Law&Crime Sidebar - Top 8 Critical Moments of Charlie Adelson’s Testimony in Hitman Conspiracy Murder Trial — Day One

Episode Date: November 2, 2023

Charlie Adelson took the stand in his own defense Thursday after prosecutors pinned him as the mastermind behind his former brother-in-law’s murder. Investigators believe Adelson hired multiple people to kill Dan Markel — a law professor at Florida State University and the estranged husband to his sister — but Adelson said he is innocent. The Law&Crime Network’s Jesse Weber uncovers the most critical moments of his testimony so far.PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW:Thanks to Uncommon Goods for sponsoring this episode! To get 15% off your next gift, go to uncommongoods.com/crime10 for 15% off!HOST:Jesse Weber: https://twitter.com/jessecordweberLAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokePodcasting - Sam GoldbergVideo Editing - Michael DeiningerScript Writing - Savannah WilliamsonGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this Law and Crimes series ad-free right now. Join Wondry Plus in the Wondery app Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Agent Nate Russo returns in Oracle 3, Murder at the Grandview, the latest installment of the gripping Audible Original series. When a reunion at an abandoned island hotel turns deadly, Russo must untangle accident from murder. But beware, something sinister lurks in the grand. View Shadows. Joshua Jackson delivers a bone-chilling performance in this supernatural thriller that will

keep you on the edge of your seat. Don't let your fears take hold of you as you dive into this addictive series. Love thrillers with a paranormal twist? The entire Oracle trilogy is available on Audible. Listen now on Audible. Did you cause the death of Professor Dan Markell? Absolutely no. Did you hire anyone to kill him? No. Did you put any letters in any diaper bags of Katie McBanowa to have Professor Markell killed? No. How do you feel right now? I'm really nervous.

Why are you nervous? My whole life depends on it. Charlie Adelson, the defendant accused of murdering his former brother-in-law, FSU law professor Dan Markell in a murder-for-hire plot, has taken the stand. We break down eight of some of the major moments. Welcome to Sidebar, presented by Law and Crime. I'm Jesse Weber. Big developments in the trial of Charlie Adelson.

The defendant himself has taken the stand. So we covered this on a previous sidebar, but Aidelson is accused of first-degree murder, conspiracy, and solicitation, all in connection with the death of his former brother-in-law, FSU Law Professor Dan Markell. Now, the theory from the prosecution is that Markell was in the middle of this bitter custody dispute with Adelson's sister, Markell's ex-wife, Wendy Adelson, to give you an idea, Dan had petitioned the court to prevent Wendy's mother, Donna Adelson, from being allowed to be

with he and Wendy's children unsupervised. He believed that she was bad-mouthing him to them. So investigators believe that with all of this bad blood, Charlie was the one that orchestrated Dan's killing, that he facilitated the payment of $100,000 to be shared by Catherine Magbanawa, Sigfredo Garcia, and Luis Rivera. Well, who are they? Well, back on July 18, 2014, Markell was shot to death in his garage at his home in Tallahassee, Florida. The hit men were Luis Rivera and Siegfriedo Garcia. The investigation revealed that they were tied to this plot through Catherine Magbanoa, the mother of Garcia's children, and the former girlfriend of

Charlie Aedelson. Luis Rivera said that Magbanoa acted as the middle person in this plot. In the end, Luis Rivera pled guilty in 2016 to second-degree murder, not first, in the killing of Dan Markell. He received a 19-year prison sentence to run concurrently with a federal sentence on an unrelated case. He testified against Garcia and Magbanua, and now Adelson. And Siegfredo Garcia, whom Rivera claims was the actual shooter, he was convicted of first-degree murder of Markell. He was sentenced to life in prison. for Magbanoa, her first trial ended in a mistrial, but in her second trial, she was ultimately convicted of first-degree murder, conspiracy, and solicitation, and she, too, was sentenced to life

in prison. Now, in this trial, Charlie Adelson's defense team says he's innocent, that he is actually the victim of an extortion plot at the hands of Catherine Magbanoa. Their theory is that Magbanoa took it upon herself to plan and carry out the murder of Dan Markell with her accomplices and then extorted Charlie to pay up or his family and him would be killed. With this idea, you have to imagine Charlie Adelson had to take the stand, right? Well, with that, let's get into eight major moments from Charlie Adelson's testimony so far, because at the time of this recording, we haven't even gotten into his cross-examination. We may save that up for a next sidebar. Okay, so the first thing that he says on the stand is that he wasn't responsible for Dan's

death, that he didn't hire any hit men, that he's nervous, his life is all. on the line. He gets a little bit into his relationship with his parents, Wendy, which I thought was interesting because, you know, it seems like he had a good relationship with Wendy, but not overly close. He would call her. They talk from time to time. But I don't think he gave off the impression that he would kill for her, right? I didn't think he wanted to give off that impression. And he also talked about how he learned that Dan and Wendy were having these marital problems from Wendy, that he, you know, according to him, Dan wasn't treating her right. Not that he was abusive or anything, and that's important because it seems he didn't want to give

off the impression either that the situation was so dire between his sister and Dan that he needed to have Markell killed. Now, one of the things he did do on the stand was set up his defense. Remember, he's saying he was the victim of an extortion plot. And as you'll hear in a little bit, it's because of what he says to Magbanawa. All right, let's take a sidebar from sidebar right now to talk about the holiday season, because what is that one phrase that you always hear when talking about? gifts. Where'd you get that from? That is where Uncommon Goods comes in. Okay, so what Uncommon

Goods does is it makes it super easy for you to find these unique and cool gifts from across the world for your loved ones, your friends, your coworkers. I mean, in the first 10 minutes when I was checking out their website, I found a make your own dumpling kit. A lot of people don't know this about me, huge dumpling guy. Okay. And then I found this mini escape the room, solve the case game. It's like a mini foldable piece of luggage that you carry around with you. So now I don't have to gather a bunch of my friends to go to one of these places to play the game, just do it in our living room. It's just awesome stuff, high quality, different handmade. It shows the person that you're getting a gift for that you actually put some thought behind the present. It has

meaning. It's not some vanilla standard gift that you get in a department store. When you shop at Uncommon Goods, you're really supporting all kinds of artists and small independent businesses, which is always a great thing. And by the way, with every purchase that you make at Uncommon Goods. They give back a dollar to a nonprofit partner of your choice. They've donated more than $2.5 million to date. That is incredible. So to get 15% off of your next gift, go to Uncom slash Crime 10. That's Uncomcom slash Crime 10 for 15% off. You really don't want to miss out on this limited time offer. Uncommon Goods, we're all out of the ordinary. So he tries to set up the idea that Magbanawa had found out that he had money.

and that he spoke maybe too freely about his life and Wendy's life. And that includes this idea that the family had at one point to pay Dan off to give him a million dollars so that he would relocate. There was also this idea of threatening to enroll Dan's kids in Catholic school, even though Dan was a religious Jew. So we know that his sister, Wendy, had petitioned to relocate to South Florida. It was unsuccessful. But all that in mind, it's important that you hear from Charlie about what he was saying. What were the terms of the offer? How much was it for? The offer was for $1 million to have him move down south to South Florida with my sister and the boys, and that would afford him

enough money that he could easily commute to his job in Tallahassee for the days that he worked. Now, how were you involved in this idea? Not super involved, but I definitely said to my parents, I said, I will help, and I will pay a third of that million dollars. And when Wendy one day starts making real money, you know, and she's able to, I want to be paid back. Charlie, you like to talk a lot, right? Yeah, I didn't realize how much I talk until I listened to all those tapes. And evidently, I do. I mean, I knew I liked to talk, but didn't realize how much.

when you got involved in this million dollar offer would you talk about it with others yes did you ever talk with katherine magbanowa about that million dollar offer yes i did and what do you remember telling her the same thing i told everybody else is it came up when my

she was asking me about you know doesn't your sister want to move back home and i said yeah i said you know we tried everything we could. We even offer Danny a million dollars to move back to South Florida and it didn't work. The same thing I said to hers, what I said to a bunch of people. How did she respond? She was like, wow, that's a lot. That's a lot of money. She's like, you've got to take out a loan for that? And I said, no, I got cash. I can pay for it. So now Magbattenwood knows about the cash. And by the way, he says earlier on in his testimony that he always liked to have to have cash on hand. He liked collecting cash, almost like a hobby. Maybe it wasn't so much about him

having cash on hand to pay off his former brother-in-law's killers, but more just, I had money around. And also having cash on hand is important because it backs up his story that Magbanawa wanted that money. And we're going to get to that. Now, he did spend some time also explaining away other bad evidence. For example, at one point, Charlie made a comment to his sister Wendy, essentially that it would be cheaper to buy a TV than hire a hitman. After Dan was shot, Wendy admitted that Charlie had said this. Not great when your former brother-in-law was shot and killed by hitman, but here is Charlie trying to explain that away. Now, do you recall making a joke that buying her a TV was cheaper than hiring a hitman? Something to that effect. Yeah.

It was, the moment I say, what I... Yeah, tell me what the joke was. What happened was, when I gave her the TV set as a divorce present, as stupid as the stupidest thing I ever said in my life. And I said, you know, I was going to get you a hit man, but the TV set was a lot cheaper, so I went with the TV set instead. And I said it as a complete joke, and it was stupid, but I do that a lot. Did you make that joke to others?

Yes. Did you make that joke? many times throughout 2013 and 2014. I made that joke when she was having problems and she was fighting and she was upset. I recycled the joke and it was stupid. Did you ever say that joke to Catherine Magbanawa? Yes, I did.

Just to be clear, did you ever look into hiring a hitman? No, never. never. So not only does he say it was just a bad joke that came back to bite him essentially, but he repeated that joke to other people. So maybe it's not as nefarious as it was meant to be. But he also told that to Magbanua. So now that could have given her the idea or Siegfriedo Garcia the idea to assassinate Anne Markell. And speaking of Sigfredo Garcia, in order to amplify this defense theory that Charlie was the victim of an

extortion plot at the hands of dangerous people, Adelson explains that when he was dating Magbanua, he realized how violent and perhaps unhinged Garcia was. Again, he was the former love interest of Magbanua, father of her children. I want to talk briefly about July 1, 2014. And just kind of to give you a road map. In March, you had dinner with your sister, correct? Yes, at Yarberman. And we've learned that at that dinner, Siegfriedo Garcia thought about killing you. Yeah, he was stalking me with Luis Rivera. And we've learned through this trial that a first attempted murder on Professor Markell's life happened, give or take, six weeks later. Yes.

Now let's talk about July 1, which is about three or four weeks after that. By the way, up until July 1, had you ever talked to, texted with Matt Siegfriedo Garcia? No, not at all. What happened on July 1? We started driving out of her, And we got about 100, 200 feet, and this blue car comes flying out of nowhere, flies in front of us, and slams on the brakes. And I've got a car, and I'm towing a 1,200-pound jet ski behind it. And she started screaming, that's tea, that's tea, that's tea. And I'm almost rear-ended this car. And this guy gets out of the car, and he comes over, and he's screaming every kind of four-letter word at me, threatening me.

I mean, his face was real red. My windows were up, and a guy was going crazy. He then got in his car, chased alongside of us. He was right alongside of us, rolled his window down, was screaming all this stuff at us. And when we got to the light, it was just turning yellow, and I gunned it. I remember making a left-hand turn. And I said to Katie, I go, that guy's fucking nuts. And she goes, he goes, nuts.

She goes, he's really calmed down. And I go, what do you mean, he's calmed down? And she goes, the old tea I know would have broken your window and dragged down to the street and beaten your ass. The idea here is saying, yeah, Garcia is someone who's dangerous, that he didn't like Edelson for dating Magbanua, that he was stalking him with Luis Rivera, that this is not someone that he met or would enter into a partnership with in a murder-for-hire plot. That was the theme, I think, that Charlie Adelson and his defense team were getting at. So then Aidelson explains how he found out that Dan Markell was shot. He said his mom called her, told her that Wendy found out that Dan was shot. He says that his reaction was he was in shock.

He was worried about her kids. He didn't know what was happening. Now, at one point, he says that he called Magbanawa, again, his girlfriend, to come on over. Let's hear what he said. You said you called Katie after your shower. Why did you call her? To see if she was still planning on coming over and what time she was going to be there because it was already like 10.15. When she arrived to my house, she came in through the garage, entered into the kitchen from the side door like she always does.

And she just looked panicked and upset. I mean, she walked straight in and gives me this big, tight hug and asked me like, are you okay? And I said, yeah, just it's a horrible day. But she looked more upset than I, I mean, I've ever seen her. I'm like, are you okay? She's like, no, I'm not. I'm like, what's wrong? She's like, just come sit down, I need to talk to you.

And she said, listen, this is all my fault. But I had no idea anything was going to happen, but this is totally my fault. I spoke in too much detail about your family's personal problems, about your sister, Dan Markell, and the million dollar offer. What did you say? I'm like, what are you talking about? and she's like, she's like my friend killed Dan. And he wants to be paid a third of a million dollars.

Wow. So Magbanua comes right out and says, I know who killed Dan. This is my fault. And you got to pay up. Remember, we never heard this before this trial. Okay. As we just heard, according to Charlie Adelson, on the stand, he's hit with this news. He's reeling from the shock of learning his former brother-in-law is killed.

And he learns from his girlfriend. Catherine Magbanawa that she knows the killer. Well, what is Edelson's reaction to this? How did you react? I was like, what did you just say? And she's like, my friend killed Dan, and he wants you to pay a third of a million dollars. What happened next?

I stood up, and I started cursing it. I'm like, what the a fuck? Are you kidding me? And she's like, no. I'm like, who did this? Who's your friend that did this? And she's like, I don't want to say, I can't say. And I said, who wasn't?

She just kept saying, I'm not going to tell you. and I was like, was it sick, Frato? And she's like, no, I'm not telling you. And I just walked in my bedroom and sat down on the edge of my bed. And I'm like, Katie, I'm not going to be part of this. I'm not going to be part of paying for a murder. This is insane. And she's like, look, if you don't pay in 48 hours, they will kill you.

And I said, Katie, I feel like I'm getting extorted now. How did she respond to that? she got really mad at me. She got angry. And she's like, look, I'm not extorting you. Okay, look, this is arguably the most important part of his whole testimony, right? It's either the jury believes this or they don't. I think it all comes down to whether this story is believable or not.

The jury heard from Catherine McBanow already. I mean, she took the stand. She admitted that she lied in her trial about not having any involvement in the murder, that she lied to get herself off, that that didn't work. She was convicted. And now, in Charlie Adelson's trial, she says, okay, I'm finally coming clean. This is what happened. He's responsible.

So the idea, once again, is he is the victim. And as he explains, while Magbanowal had told him that she had no part in this murder, as his defense counsel argued, she was the one who was the mastermind behind it all. Well, what about the money? Does he pay up? Let's find out. She's like, I got dragged into this the same way you got dragged into this. She's like, it's my fault for running.

my mouth the way I did, but I'm not extorting you. Like, I'm trying to help you. So she's like, you got to, she goes, what are you going to do? You're going to go to the police? She goes, you go to the police, they'll kill you. Did she tell you that they would just kill you, or they would also kill other people? She said, you'd come after you, you'd come after the family. Like, Charlie, you don't have a choice. Just pay the money. I said, Katie, I don't have a third of a million in cash. And she's like, well, you have a ton of money in you're safe. And I say, hey, I don't have that much in my safe. I do have a lot. And I said, come, take a look. And I walked over to my safe. I opened it up. And I'm like, here, take a look. And I took it out

in piles and put it on the dresser next to us. And I said, go ahead and count. That's not a third of a million. And did she count? Yes, she did. How much money did she count? 138,000 so it wasn't a hundred thousand it was 138,000 correct and she said can you go to your parents and get it and I was like if I go to my parents my dad will go to the cops and she said well can you pay like can you pay like $3,000 a month and I said yeah I can I can do that what did she do next she took her purse her keys in her phone and she's like I'm going to go call my friend and see if, see if this works for him. And I'm going to try to help you out.

And she's like, I spoke to him. You can pay $3,000 a month or you can pay the rest off. She goes, but the $3,000 a month you're paying doesn't go towards the balance. Okay, her being the middle person, trying to save his life, works out this payment plan that he feels he has no choice but to agree to, to protect his life, to protect his family's life. And again, he's saying to the jury, this is my fault. I kept maybe, you know, mentioning too freely that I had cancer.

cash and money, set it to Meg Banewa. That's what maybe caused this. Now, I got to talk about this next statement. Do you think he kicked Mag Banewa out of the house that he didn't want to have anything to do with her? Not quite. Did she spend the night that night? She did sleep over that night. Now, why didn't you kick her out? I was in the state of shock and I didn't think she had anything to do with it. I didn't even want to believe that she had anything to do with it. that may be hard for a jury to believe this woman is responsible for ruining your life basically and you have her sleep over or is the jury going to believe of course she slept over she's your accomplice well that brings me to the final major moment that i want to talk about

and that is when he tells his mom donna adelson about what is going on now remember there has long been suspicion including by investigators that donna is a co-conspirator in this murder for hire plot. She hasn't been charged, but neither is Wendy, and Wendy is an unindicted co-conspirator as well. So with that in mind, let's actually hear what happened with Charlie and Donna. And by the way, he claims he thought about going to the police but thought that would get everyone killed, but yet he ends up telling Donna, and he tells her because she starts noticing these payments from the dental practice to Magdanoa. She's like, well, $1,000 a month, there's a lot of money to pay somebody. And,

And she's like, what exactly is she doing for you? And I said, it's a long story. And then she said, well, I'm your mom. Like, tell me. Like, don't just tell me it's a long story. She's like, well, why are you giving her $1,000 a month? This makes no sense. What happened next?

I told my mom, you know, I wanted to tell somebody because if I get killed, at least somebody will know where to look or what it could have been about. So I wanted my mom to know what happened, but I also didn't want her saying anything to anybody. So I told my mom, I said, listen, I'm going to tell you something, but I never want to talk about it again. I never want you to talk to me about it on the phone. Don't talk about it anywhere. And please, whatever you do, do not say anything to Dad. Do not say anything to Wendy.

Do not try to make me go to the police because I'm not going. You've got to promise me all that, and then I'll tell you. and what did you tell your mom I told her that the night of the 18th I got extorted for a third of a million dollars how did your mom react she flipped out and she's like what do you mean like what is this about

like you know who killed Dan what did she want to do she wanted to go to the police and what did you tell her I said absolutely not I said it's not going to bring Dan back you're just going to end up getting me killed or they'll come after somebody in the family.

So despite Magbanowah telling him, can't tell anyone because that'll put them in danger, he tells his mother. Now, I do wonder if him telling his mom this information will implicate her in any way in a crime. Maybe that's a conversation for another sidebar. But what do you think? believable story from Charlie Adelson.

Will the jury trust it? It helps to show that he's involved, but not involved at the same time. Oh, and don't forget, we have cross-examination by the prosecution, too, that will, I imagine, certainly be interesting. That's all we have for you here on Sidebar, everybody. Thank you so much for joining us. Please subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, wherever you get your podcast. I'm Jesse Weber.

Speak to you next time. You can binge all episodes of this long crime series, ad-free right now on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.