Legal AF by MeidasTouch - Free Brittney Griner; Jail Guy Reffitt; Vacate Ghislaine Maxwell?

Episode Date: March 10, 2022

Welcome—Legal AF Midweek edition with your hosts Michael Popok and Karen Friedman Agnifilo. On today’s :40 minute pod, and in rapid-fire, edge of your seat, fashion will take on the “3 Gs” from this week’s political and legal news headlines: WNBA Star basketball player Brittney Griner now a Russian political prisoner; Ghislaine Maxwell’s efforts to obtain a new trial; and Guy Reffitt’s conviction for being a leader of the Jan6 insurrection. Follow Legal AF on Twitter: Legal AF: https://twitter.com/MTLegalAF Karen Friedman Agnifilo: https://twitter.com/kfalegal Michael Popok: https://twitter.com/mspopok Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to the midweek edition of Legal AF. This is all of the legal and political news that you can handle and all the legal and political news that's fit to podcast. I'm Michael Popock. I'm Karen Priebman Agnistelo. And Karen, we're going to do, we just figured it out, we're going to do three Gs today, rip from the headlines. Literally one is like from today, from Wednesday. We're gonna do what happened in the Galein, Galein Maxwell case. That's our first G, related to Jure number 50 and her attempts to obtain a new trial. We're gonna talk about poor Brittany Griner. That's our second G, she of the WNBA All-Star fan and also unfortunately a person who plays in a Russian league and has been trapped in Russian now.

And I know what it sounds like a trumped up drug charge. And our third G is, again, right from today, the jury has come back and the guy refit the first Gen 6 criminal trial. We have a verdict after four hours of deliberation. And we're going to talk about that too. But let's kick off with each other. How you doing?

I'm doing all right. I appeared in federal court yesterday on a motion to dismiss an oral argument, which is only my second time ever in federal court and on a civil matter. So it's all new to me, but I'm enjoying it. Yeah. So you and I, this just again, to reinforce how few talking heads really have a practice. Today, I was in, I argued at the second circuit court of appeals in person live, partially with a mask and partially without on behalf of one of our clients, John Melendez, against Sirius XM. And the day before I filed two federal briefs back to back in Nevada

on another case in the gaming space, we are practitioners. We do this for a living. If I could figure out a way to do podcasting for a living, you and I have joke I would I would because it's so much better. And I like my clothes so much better on podcast day. I don't have to wear a suit. Yeah., you know, listen, for all you know, it's just the sweater today. So here we go. Oh, good. Let's talk about Golanem Maxwell

and what happened with Judge Nathan. And I want to ask you a few questions about it. First I'll frame it, then I want to ask you questions. So, juror number 50, who we've now heard about for the last two and a half months, was on the jury, was part of the jury that convicted Elaine Maxwell seven out of eight counts, including sex trafficking, which she's looking at a lot of time for that. And then did what I guess some jurors do, they go to the media and gave a lot of

interviews and signed a lot of book deals with, he's from originally from London, so it was with some British papers. And in it, he said he was a victim of sexual abuse himself several times. And that was not disclosed at all in the jury questionnaire, which is part of the process that we've talked about in other episodes of Legal AF, the Vwaddeer process of jury selection, which requires jurors to be honest in the answers to their questionnaire and in the answers to the questions asked by the lawyers and or the judge during the process. He was not either because he was dishonest, lazy, as he admitted today, or something else. And the judge used her time today and she was the only one that cross-exampt him in response to the motion for new trial by the defense to get to the bottom of why Scotty Greg, who's he's identified himself

by his first and middle name, why he did not disclose that he himself was a victim of child sexual abuse. Now, here's a question I have for you. It's a couple of questions. Why are the only questions she's asking of him about why he lied on the form and not about, at all, in fact, she had managed him not to speak about jury deliberations? Why doesn't she care at the new trial level when she's considering the motion? If anything that he said or did in jury deliberation might have adversely impacted that process, why do you think? So jury deliberations have always been sacrosanct. It's the sort of this bubble that you aren't supposed to have anything intrude in that

process and the deliberation process. And so the judge was very careful not to intrude in the deliberation process of the Gillen Maxwell trial, but the questions ahead of time. War deers, as you said, is all about trying to pick a fair and impartial jury of your peers who can listen to the evidence and bring in their life experiences, of course, and their common sense, and render a verdict that's consistent with the facts and the law. And in the voiretale process, it's really important that the lawyers get to know anything about you

that could impede in your ability to be fair and impartial because obviously it wouldn't be fair to the defense or the prosecution for that matter to have someone who can't be fair and impartial. And during this jury selection process or this war deer process, lawyers have a certain number of challenges. There's two kinds of challenges and challenges challenges mean you can say, I'm going to bump this person off the jury. I bring in panels of dozens and dozens and dozens of people. And in high profile cases, sometimes it's hundreds of people. Because people will just say I can't sit for a really long time. Or I heard of this case and I can't possibly be fair.

So usually in a big high profile case, we're bringing hundreds of people and they'll pre-screen them. And they usually pre-screen them through things like jury questionnaires. And that's what happened in this particular matter. And as I said, there are two types of challenges, both forecaused challenges and preemptory challenges. And forecaused challenges, there's an unlimited number of those. It just means you can't be fair and impartial

and therefore four cause. The judge will say as a matter of law, you are not qualified to serve on this jury. But then there's some preemptory challenges and the number of preemptory challenges depends on the jurisdiction you're in, on the charges you're facing, on the level of crime it is,

et cetera. But New York State, for example, you sometimes can get up to 20 preemptory challenges. Now, you can't discriminate using your preemptory challenges. So for example, you can't say, I don't want any black people on my jury. So I'm going to bounce all the black people from the jury. There's things like that that you can't do as a prosecutor.

And so, there's challenges, but pretty much otherwise, your preemptory challenges are ones that you can use anyway that you want as long as it's not discriminatory. Now, the reason I bring that up in this case, and the reason I think this is significant is the questions, just to answer you're circling back to your question, Popoq. The questions the judge was asking, juror number 50 today, all had to do with his motivation, his intention, his whether or not he could be fair, because she was trying to determine whether or not he would have been challenged for cause, meaning disqualified as a juror, because there's a Supreme Court case that lays out the standard, it's from 1984, that lays out the standard here on what would disrupt this and give and give her a new trial.

And it would have to be something that goes to the heart of, that goes to the heart of the fairness of the matter, It was Macdonough power versus Greenwood from 1984. So if he was mistaken, though honest, the way he said he was and the judge credits that, it might not get reversed. But if it's something that goes to the essential fairness of the trial and if he couldn't be fair and impartial and therefore be able to have a forecaused challenge, I think they'd be in trouble

here, but my prediction and I want to hear your thoughts, of course. My prediction is based on what he said today does not get overturned. What do you think? What are your thoughts? What's an impact some of it? So, wow, I've never had 20 per-emptory challenges if that's six at most. Have you ever tried a murder case in New York State? No, no, I don't know. I'm saying that's just a lot. And even though you're not supposed to use your per impteries to remove people of color and otherwise, we know it happens. And we know that all of a sudden, you know, maybe not from the prosecutor level, but

I've certainly seen it in civil cases where you suddenly have an all white jury because of the use of that process. But I guess the question I asked was, she's not asking Judge Nathan's not cross-examining this witness about the deliberation process, which I thought, one of the things that he said is that when he was in deliberations, he told the witnesses, he told the other jurors

while they were deliberating. This is all public record now, that when there was an expert that was put on about repressed memory and the ability of a sex abuse victim to recover memories, he used his own personal experience in the room and talked about it to bolster the credibility, if you will, of the witness that was on there for the prosecution. And this does not seem to be at all the focus of what the judge is going to grant or deny the emotion for New Trial Hunt. She doesn't, maybe because it's sacrosanct, maybe because she doesn't think that's where

she needs to go. She's going to the Sixth Amendment right to a fair and impartial trial, not a perfect trial, but a fair and impartial trial to determine, as you said, whether even if he disclosed that he was a sex, that he was the victim as a child of sex abuse, does that mean that sex abuse victims and sex cases, sex trafficking cases can't ever be jurors? And the answer to that is no.

They can be jurors if they can be fair and impartial. If they can't be then for cause, as you said, if they say, listen, I had this dramatic thing, terrible thing happened to me. I could not sit on this jury and be fair and impartial. I'd be thinking about my own past and my own thought process. Okay, that is a four cause, which, which lawyers like you and I are happy about because I don't have to use if I have a limited number of preemptories, I don't have to use my preemptory challenges because the judge has just taken one juror off the block without be having to use it. And so that strategy and gaming that goes on between defense and prosecution or plaintiff and defense lawyers, who's going to use the preemptory?

Who's, you know, I want to get to juror number six, a potential juror number six. That's true. It's like, Jess, how do I get there? You can even negotiate sometimes, right? Yeah. You look apart with your adversary and you say, okay, I'll agree to unseating this person if you'll see that person. Well, well, you just mentioned a good thing.

There's also backstrikes, which means you can strike, but then you can take it back and negotiate. It's a whole, we make it sound like it's just this run of the mill ordering like you're at the deli, it's not. It's a lot of this going back and forth. Maybe like so. One question for you on the challenges really quick. Do you think it would matter if the lawyers,

if the defense attorney in the Maxwell case had run out of preemptory challenges? And therefore, because I was just curious, because look, say it wouldn't have been forecaused challenge, because he did say today under oath that he could be fair and impartial. So that knocks him out of the forecaused category. What if they had run out of the forecage category.

What if they had run out of challenges? And so it would have been harmless error, if you will, analysis or moot. Like what is, what do you think about that? Well, if they, if he was up early enough that they had a paramptory, but they'll think they have to go the next step, which is the way you framed it,

which is we would have removed him, but removing a juror or one or two, that's not fair and impartial issues. You know, I haven't gotten the perfect jury. You get the jury that you choose. You get the jury that's left to you after all of these challenges and this checker board of challenges and the judges involved. And this is your jury.

And the question is, are they fair and impartial? So they're not going to be able to argue. And I doubt that they will that, oh, he would have not been in there. And I would have had the, you know, the postal worker, you know, one next to him. And that would have been better for us. That's not, that's not six amendment. So, you know, you're right. I think, I think at the end, if this is the focus and not on his outsized influence on jury deliberation, which it seems to be based on the questioning, I think this new trial goes down in flames as a motion and we'll have to see what the second circuit does. So you think they get to reverse and I think

it doesn't get reversed. No, no, I think the motion goes down in flames. I think it does not. The motion goes down in flames. Yeah, it's not. Oh, the motion goes down. Yeah, it's not successful. So you don't think it's successfully there. So do you know who, do you know who was his lawyer? Todd Spodak, your favorite lawyer from Anna Delvie. Seems like everything we talk about is related, right? Yeah, although I don't want to disappoint you, but go online and look at his picture versus the actor that played it.

I know. I checked. They've left slightly different. So I mean, time. Sure, Todd's a nice person. I'm hoping I'm hoping a mall colony plays me in the movie version of my life. Todd Spode actually be thrilled by the casting in the inventive. I saw by the way also that the US attorney Damien Williams actually was in court today, which shows how important significant is hearing on US attorney. So he's not trying the case, but he is the US attorney for the district. Yeah. So that's just that signals how important this marriage for the office and signals to the judge that this

office is taking it seriously and not to say she's not going to rule a certain way because she's got U.S. attorney sitting there, but she knows it's serious. Plus, let's be frank, she wants to get out of here and get to the second circuit where she's, she's waiting to be confirmed. So let's move on to our second G. We're making, we're making great time here. Let's move on to our second G, which is going to be after we're done with that one one that you and I talked about offline that you're very interested in. So my poor Brittany Griner, who is captured my heart, I have to say, gone. 12, 12 time all star. She's LGBTQ, she and her wife were there and the and sort of the dirty underbelly of women professional sports is that they can't make a living in the United States.

The US soccer team Ben and I talked talked about on a prior podcast last week, you know, just entered into a historic landmark settlement to get $22 million, which to any billionaire is a rounding error into a fund so they can use it to equalize their pay. And here you have, and I didn't really, I don't really follow the WNBA that much. So I wasn't aware that if you're a star in the WNBA and your salary is capped at $200,000. $228,000. Right.

Look, LeBron James is making $48 million a year. So just, okay, so he wouldn't even miss if somebody took from him $200,000. He wouldn't even notice it, okay? That's how much they're getting paid to do the same job that the men are doing because there's not enough marketing and money in the WNBA. It's always been seen as sort of a backwater sport. So what does stars do that want to make a living and maximize their earning potential for this talent that they have? They go to Russia and they go to Turkey and they go to Greece, but Russia and apparently the team that Brittany has been playing with or for the last eight years and bringing home the championships for

them as well as bringing home the championships for the US teams that she plays for is a team called E-Cott or E-Cott U-M-M in a city near Siberia of all places called Yekaterinaburg. So they play, she plays for the low. And why, who cares? Because Putin, you might have heard, you heard of Putin. Everybody. Putin is really good friends with the copper and zinc mining magnet who owns that team. And they just, he's able to lavish million dollar salaries and private apartments and showfurs. Is a magnet different than an oligarch? Just curious. Yeah, it used to be a magnet and now it's an oligarch.

Magnet sounds like thirst and howl the third. Yeah, exactly. I can't keep it track. Right. It sounds like, you know, a guy with an mascot, you know, and by the way, your date, you're aging us by talking about Gilligan's Island. I love doing that. That's what I get up in the morning saying, how can I age me?

So the oligarch part of the club tockracy that is Russia is able, you know, and they are, Brittany is the recipient of it. Why are we talking so much about Brittany Griner? Because she had the misfortune of having to return to the league after a mid mid-winner break from New York back to Siberia passing through Moscow and her luggage tipped off the drug dogs at the airport in Moscow. If you believe that story. Well, I believe the story.

I don't believe that she was, she's a drug mule. Did she have, is it possible that she had a vape pen that had some hash in it? Maybe, I mean, that or pot or marijuana. Is she carrying bundles and bales of pot through customs at the public airport in Moscow? I doubt it. The only, the only reason I'm just suspect of that is, January 23rd, the State Department issued a warning to United States citizens saying, don't travel to Russia, saying that US citizens are going to be potentially the target of arbitrary enforcement of the law.

And I think intelligence officials have their ears on the ground, and they know when stuff's going down and things are happening and they warned people not to go. But as you said, you know, poor Brittany, who, you know, I didn't know anything about this before this story, but it really sort of captured my heart a few days ago and I started kind of researching. the average WNBA salary is between $75 and $100,000 a year, whereas the average NBA, the men basketball teams, is $7.7 million a year. That's 10 times the amount. And the NBA. But that's for the guy that sits on the bench

and never gets in the game. Exactly. And the NBA owns half the WNBA. So if they could have, yes, they make that make as much money or pack the stadiums, but if they cared and believed in pay, um, pay parity, they would pay them a living wage and they wouldn't have to travel to places like Siberia and be put in a situation where she's LGBTQ that that is not that that that people against the law in yeah, exactly to put her in that position. I'm just I'm really appalled. And I hope that this

is that I hope the NBA comes out and does the right thing. It starts to pay the women of the WNBA. A salary doesn't have to be exactly the same, but something coming close to what they deserve. She's a, as you said, she's a two time Olympic gold medalist. She's a, you know, a champion who's, you know, I don't know anything about sports. So I can't rattle off her statistics, but she's certainly impressive. She's on WNBA champion, seven-time all-star. But here's the issue. So let's say she had the vape pen in there. She had it. We know that she had a B in Russia because her league

was starting up again after a winter break. The good news for our listeners and followers is that the entire rest of the WNBA who play in Russia have all been successfully extracted and removed from Russia except for poor Brittany, who by the way got arrested in the middle of February and you and I and the rest of the listeners didn't find out about it until a week ago. So this poor person has been sitting in a jail in detention for three weeks. I don't know what was so slow. The hurt the people around her are not doing her unless they felt like because of the Ukraine thing, they did not want to publicize it. They must have made a strategic decision that they wanted to sort of keep her undercover of darkness because normally you'd be like, yeah, free Brittany and let's get Brittany.

And here's the problem. Yeah, we should we should we should re ignite the free. But now that Britney Spears has has got, but now that she is no longer under, you know, the hostage of her father, the free Brittany hashtag, we should turn it over to Brittany to Brittany Griner. And here's the problem. The problem is that that the diplomatic channels

between the US and Russia are not existent at the current time, which means that probably a third party, maybe in the sports world, maybe who straddles somebody in the NBA, somebody, some former senator, some Russian-American business person, is gonna have to broker a deal to get Brittany out

because otherwise, from a legal process, she's looking at 10 years. And just to give an example that you and I hadn't heard about, but now of course we're hearing about it while we're talking about Brittany. A US female Israeli-American Jewish backpacker named Nama Isaacar in 2019 got caught with a small amount of marijuana. I don't know, a joint or two in a small regional to nine years. She only got out after nine months because they gave her a,

not a cup, maybe a commutation of her sentence, only because at the, the president of Israel at the time, Bibi Netanyahu was in good standing with Putin and was able to negotiate a deal and she was able to get out after nine months. Otherwise, she was looking, she was already sentenced to nine years. You know, this will be in an, and you know, it's going to happen. Putin is going to use her as a political prisoner, Brittany, in order to use her as trade bait.

Yeah, she's a high price. She's a high, yeah, high profile hostage. Talk about wrong place, wrong time. I know. I know. I know. Yeah. And you know, the thing is she was open about struggling with mental health. Yeah. I, you know, she was very open about that and very public about it. And I, it breaks my heart for her. And I want to send her support and love and, and raise awareness. I mean, look, I, I think you're right. I think they wanted to keep this low profile to see if they could just get her out and

not have her become a pawn to negotiate, you know, in this horrible high, you know, high-stakes situation that we're in now. It's three weeks. Now it's three weeks. I know. I know. She said she's still stuck there. But look, everybody's out. Her wife got out. And there were other WNBA players. I mean, I don't know. They were sort of in a bubble, but, you know, LGBTQ status is not only not recognized in Russia. It is illegal in many ways. And a lot of these women are married to other NWNBA players or other or other same-sex people. And I'm glad we got them out. But now we got to we got to put a lot of effort on Brittany and you and I will continue to follow that story. As we move to our third and last G for the midweek additional legal a F guy ref it who Ben and I picked it

up with our Saturday podcast talking about the first Jan 6 trial for those that are asking what is the Justice Department doing? They're doing lots of things, but one of the things they're doing is they're trying to try 500 people for participation at the Jan 6 insurrection. And so guy ref it and now I know why we'll talk about it at the end. I saw the press conference with his wife, I guess he can call it a press conference. I now know why he went to trial. I asked Ben, why does he go to trial with so much evidence against him? Because he wants to be a martyr because they call themselves,

I don't know if you caught this, they call themselves the one sixers, like the 70 sixers, they're the one sixers, which is, you know, again, two, three, four, three, six. Yeah, of course. Yes, the one sixers. So, you know, so now they're in a cute club that they get to say, yeah, so at the, well, we'll talk about the conviction today after four hours of deliberation, but we'll go first to the wife on the courthouse steps who sent out a signal to all the other one-sixers and said, don't take a plea. We need to ban together. We were only expressing our first amendment, right?

Your first amendment, right to use a fire extinguisher and a Capitol police officer, your first amendment, right to use bear spray to cause a heart attackuisher and a Capitol police officer. Your First Amendment right to use bear spray to cause a heart attack of one of the Capitol police. That to go and try to find Nancy Pelosi and drag her out by the roots of her hair. That's your First Amendment right. I mean they are, they are still nuts. And if he doesn't come around in the June sentencing and he maintains this position of not showing any remorse. Yeah, the judge is going to slam him and give him the max. Even though it's a Trump appointee, I looked her up to Abney Friedrich. She's former US attorney, assistant US attorney. She got to, she was on the sentencing commission.

She's got a good track record. She throws the book at him. So let's talk about what happened. So what happened today with the counts of the jury deliberation, Karen? Yeah, so, you know, it was a really quick. I didn't understand the defense strategy. It was a short opening. I'm sorry.

I'm sorry. You're suggesting there was a defense strategy. I mean, I just never seen anything like it. There was like 10 minute opening statement. They didn't put on any witnesses. No, three three minute opening statement. Oh my God. Well, it takes longer to make an egg. Yeah, exactly. So I don't know. I don't really understand what and not only that. So say you want to be a martyr and that you want to make a statement and exercise your first amendment rights. How cruel of a person can you be to put your own son through that, to make him testify against his own father?

To me, that's, he's a sick person who has, and now that you tell me, I didn't see the press conference, that his wife is stood by him, so the mother is also, like this family has no, I mean, put your family first. Do not put anything else first. I mean, these people are delusional.

I can't believe it. But anyway, getting to your- Go away, wait, before you go on the kids, I want to ask you a question. So I'm going to give you one fact point and then I want to hear from the former prosecutor that you are, what you think. They put on the sun and he did really well.

And while that sun was testifying at the very beginning, in the open courtroom with the jury president, Guy Reffett burst into tears and turned red faced and sobbed during much of his testimony. They later, the prosecutors, at the end decided not to put the daughter on. Why do you think that is? Because because they have a heart because because the prosecution has a heart and they got what they needed out of the defense out of the sun. And don't don't ruin this family even more. You know, first of all, this is one at before of a hundred potential trials.

They have a long road ahead of them. They have a conscience and they're just not going to, there's no reason to put her on and put her through that. It's got to be, this son is, he's 19 years old, he's going to be married for life, just having to testify against your own father and then watch your father sit there sobbing. And he wasn't, the reason he was sobbing, I'm sure it was because he was disappointed. Not because he felt bad, not because he has any regrets, but because he was disappointed, this is me just totally guessing, by the way, I have no, you know, I just,

We do, we do here on legal. I know, but he just has, that he's so disappointed that his son, that his son is clearly sees the insurrection for what it was and is willing to come forward and do the right thing and testify against your own parent. I mean, I think that's just got to be the hardest, hardest thing. And I used to be a child abuse prosecutor. And so I know what it's like for these children. He's not an abuse victim in the sense

of a typical child abuse, although I think threatening your child with a gun if he comes forward. It is child abuse. I'm sure it wasn't the first time in that in the sense of a typical child abuse, although I think threatening your child with a gun if he comes forward is child abuse. Sure, I'm sure it wasn't the first time in that asshole. Yeah, well, exactly. It's a very tough thing to for psychologically for a child to to testify against their father. And you know, it takes a lot of strength and a lot of courage. And I applaud that that child and really think he, I admire

him for the courage and strength that he had that not a lot of people, not everybody has. And, you know, it's a hard thing to do. I like your observation about the prosecutor, the prosecution having a heart and also keeping something in the tank because they've got like 400 more of these. Although they clearly they didn't need it since what it was a three hour deliberation or four hour deliberation. So clearly, yeah, so they didn't need the daughter. They had a good read on their case. Yeah. So I think there's another another reason they didn't do it. They have a heart. I also think they were worried. This is just my up season speculation that they didn't want to also engender any sympathy with him bursting into tears again.

They knew they had they were up on points by a large margin with trial was going. They didn't need the overkill or having it backfire and him screaming out, I love you or something from a movie. I agree. I agree with you. I like that. I think that's a movie. I agree. I agree with you. I agree. I think that's a good point. Yeah. I agree with you. So let the daughter go and plus the mother, I'm sure I was not happy.

As you can see from the press conference with the daughter testifying. And I'm sure made the prosecutors life a living hell in that way. And you know, the old Joe. Plus the daughter was a minor, right? Yeah. The daughter was a minor. And the son was not.

So he can make his own decision. That's right. And I think the mother influenced it. And we're piecing it all together here. The thing that I loved about the four-hour deliberation is it proves the old adage that I saw it. I've seen in my own career, which is Jury's never reached a verdict, even if they're going to do it quickly before lunch.

They the four hour mark is you three, four hours is the earliest I've ever seen it and it's after the bailiff has delivered lunch. They get charged, right? And the charging takes so long. The reading of the, and we'll talk about this another legal A F mid weeks, the charging, the jury instructions that the judge gives can go on for like an hour and they are like watching, you know, paint dry and even for lawyers. I've, I've almost knotted off during, and they're important

because if they get a word, they get a word wrong, you got a reversible error from the instruction. So by the time the jury's instructed, by the time they grab their pads and the bail of takes them back to the deliberation room and reads in the riot act about what they can and can't do, you know, it's, I don't even know when it ended. It's getting close to, it's getting close to lunch. They bring the sandwiches, everybody orders off a menu. This is the insider stuff that people come to the lab for. By the way, they get the tuna salad and they get the ham sandwich. And then they eat their sandwiches and they take a quick straw poll. And then they come at it. They come at 20 minutes later. It's not really four hours. It's lunch

plus 20 minutes of deliberation. I mean, look, just I've seen a 17 minute verdict. Very rare, but I've seen 17. I've seen it. I've also seen, I've also seen my minute verdict. Very rare, but I've seen 17. I've seen it. I've also seen my husband had a jury out for six weeks once. I mean, it was unbelievable. How many Allen charges were there? Oh my god. How many charges were they given to continue to deliberate?

You know, I don't recall, but it was six weeks. He actually missed our family vacation because we thought for sure. You know, and I went and I said, oh, you'll come meet us. And he never was able to meet us. But but the Maxwell, the jury was out for five days. And I think, you know, a day, two days yeah, is is is common. So I've seen three years. I've been on I've been I've handled trials where, you know, it's between one and three days. I don't think I've ever done it. I've gone on I've been I've handled trials where you know, it's between one and three days. I don't think I've ever gone to five. If gone to five. No, but three, but three or three hours. I've had three hours. Exactly. I just wanted to give the context that three hours is considered a

really quick verdict in in the world of prosecution. I also didn't hear maybe because it happened so quickly. I didn't hear that they that they sent out any notes at all to the, well, look, when you have it, I'm not kidding, when you have a three-minute egg timer for your defense opening. I mean, even the, even the prosecutor was only half an hour. Given the volume of evidence, didn't you think a half an hour was sort of short, too? I just think they had so much that they, they were like, we're going to do it a half an hour. He did it in three minutes. You could have literally a five second gunpoint robbery, right?

Someone comes up to you in a dark alley, points a gun at you, takes your wallet and runs. The whole thing happens in five in five seconds. Two hour opening. That's, yeah, I was going to say that's a two hour, that's an hour opening statement for a five second crime. This is, I mean, the, the, the, the, it takes me an hour to clear my throat. I mean, I mean, it's just, it's, so it's just interesting to me, you know, just to see, to see this and, but, you know, what you

make, I want to leave it on this. What from a prosecutor, a former prosecutor standpoint, what you make of the, um, defense lawyer in his closing. I think that lasted four minutes, but in his closing, he conceded that his client committed a crime. It was just a misdemeanor. And then everything else was puffery and bragging. And he didn't really do anything. And no one testified that he punched anybody

and let my client free. What do you think about the admitting of the misdemeanor crime? I think that's a tactic that is used and is successfully used very often by defense attorneys. However, not for only you've got to do more than four minutes. I mean, if that is your theory and you want to say that it's a Mr. Meanor not a felony, you know, misdemeanor being the exposure will be obviously less than a year incarcerated whereas he's facing 20 years on this felony. So, so there's a reason why you you would argue that because he's on tapes on videos. You said that you had a GoPro camera where he's, you know, showing all of it. So there was no doubt he was there. So

I think that was probably the only defense that he was there, but it was, it didn't mean it. And it was just, it was all overexaggerated and it's a misdemeanor. But then you have to methodically not only break down the government's theory, but put something on yourself as to why it's a misdemeanor and not a felony. You can't do that in four minutes. That's a four hour summation right there.

Maybe he was double parked. Maybe he had to get out of the courtroom. I don't know. But these are the types of things that you and I like talking. This is the inside baseball stuff, even though you told me earlier that you're not a sports person. It's the inside molecular level things that people come to expect from legal AF law school podcasts, midweek editions. And we've just delivered another one.

And we're at the end of this show. I really appreciate the listeners and followers. Shout out to the Midas Mighty. Always, as I've said before and I mean it, I can't think of a better Wednesday night way to spend it than with Karen Friedman Agnifalo. Hope YouTube lets us on this time. It's great. Oh, we're out of YouTube jail. Oh, that's right. You know, we should End it on that. We are officially out of YouTube jail. It wasn't even us. It was our brothers. Our brothers that might as

Touch who did nothing wrong, by the way, and they got and they got I think I think the mightest brothers actually posted it. They got a form posted it, they got a form tweet back that said from YouTube, sorry, you're totally right. That was not consistent with our policies. Oops. I'm like, wait a minute. You and I had this amazing podcast last week. And then we had a scramble with 2,000 of our closest listeners and followers and go find another outlet off of YouTube and by the way we had our highest watched listen to

downloaded episode of midweek edition since we started. I think we should create a stampede effect every show with some sort of we're in jail everybody let us out go meet a song on Facebook but this one's gonna this one we're dropping on YouTube. It will be shown on time this evening and then in all the other places the people get their podcasts. So thank you again. We'll see you Karen next Wednesday. And I'm sure we're going to have a lot to talk about. Great to see you, Popeye. YouTube. Bye. Bye. you