably conspiring about ImClone. The judge stonewalled that during a prolonged debate with lead prosecutor Karen Seymour. You may not argue that because there was a phone call on X day that the phone call was about X, Cedarbaum stated. Firmly. Later, Cedarbaum also ruled that a particular call at 7:09 a.m. on Feb. 4 -- from Bacanovics cell to Stewarts cell -- on the very morning she was going to be interviewed by investigators was also not admissible as evidence. I think they call it making a motion, but it sounded like begging to me when Seymour kept pressing the judge to accept this call because of how suspiciously early it was made. That is speculation, the judge said dismissively. I totally agree with Seymour, the timing is suspicious. But I see the judges point. What if Bacanovic was just calling to wish her luck before her meeting with the feds? Can a jury die of boredom? The torment continued Wednesday as a former top lawyer for Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia It wasnt that Gregory Blatt was so dull (those phone logs took the cake). But the way testimony unfolds in the hands of lawyers spouting legalese makes it a chore to decipher. As usual, I tried to put myself in the shoes of Average Jill Juror and take in what is supposedly Very Significant Testimony. The main point during direct testimony was that Blatt identified an e-mail from one of Stewarts lawyers on Jan. 22, 2002, which indicated that Stewart would be consulting with known white-collar crime attorney John Savarese. Was that damning? Or simply a wise precaution? As a juror, I could see it either way. Morvillo to the rescue I eagerly waited for cross-examination, because you know I love Robert Morvillo, Stewart's defense attorney, but even that was a disappointment. Morvillo referred to a series of exhibits -- about three dozen copies of newspaper clippings from when the scandal first hit the fan in June 2002. He had Blatt read out loud from just a few, in each case pointing out that as the scandal gained steam in early June, Stewart did not release a statement in her own defense for many days -- even though Blatt was practically having a cow, calling repeatedly to urge the company to do so. (They stopped returning my calls, he admitted at one point, to general laughter.) So, OK. Morvillo made a fairly good case for the fact that Stewart couldnt have been trying that hard to protect her stock price (which was dropping, Blatt said), or shore up her companys performance, right? Maybe. More than anything else, the prosecutions case will live or die based not on the facts, but on the perceptions of a jury that is under considerable pressure to make accurate deductions from a long (and boring) trail of evidence -- without the benefit of watching TV, reading my edifying column, or even talking to each other (all of which are totally forbidden). Judge Cedarbaum would no doubt rule that I am speculating. But we have several weeks left before we know for sure. |
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