Blackwell's Own Goal -

Trayvon Martin Shooting;
George Zimmerman Accused . . .

The leitmotif of Friday afternoon's court session was the state's Star Witness #8. I followed the live-streamed proceedings on my laptop, but the quality of the audio I received was rather poor.

The Defense Team fielded two principal motions. The first motion was an effort to depose Benjamin Crump who was being represented by Bruce Blackwell. The second motion was an effort to get the addresses of Witness #8 and several other witnesses as well.

Benjamin Crump's role in this matter is highly ambiguous. I would describe his role as that of a deus ex machina because it was he who inserted Witness #8 into this case. If it weren't for Benjamin Crump, there would be no DeeDee. Her entry into this case was critically contingent upon Benjamin Crump producing the largely unintelligible tape recording of her alleged ear witness of the incident. The problem with this is that deus ex machina is not a legally-defined role.

Bruce Blackwell argued that his client Benjamin Crump should be immune, exempt, and insulated from deposition. And, according to my best understanding, Blackwell, at one point, argued that Crump's role was that of a Qui Tam, which I did not find credible at all. From where I sit, Crump's role appears to be, at best, that of a friend of the court or amicus curiae. It is what it is and quite simply just that.

As far as Don West's questions about the provenance of Witness #8 which can impact upon DeeDee's authenticity and veracity, Blackwell seemed to argue that such discourse would be privileged "work product." Thus, as a direct result of Blackwell's argument, DeeDee herself now appears to have been the "work product" of Benjamin Crump who may have entirely manufactured her.

Blackwell bloviated to such a degree about this that I believe he scored an "own goal" with it. In using this "work product" concept, Blackwell seemed to have completely rubbished DeeDee's credibility altogether. At this point, Tinker Bell might be more credible.

One is obliged to wonder why Blackwell was trying so hard to shield Crump from scrutiny concerning the provenance of Witness #8 - the obvious probability would be: because Crump suborned this witness. I hope that's not true.

I agree that DeeDee's identity should be protected and I expect her to testify in court in silhouette behind a screen. It's my impression that she speaks only an African American subculture patois, a dialect which is so distinctly different from mainstream American English so as to be incomprehensible to 300 million other Americans. Thus, DeeDee is entitled to be furnished with a court-appointed interpreter.

I agree that her address should be shielded from the Media and the random Public, but it is my understanding that the law clearly affords Defense access to it.

In the end, Judge Nelson ruled that Defense may not depose Benjamin Crump because he has nothing relevant to contribute. I think he does have relevant information about the provenance of this magic rabbit he pulled out of his hat which directly impacts upon the authenticity and veracity of Witness #8, but I won't miss his deposition, since Blackwell has already all but destroyed her credibility anyway.

This case has suffered mightily in the Public's understanding from shoddy reportage which mostly looked like the product of some exotic Institute of Propaganda. Even a year later, some reporters still haven't accurately nailed down the basic "W" issues.

Thus, I was happy to see that TV Station WKMG in Orlando commissioned a competent person to write a summary of this hearing which is distinguished by the absence of such batsh*t crazy nonsense. Kudos to this organization! I can only hope that other news organization will now follow suit. It's about time; don't you think?!

:: WKMG Summary of Hearing ::

:: TalkLeft Discussion of Hearing ::

...

Hole In The Wall Furor -

A Banksy mural called Bunting Boy which was hacked off a wall in north London is being put up for auction in Miami with a guide price of $500,000 to $700,000, much to the consternation of local residents across The Pond.

:: Guardian :: - - ::WSVN ::

:: BBC :: - - :: Haringey ::

...

SoFlo Using Social Media -

The Miami Herald is changing
its internet commenting system . . .

"Readers who want to comment on stories will be required to log in using a Facebook account... The cloak of anonymity stifles respectful debate. We believe this change will encourage conversation - but in a safer, civilized space."

Social Media is a safe place?

A South Florida man used Facebook to recruit a local 16-year-old girl to "join da team" and work for him in the flesh industry, telling her she could make as much as $3,500 a week for selling her services, according to court records.

Meanwhile, WPTV is reporting that Facebook may be working on an app that tracks users' locations, but James Ball is not convinced this concept is so nifty.

...

Weekend Browsing -

Famous Literary Agent Sterling Lord has published his memoirs at the age of 92 in paperback and e-book formats, Carolyn Kellogg reports.

# Rage is Back is a novel by Adam Mansbach about NYC's Graffiti Subculture; reviewed here by Geeta Dayal. An interview with the author by Jonathan Donaldson.

# Adam Woog reviews a clutch
of new Nordic noir mystery novels.

# Nicolas Lezard reviews
 Forever Rumpole by John Mortimer.

# An unusual graphic novel about
architecture, Batman: Death by Design.

# Letter from the Jaipur Lit Fest from JD Daniels.

# Jake Kerridge picks some new detective novels.

# Geoffrey Wansell reviews
a trio of crime fiction novels.

# The Uninvited by Liz Jensen
reviewed here by Anna Mundrow.

...

Six Degrees of Ambiguity -

IMO: Trayvon Martin, A Death By Misadventure vs
George Zimmerman, Accused 2nd Degree Murder . . .

A seemingly voluble old-fashioned Southern country lawyer put in a dramatically late appearance during the Tuesday morning proceedings which could have been straight out of Perry Mason. He had the entire courtroom riveted on him when he introduced himself as Mr Blackwell, according to my notes, and announced that he was there to represent Bernard Crump, lawyer for the birth parents of the decedent.

With a collegial nod to Mark O'Mara, he apologized for being late, explaining that his client, Mr Crump, was based at a distance in Tallahassee. Mr Blackwell wanted to submit an affidavit on behalf of his client whereupon a back-and-forth erupted about the use of the affidavit and/or the deposing of Mr Crump. Don West for the Defense argued that since he hadn't had an opportunity to look at the 15 page affidavit, it would be premature to decide about a deposition; however, Don West also introduced a point of law about this matter.

Does Mr Crump's affidavit satisfy all our questions about Witness #8? No, it didn't answer all my questions. I still feel unclear about how many DeeDees there may be; whether the DeeDee interviewed by Mr Crump and the DeeDee recorded by Matt Gutman are one and the same; whether any of the DeeDees is substantially as Mr Crump depicted her; and whether this conversation actually took place at all.

Already a possible discrepancy has arisen in discussions about this case; viz: Mr Crump claimed DeeDee was a juvenile of tender age and a legal minor, but an alternate source of information claims she was not a minor and that she was already 18 years old or more.

Witness #8 aka DeeDee appeared in this case like the quintessential legerdemain white rabbit from out of the cloak of Benjamin Crump Esq, but since then has been mostly just magic with scant documentation.

If the State cannot nail down a palpable one-and-only DeeDee, I expect that failure would significantly erode the credibility and efficacity of its case against George Zimmerman.

Further to Defense's crucial question: what were the circumstances of the State's first contact with Witness #8?  Someone - I believe it was Bernie de la Rionda - mentioned that it was Martin Spoffard who was the State's first contact with Witness #8. Thus, observers were left to assume that Don West will have to locate this individual on his own and depose Spoffard himself for further information.

Undoubtedly, Mr Blackwell's belated entry with sizzling affidavit in hand was the highlight of the hearing, although there had been some chatter on the Internet which predicted that Mr Crump would be represented by a spectacular
Jackie Chiles.

Judge Nelson refused Defense's effort to delay the trial, and I formed the impression that she wants to wrap up this trial as speedily as possible.

From the Stuff Happens Dept: my Internet connection was disrupted due to some mysterious red tape snafu; sorry for the delay in posting this entry. I watched the proceedings streamed over Click Orlando, although I arrived a bit late.

TalkLeft has a recap of the legalities covered in the foregoing session and a link to a copy of the aforementioned affidavit.

The next hearing may be on March 5th.

...

Poking The Peacock -

NBC News Chief Steve Capus is stepping down from that position and will be leaving the organization altogether in the near future.

NBC is the target of a lawsuit by George Zimmerman's Defense for maliciously manipulating a tape recording in order to give viewers the false impression that Zimmerman is a racist who shot Trayvon Martin because the juvenile was Black.

Speaking of Zimmerman, a hearing will be held on this coming Tuesday, February 5th, before the judge.

Also of interest to those following the case, Defense has filed a Motion for Specific Discovery.

...

News Notes From Florida -

All they ever found of Lorraine Hatzakorzian's remains was her head. No one knows what happened to the rest of her. But the authorities did discover who was driving her blue Dodge pickup truck.

# George Zimmerman's lawyer has released what the defense says is a new picture of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin on Wednesday. Mark O'Mara has filed for a continuance, asking for more time to prepare the case, as it has been a protracted struggle to get prosecutors, who seem to be dragging their feet in slow motion, to turn over evidence.

# An elderly Canadian snowbird couple were found slain inside their Hallandale Beach condo earlier this past month. David Pichosky, 71, and Rochelle Wise, 66, from Toronto were the victims of a double homicide, but the police have not disclosed much information about the circumstances, which has left the couple's neighbors feeling very uneasy.

...

Brief Browse -

Fans of Miami's Wacky Factor . . .

will be delighted to learn that Dave Barry has a new novel making its debut called Insane City. And NPR has posted a recent interview with him.

# Laura Wilson briefly reviews a clutch of crime fiction picks, including The Man from Primrose Lane by James Renner.

# The Future of Davos:
Is a Hipper World Forum On Its Way?

# Man Booker Prize Finalists announced.

# Jaipur Literature Festival

...

Chasing Media Phantoms -

"Trust your mother, but cut the cards,"
as the late Sidney Zion used to say . . .

The story about the football player's girlfriend who turned out to be a hoax, which the Mainstream Media went along with, is a cruel story, but not more cruel than the MSM's shoddy reportage of the Trayvon Martin shooting.

"The tissue of lies in the Notre Dame star’s personal life would have been easy to unravel, but few tried. How the mainstream press fell for the story of an imaginary tragedy."

# How does a five-month-old baby go missing for 15 months and no one look for him? the High Priests at The Miami Herald cogitate. Yeah, that's a real thumb-sucker.

A five-month-old child named Dontrell has gone missing for 15 months. What went wrong here? Well, we can guess: the young mother should have been plugged into the long-established Baby Be Well Program sometimes known as the Well Baby programs.

It starts when the young mother is giving birth in the hospital (if not in the pre-natal phase). A Registered Nurse Practitioner comes around and solicits the young mother by offering her a range of irresistible services while getting the mother's contact information, home address, etc.

Then, when the young mother leaves the hospital, the RNP takes the initiative to travel out into the field and visits the young mother in situ. The RNP is able to answer all sorts of questions, has resources available for vaccinations, and can spot any basic problems which may arise.

# It Came Outa Boca Loca: The Weekly World News is going behind a paywall! Their website now has twice as many visitors per month as its former print edition, so they have decided to follow the leadership of The Miami Herald.

...

Trayvon Case: Backing Down (3 of 3) -

What about this "Duty to Retreat?"

"You either have the ability to defend yourself without the duty to retreat or you don't," explained Jacksonville attorney Mitch Stone.

How does that premise relate to this case? I believe the State could try to take it in potentially two differing directions.

First, they might argue that Zimmerman should have tried to disengage from the physical struggle with the teenager, but, in my opinion, this line of argument is a cul-de-sac, because Zimmerman's back was up against concrete which was being used by Trayvon Martin as a weapon, so that Zimmerman had no egress available to him.

A possible second direction the State may try to advance here could be the premise that Zimmerman was obliged (by the illusory Duty to Retreat) to stay in his vehicle and should not have questioned the teenager.

This is a fundamentally flawed line of polemic, I believe, because the encounter took place on private property, the owners and management of which have a right to know who goes on their property and what they are doing there.

Any prosecutor who expects to abrogate the rights of private property, including estate and shopping mall owners and management, in this way is headed toward doom, I am inclined to believe.

End of Part 3 of 3 Here.

...

Trayvon Case: Backing Down (2 of 3) -

I have no interest in demonizing a juvenile minor; my point here is that there may have been overly lax supervision of a minor, which was evinced in the youngster's strange reaction to his encounter with a resident of the estate, George Zimmerman.

Instead of simply explaining to Zimmerman that his father left him there to babysit a younger child named Chad, Trayvon reacted by violently assaulting the resident Zimmerman.

On the face of it, Trayvon Martin's reaction doesn't make any sense, and we have struggled to figure out what Trayvon's state of mind could have been to motivate such a weird reaction. Over time I have come up with several tentative theories, but none of them satisfy me. Properly done, this is known as a psychological autopsy.

Wasn't Trayvon Martin just minding his own business at the time of the fatal encounter? Trayvon Martin was on someone else's private property. Speaking from practical experience, I would say: when you are on someone else's private property, your business very much becomes their business.

Do we have a right to wonder about someone's state of mind? Sure we do. If you ask someone whether they are lost, you don't expect them to punch you in the nose.

Attorney Jeralyn Merritt explains the legal aspect
of this issue in extensive detail in her blog post today.

Continued . . .

...

Trayvon Case: Backing Down (1 of 3) -

The Birth Mother of slain juvenile Trayvon Martin has called for the repeal of Florida's "Stand Your Ground" law. Sybrina Fulton, accompanied by a group of state legislators, appeared at a press conference in Tallahassee earlier today.

The defense team for George Zimmerman has received Martin's school records, but won't release them to the public.

Despite that, it has come to light that the youth attended numerous schools, which is not even possible in other parts of the country under normal circumstances, where communities routinely send out detectives to verify the residence of parents in their district and may sue them for fraud or theft of services in order to recover expenses of student tuition.

To date, we do not know where Trayvon Martin was actually residing, who his legal guardian was, or what relationship - if any - Sybrina Fulton had with him. A different woman named Alicia Martin appeared on the Dr Phil TV Show as his stepmother and claimed to have raised him on an everyday basis for much of the teen's life.

The father appears to be an itinerant truck driver, who may or may not have been Trayvon's legal guardian. The peripatetic Tracy Martin dumped Trayvon on an alien private estate in a universe far from home without instructions, rendering his son a possible Youth in Need of Adult Supervision.

Sometimes it seems like the more
we read about this case, the less we know.

Continued . . .

...

Browsing Around -

Murder off Miami by Dennis Wheatley was originally published in 1936 and then reprinted in the 1970s. Today, it has become a collector’s item. Christopher Fowler wrote about it recently on his blog.

# Anyone miss Max and Freddy, the bicker team of Cologne detectives, from the German Tatort TV series shown here on the MHz Network? Alexandra Alter reviews Snow White Must Die by Nele Neuhaus, newly translated from German.

# Adam Woog's Mystery column this month includes the return of the precocious detective Flavia de Luce.

# British author Warren Ellis debuts his novel Gun Machine which Douglas Wolk reviews at LAT.

# Hatchet Job of the Year: "searching for the angriest, funniest, most trenchant book review of the past twelve months." Shortlist of nominees for the past year revealed.

...

New Spree Groupies -

Serial and Spree Killers
have attracted groupies before . . . 

Such a retinue or fanbase has emerged around the accused Colorado movie theater shooter James Holmes called the Holmies, which is beginning to attract attention from the Mainstream Media.

Trench Reynolds gives his picks of Best and Worst for the past year, including the new teen group called the Holmies, which he has blogged about before.

# The Watson Computer
couldn't cope with the Urban Dictionary.

# Dan Kennedy in Boston blogs an entry
about the ongoing collapse of corporate radio.

...

Firestorm Over Boca U -

James Tracy is a tenured Media and
Communications professor at FAU in the
land of the shopping zombies, Boca Loca . . .

Apparently, Tracy has dared to suggest on his blog that alternate theories of what happened in the Sandy Hook mass shooting are possible. Moreover, he has allegedly asserted that there are: Unanswered Questions and Missing Information. OMG!

Thus, Tracy has committed an American version of blasphemy by challenging the self-appointed high priesthood of the Mainstream Media who have now whipped up a hysteria about him.

...

A Breezy Browse -

Alex Harvey has written a feature piece about singer/song writer Tom Waits for the LA Review of Books describing the life Waits once had in Los Angeles which informed the kind of songs he was writing.

# Thomas Pynchon will debut his new novel called Bleeding Edge this fall via Penguin Press, according to Jason Boog.

# Amy Wilentz revisits Haiti in her new book Farewell, Fred Voodoo, which is reviewed by Hector Tobar at LAT.

# Tom Slater reviews Sam Thompson's Communion Town, a story which unfolds via multiple points of view in a post-modern construction.

# Alex Hern writes that the graphic
novel Scene of the Crime is back in print.

# Sarah Ward reviews Bed of Nails by
French Mystery author Antonin Varenne.

...

Strangers In The Night -

. . . shoobee shoobee doo . . .

Some of the people you see on the streets here in South Florida may be your neighbors, but some may be just passing through. Some may be roofless, while others may be enslaved. Appearances can be misleading.

An elderly man was catching a bite to eat one evening at a Wendy's branch in Fort Lauderdale when he met a young couple there. They all got to chatting during which it emerged that the couple needed a place to stay.

The elderly gent impulsively offered to put them up in his apartment, whereupon the trio was observed leaving the restaurant together. The seventy-year-old man was never seen in public again. That was on Oct 15th.

At the beginning of November, police were called to his apartment complex because a foul odor was detected there. It was only then that the body was discovered. Arrest warrants were issued.

The hold-back and big reveal turned out to be that no gun or knife was used to commit this homicide; instead, a plastic bag was allegedly used by the young couple to suffocate their host.

*  *  *  *  *
A young woman enrolled in a drug rehab program disappeared. The ensuing investigation into her fate yielded the information that she had found a dubious benefactor. It was only then that the entire sinister pattern began to emerge.

She had become ensnared in a sex slavery racket. Sadly, this is not a unique case. A higher than average percentage of transients in the area permits this kind of traffic to blend in with more conventional guests. And don't be misled by the dreadlocks - this is a multi-ethnic problem.

*  *  *  *  *
American medical schools customarily locate many of their training facilities in urban areas because the population density there affords more of a concentration of opportunities for physicians to acquire experiences which will develop their skills.

Thus, a young Canadian physician who wanted to specialize in trauma surgery moved from her relatively sedate environment in Toronto to South Florida.

She writes a muddled-minded Op Ed piece in The Miami Herald in which she laments that she has encountered a level of Cruelty here among her patients, who are often the victims, which she was unprepared to deal with.

Maybe she picked the wrong specialty.
How about switching to Dermatology?

If we reduce the numbers of guns on the streets, the psychopaths will probably use knives instead. Or maybe even plastic bags.

...

Novelist Gets Slammed -

The Saudi novelist Turki al-Hamad has been arrested by KSA authorities for emitting provocative tweets.

It appears (albeit at long distance) that Prince Nayef, who has been serving as Interior Minister lately, may have been pressured by prickly religious elements to go after Perceived Insults to Islam.

Well, you know how it is with Perceived Insults:

The color Aqua can be perceived as Blueish Green or Greenish Blue. But then you have to choose how you will interpret it.

You have to choose to be insulted. Then, on second thought or review, you can make a different choice that maybe you were not insulted.

For what purpose do you choose to be insulted?

"His novels have dealt with political and social matters long considered taboo in the religiously conservative kingdom."

What happened to the approach of convening a panel of scholars to discuss these issues with those who deviate from the Kingdom's official interpretations? Where is the shura on this matter? Looks like a lot of intermediate process is missing here.

Was this arrest the result of one individual's personal grudge or vendetta?

Saudi intellectuals have accumulated at least 500 signatures on a petition for Al Hamad's release, according to the latest AFP report.

:: GlobalVoices :: - - - :: Volokh ::

...

The Case of The Naked Roofer -

It's raining men!
Hallelujah! It's raining men!

Daytona Beach Police Chief Mike Chitwood is seeking TIPS concerning the beating death of Dylan Thomas Tharp, whose nude body was found on top of the Peabody Auditorium on November 3rd.

Chitwood is convinced that somebody out there knows something, so a $5,000 reward is being offered for any information leading to the arrest of Tharp's killer.

Anyone with information on this case is asked to call detective Dale Detter at #386-671-5218.

:: It's Raining Men ::

...

SoFlo Paper To Be Orphaned?

Sun Sentinel parent company, Chicago-based Tribune, is undergoing a makeover as a TV organization poised to sell off its newspapers, according to Reuters.

It's anyone's guess whether a prospective buyer would be interested in buying the Broward-oriented print publication set in the context of a literacy rate reputed to be comparable to that of backwoods rural Mississippi.

 If Tribune cannot find a buyer for its Broward outlet, will the orphan newspaper have any future at all?

:: Reuters ::

...