GUILTY CT - Jennifer Dulos, 50, deceased/not found, New Canaan, 24 May 2019 *ARRESTS* #68

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Luft Interview post trial:


Quotes from Interview:

Following Michelle Troconis’ seven-week trial in Stamford, close friend and spokesperson for the friends and family of Jennifer Dulos, Carrie Luft, opened up about the trial, evidence and Jennifer in an exclusive interview.

“It was an almost indescribable experience, as you can tell from my lapsing into silence,” Luft said about the trial. “I mean, for me, I think I was experiencing this disbelief in that I don't know that I believed that that day would ever come, and like the solemnity and seriousness and ritual of the court and the legal process, and of the jury presenting their decisions, it was it was profound.”

Luft noted the sheer amount of evidence, saying the trial will have an impact on her, as well as Jennifer's friends and family, for a long time.

“I may have already used the adjective epic, but it was, it was epic. It it was fascinating to have the body of evidence illuminated piece by piece meticulously and systematically over the entirety of the prosecution's presentation," Luft said.

Luft also said that some of the evidence was incredibly difficult to look at. She and a small group had been privy to some photos of evidence collected along Albany Avenue in Hartford, but she said to see it in real life was hard.

“And that was incredibly affecting. You know, like I said, it made seeing her clothing just left, no question as to what had happened to Jennifer and seeing her clothing and knowing that that's what she wore, that's what she wore on the morning that she dropped her kids off at school, and that we've never seen her again. And it was it was brutal to witness,” Luft said.

Luft went on to say it was essential for jurors to understand the horrific acts done against Jennifer.

It was necessary to make clear that this woman would never have voluntarily left her children, but certainly did not, in any sense of the word, voluntarily disappear. That she was murdered in her garage.
Carrie Luft
As she has throughout the process, she also thanked investigators, jurors, the judge and state prosecutors following the massive case they had worked on over years.

“I know that Jennifer was always at the forefront of their minds, as you know, as they tried this case, as they walked each of the witnesses through testimony and as they presented the evidence, they were doing it on behalf of Jennifer and on behalf of her family and her kids," Luft said.

She also hopes the attention will continue to stimulate appropriate leads for investigators to follow up on.

“I guess I believe that there are some people who may have been involved in this situation who do know more than they've ever let on, and I hope that that comes to light," Luft said.

She was also asked about the five Dulos children, and while she couldn’t offer much because of the private nature of their lives, she could offer a small bit.

The priority is leading their lives, keeping the memories of their mom alive and the love for her alive and everything that she taught them and instilled in them.
Carrie Luft
When asked about Gloria, Jennifer's mother, and her willingness to take the stand as state prosecutors' last witness, Luft offered a bit about courage.

“For Gloria, she was incredibly brave to get up there on the stand, but I think she decided that it was right and necessary," she said.

As the trial ended, Luft also noted she would like people at home to recognize the victim in the case, Jennifer, as the person she was.

"She was all about love. She loved her children so immensely. She always wanted to be a mom,” Luft said. "She was not just some photo online. She was a real, incredible, vivid, hilarious, wonderful person. And I think that's part of what gets lost, understandably, in the trial. The victim ends up being this sort of emptiness or an absence around which everything in the legal process is taking place."

She said somewhere down the line, one way she has considered as a positive way to remember Jennifer would be to give her writings, new life.

“You know, she was incredibly accomplished. She's a great writer, a really powerful, wonderful, hilarious thinker. So, you know, I think down the road, it would be wonderful if some of her work could be given more life,” Luft said.

But in the immediate future, she said Jennifer would never want anyone to go through what she endured. And Luft said she expects Jennifer would have championed causes like domestic or intimate partner violence, to prevent situations like Jennifer's.

“It's important to note that this case has received a disproportionate amount of coverage, and I realize I'm contributing to that by speaking to you right now. But there are so many people whose stories are not being told, whose stories, when they go missing, don't get covered, you know, in that crucial window of time when it might be possible to find them if they are still alive and, you know, tragically, for those people who are murdered by their partners, that their stories are not being told, I think that needs to change,” Luft said.
 
Wow- hate to admit that this chronic air-lovemaker has one point.

The prosecution probably should not have said that this case was "about" Jennifer's children. True that: the trial was about Michelle being guilty or not guilty.

It's hardly like JS didn't do similar- trying to communicate his clients motherhood as much as possible, which also has nothing to do with the evidence and guilty or not guilty.

But he is right. Like a broken clock.

MOO
 
Yes to all! And lucegirl and afitzy: what an extensive group of summaries of this sad saga. Great work there!

I keep looking back at the fact that defendant MT IIRC was ‘trumpeting’ the existence of that sealed ‘Report’ in one (or more?) of her early recorded interviews with investigators, and her earlier attorney.

So that ‘Report’ seems to have been an early interest for whatever reason, and believed to be of some supposed ‘value’. MOO
I go back and forth about why the constant harping on the “report”. I tend to think the Defense used the mere idea of a mysterious report as a distraction and maybe it held more value sealed than unsealed. As @AbbyG said - whether a doctor thought she may have a disorder is a red herring. He murdered her and MT conspired. And the jury agreed.

It just seems so risky on the part of the defense to have suggested that Jennifer was in any way shape or form unfit, let alone less fit than FD. In hindsight - I think the jury held this unfounded insinuation against MT - and rightly so.

Jennifer had full custody because she was the only fit parent. The nanny’s testimony was as close as you could get to knowing what Jennifer was like as a mom and person; it’s just not reasonable to make the absurd leap the defense wants you to make - that the fit parent was suddenly so unfit that the otherwise unchanged unfitness of the parent without custody should expect a big change in his circumstances.

The nanny also gave a first hand account of FD’s unhingedness - as did PG: “Don’t do anything stupid because she might have security cameras.”

Regardless of what was in the report, FD had a huge burden to overcome in the eyes of the Family Court. He needed to demonstrate fitness in his own capacity. He doesn’t suddenly become “fit” because Jennifer may have seen a doctor for stress or whatever; but, she was not unstable, unfit, or throwing up red flags everywhere. You don’t inherit fitness from someone else.

Without even needing to read the report, it is clear that the defense mischaracterized its relevance with respect to any near term change in the custody arrangement. It seems more like others were walking on eggs around FD right until the murder. FD was a hothead and a bully - forcing people to sign NDA’s in unreasonable circumstances. The dinner party guests, may have just gone along with whatever story he was spinning to avoid confrontation; just tell him what he wants to hear.

FD probably bullied the GAL who seemed to skirt around saying anything concrete; the GAL spoke in generalities and longer term milestones - “Yes Fotis, we all know how much you love your kids and are excited to ski with them at the Pond. The court’s goal is reunification; so yes, you should be optimistic.”

The reality was FD was chipping, scratching, clawing and trying to get a toe hold anywhere just to get supervised custody - I mean that is intense that the supervisor had to be within eyesight and earshot of him at all times; it’s really hard for me to imagine that FD was able to cope mentally with having a strange, female babysitter monitoring his interaction with his children; he is a control freak; people work for him; nobody tells him what to do; this supervised visit on May 22, 2019 was much closer in time to the murder than the Hermann hearing and the feedback FD got from his then lawyers (I believe that it was sometime in April 2019 that FD’s lawyer Rose, said he reviewed the Herman report with FD and FD was happy about it.) It makes more sense that being supervised, without an actual change in that condition anywhere in sight, was more a tipping point than some possibly promising words on paper in Family Court. I would think whatever happiness that resulted from the supposedly favorable report would’ve been overshadowed by his being made subservient to a court appointed monitor two days before the murder.

He doesn’t strike me as somebody who would have patiently waited around and suddenly become a rule follower - hoping a Family Court would change his circumstances. He was impulsive, and I think he was humiliated having to be supervised. Even if he had been able to graduate from needing a court monitor, Jennifer would have still been in the picture. His path to any kind of custody was moving at a snail’s pace.

He was not cooling off he was angry.

I think the State’s point in closing that “nothing had changed” in terms of custody or is his fitness was spot on. There was no imminent game changer due to Jennifer’s fitness.

I also think that FD and MT could have agreed to act happy at the dinner party, and spin the custody report to create a facade and happy ending story in order to throw anyone off the scent that it was really Murder Eve.

This is probably the one burning question I have for the jury which is what did they make of the mention of the custody report and all of the commotion around it every time it came up?
 
Optics was what mattered to FD. He thought the report, bogus or not, was going to bring about an immediate change so motions were filed and denied. So, he was looking at one more summer season beginning with his kids not at the pond, not water skiing, and not making him look good by excelling beyond other kids. He also knew that his finances were tanking and soon he would not be able to keep up the pretenses of wealthy builder.

Time was running out. He needed those kids under his roof immediately with Jennifer or her estate paying hefty support. Only way was Jennifer unfit or dead. He chose. And, MT chose.
 
Apologies in advance for venting via virtual playlist - but can we dedicate Miley Cyrus & Wrecking Ball to Esteemed Defense Counsel for his bang up job representing himself, and all CT residents, who, as a matter of principle, will not stand for closed court hearings, in any circumstance.
 
I have a question that I have been meaning to ask after I read Jennifer's blog posts that never made it to Wayback. The post is titled Boca Weekend. The whole family went to Boca in Feb 2012, FD arriving separately, coming from Greece. This is the pertinent part of the blog post:

It was a very big reunion when we all finally saw Fotis come out of his car in Boca, just an hour before the party on Saturday. He’d flown through Paris to be here on time. Had had his court date on Friday, and it went well. But even if he wins the case again (he keeps winning it), the government can keep appealing. But we are hoping that his lawyer is good enough and they’ll just deem that they’ll never win and stop draining everyone’s time!

So my question is do we know why FD was in court in Greece?

Below is the link to the wall of text posts of her blog that contain her blog posts that never got into Wayback. AFAIK, they can only be seen using this route. I also included a SS of the raw text of the post

This link contains the Boca Weekend post, among others:


This link contains more posts


This is a SS of the post

Screenshot 2024-03-09 at 3.21.39 PM.png
 
Question: this continues to niggle me. Because I can't trust FD or the Inmate. Is there any way that they manipulated the doctor/diagnosis/report? The Inmate and her 700 questions... did that come before or after that hearing? Who has that many questions? It actually sounds more like a recipe for a diagnosis. Alibi scripts meet mental health scripts.

Maybe I'm totally off but something about it sits not right.

JMO
 
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Question: this continues to niggle me. Because I can't trust FD or the Inmate. Is there any way that they manipulated the doctor/diagnosis/report? The Inmate and her 700 questions... did that come before or after that hearing? Who has that many questions? It actually sounds more like a recipe for a diagnosis. Alibi scripts meet mental health scripts.

Maybe I'm totally off but something about it sits not right.

JMO
I think it's a reasonable inference, being that the author was unwilling to testify about it, and judge Heller sealed it because it wasn't ready to be entered into the record.

It was sealed in the very court it was meant to contribute to.

That says to me, tainted.

Edited to add: the point is well taken that if Jennifer had any diagnosis, yet was able to do the parenting she did- It was wholly irrelevant. You could have cancer and be able to parent. Or you could have cancer and be unable to eat without a tube, let alone feed others. The dx is meaningless. It's the impact on the day to day, or the lack of impact, the matters.

MOO
 
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This article has some info about the sealed report. It also mention two doctors who Fotis saw and their names are very similar. Dr. Stephen Herman who wrote the sealed report and a Dr Stephen Humphry who saw Fotis 20 times. Humphry was the one Rich Rochlin was referring to in his quotes about Fotis having no psychopathic tendencies. Makes me think there may have been a bit of “3card monte” going on, atleast with how it was spun.

https://www.stamfordadvocate.com/lo...-divorce-Judge-tosses-psych-exam-14455385.php
 
Question: this continues to niggle me. Because I can't trust FD or the Inmate. Is there any way that they manipulated the doctor/diagnosis/report? The Inmate and her 700 questions... did that come before or after that hearing? Who has that many questions? It actually sounds more like a recipe for a diagnosis. Alibi scripts meet mental health scripts.

Maybe I'm totally off but something about it sits not right.

JMO
I would defer to some of our more seasoned sleuths on this thread about the report history. While searching just now I did find this ‘interesting’ article posted from January 16, 2020 with a discussion with FD former counsel NP:

 
Apologies in advance for venting via virtual playlist - but can we dedicate Miley Cyrus & Wrecking Ball to Esteemed Defense Counsel for his bang up job representing himself, and all CT residents, who, as a matter of principle, will not stand for closed court hearings, in any circumstance.
Done! Good idea for a title tack too!
Artist: Miley Cyrus
Track: Wrecking Ball

Shout out to: Esteemed Defence Counsel

 
Yes to all! And lucegirl and afitzy: what an extensive group of summaries of this sad saga. Great work there!

I keep looking back at the fact that defendant MT IIRC was ‘trumpeting’ the existence of that sealed ‘Report’ in one (or more?) of her early recorded interviews with investigators, and her earlier attorney.

So that ‘Report’ seems to have been an early interest for whatever reason, and believed to be of some supposed ‘value’. MOO
I don’t recall the time frame, but could FD been thinking about his grand plan way back when he built that addition at the Farber weekend place?
 
This article has some info about the sealed report. It also mention two doctors who Fotis saw and their names are very similar. Dr. Stephen Herman who wrote the sealed report and a Dr Stephen Humphry who saw Fotis 20 times. Humphry was the one Rich Rochlin was referring to in his quotes about Fotis having no psychopathic tendencies. Makes me think there may have been a bit of “3card monte” going on, atleast with how it was spun.

https://www.stamfordadvocate.com/lo...-divorce-Judge-tosses-psych-exam-14455385.php
I'm glad this Lisa Backus Stamford Advocate article was brought back again here for folks to see now with much clearer visibility in hindsight.

I think this Lisa Backus article from 9/2019 (following on the footsteps of many earlier articles by then Hartford Courant reporter Dave Altimiri on a variety of topics and other Hearst company writers and CBS/NBC where Pattis had longstanding connections) was when folks here started to gain visibility into exactly how the various attorneys in the case were using information fed to the Media (Lisa Backus imo has been doing this since the beginning with the arrest of FD) to create a public narrative for their clients. CT is a small state and its media market is effectively dominated by 2 huge media conglomerates (mainly Hearst) and most of the longstanding small privately owned print outlets had been purchased or closed and so with perhaps the exception of the New Canaanite locally there were no non conglomerate owned outlets covering the story. Media manipulation as Pattis showed the world was easy to pull off in CT. It was also surprisingly easy to pull off in NYC (adjacent media market where most folks in Fairfield County and Tri State market) got their news because investigative journalism had gone the way of the 'dodo' and the race was on for clicks, views and 'exclusives' etc. The media world had changed from print to online and the Dulos case imo showed what it had become imo in terms of integrity and standards as well.

Many here, except perhaps those that had grown up in a strictly digital age, had all been conditioned reading the print and on air news media to 'trust' in the idea of some level of journalistic integrity, investigative journalism and editorial standards etc. This goes back to the old NYTs "All the News That is Fit to Print", until it wasn't and the mask was pulled off via a series of scandals imo. Print media had been dying a slow death and even longstanding local player Channel 12 (Marissa Alter) had left CT and Long Island and put its so called news staff in NJ (far away from CT).

So with the MSM focus on WS as the 'standard' for information and data on a case we plowed on and consumed this media information accepting it largely as 'fact' because that is what we were conditioned to do. We continued on in this manner until it became clear that the narrative being released in the Media was quite one sided and there was never any corresponding narrative from CSP or the States Attorney Office ever. It also became clear that much of the information was not fact or reality checked and at that point we largely abandoned the Media coverage as a source of facts and focused on the AA's presented by CSP.

I don't think early on following the disappearance/murder of JF many here (myself included in a major way which is why this entire topic simply enrages me to this day!) truly understood the the media world as we might have experienced it growing up had evolved into a game of 'clicks', 'views', and sensationalism without integrity or standards such as might have existed in the past.

Articles became sound bites for POVs from defence attorneys who believed in aggressive PR and sophisticated disinformation campaigns. There was great demand from the public for updates and so the Media machine cranked out story after story from the only sources speaking to them who at the time were FD and later MT attorneys. Who can forget the carefully crafted FD NBC interviews? When was the last time we have seen someone accused of murder on national TV pretrial?

We learned that the typical routine was that the attorneys would typically make contact with a 'reporter' and put their sound bite out and in this case Lisa Backus would print the story and then the rest of the watching media would effectively reword the content and 'REPOST' the information and that is where the phrase 'reposter' was developed because these story lines would be rapidly reposted like mushrooms from media outlets all over the world. It was overwhelming to keep up and it did take awhile to figure out what was going on but eventually it was hard to hide as there never was any real new information except that which came from the mouths of defence counsels. It was also funny to watch "reposting' gone amuck when the reposted story even misstated the original source incorrectly. it all became a farce imo.

Its notable that CSP and the State beyond some very basic statements early after the arrests never spoke about the case and instead issued very long and detailed arrest warrants for public review.

In the article by Lisa Backus we see Rochlin (one in long line of FD attorneys) making his case to the public using confidential medical information about his client. This was a tactic first used by Atty Norm Pattis who iirc first brought up the infamous Herman report (Pattis had a copy of the report from FD who had stolen it either from GAL Meehan or Atty Michael Rose imo) and was simply trying to create doubt on behalf of his client and also figure out a way to admit a then sealed document into court. I also think during the period immediately following the FD arrest that Pattis set as his top goal to taint the jury pool with such proven nonsense as "Gone Girl" etc. He was so successful in this regard that the "Gone Girl" commentary even made it into the public narrative of the MT trial and we saw a juror excused for referencing it. But, CSP in the AA for FD put a pin into the "Gone Girl" with reference to the blood loss in the Welles Garage from JF and so the idea of her fleeing her much loved children was discredited and Pattis imo was seeing as a lying buffoon who became as much a part of the media story as his murderous client.

Just to respond to the OP and Dr Stephen Humphrey and FD. I believe this is the doctor that FD went to after he was ordered to therapy by Judge Heller in Family Court. FD used his children (mainly the two oldest) to lie to JF about the presence of MT and her daughter at their visitation meetings. Judge Heller had banned MT and her daughter from the Dulos children and MT and FD had decided that they knew better and so per usual disregarded the Court ruling. MT had also used her daughter to facilitate communication with FD and the Dulos children using electronic means iirc during a period when FD lost access to the children. There had been an error made in the Family Court order regarding the reference to MT and her daughter where the "and her daughter" was excluded from the no contact order. MT and FD exploited this error until such time as JF and her attorney got the error fixed in Court. FD (and MT) didn't understand how having the Dulos children lie to their mother was not a 'good thing' and not only this neither FD nor MT refused to understand the severe stress and psychological trauma this inflicted on the children being asked to lie.

It was during this period that FD and MT really tried to weaponise the Dulos children against JF and the stress and strain on JF as well as the children must have been unimaginable.

The reference in the article to 'no psychopathic tendencies' was interesting as virtually all the reading I did on the topic of malignant narcissism seemed to believe that the line between it and 'psychopathy' existed on a spectrum and that the lines between the two diagnoses was often times 'blurred'. Rochlin never talked about the powerful and potentially dangerous ability of malignant narcissists to wreck havoc with horrific results on the lives of people in their lives and instead focused his narrative on 'psychopathic tendencies'. Curious don't you think?

I was reading through some of the early media again today on the Media Thread here and its amazing imo that folks here carried on and did such amazing work pulling apart the case details using just the AAs as it became clear by the end of 2019 that MSM wouldn't be answering much in terms of what happened to JF. In hindsight though seeing the media manipulation first by Pattis and eventually Schoenhorn its shocking to see all laid out on the timeline and today all I could think of was being States Attorney Colangelo and eventually Atty Manning and Atty McGuiness and looking at the MSM and thinking correctly that an alternate universe had been created by the MSM that bore little resemblance to the facts and evidence of the cases of FD or MT. IMO its shocking but true but it was a wake up call imo about the state of the media in one of the largest media markets in the US as Fairfield Country at its southern most tip in Greenwich is roughly 35 miles by vehicle.

Sobering stuff and imo its impact on WS has been significant too.

MOO
 
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Yes to all! And lucegirl and afitzy: what an extensive group of summaries of this sad saga. Great work there!

I keep looking back at the fact that defendant MT IIRC was ‘trumpeting’ the existence of that sealed ‘Report’ in one (or more?) of her early recorded interviews with investigators, and her earlier attorney.

So that ‘Report’ seems to have been an early interest for whatever reason, and believed to be of some supposed ‘value’. MOO
I truly think the only value the report has was as a tool of disinformation and now I really wonder if the reason Horn fought like Don Quixote with a wrecking ball as described masterfully by @lucegirl was simply to prove that the report would never be released ever and so anybody could say anything about it and such statements/lies/dis/misinformation could never be disproved?

Listening the the closing arguments today again as I captured the slide show of Atty McGuiness for the Media Thread here on WS, he did explain to the jury (implied in his statement that he had read the entire discredited report which I thought was important) was that there was nothing in the report to support either FD or MT being "Happy" or "Pleased" with how things were going in Family Court. It was short reference in his closing presentation as I think he sped things up as he was slightly off pace imo. But, I think the Jury looked at the credibility of Atty McGuiness and stacked it up against the entire presentation of the Defence about the "Murders Eve" dinner where everyone was "Happy" or Hutch who didn't seem to have a clue that anything was upsetting FD all that much or even the various statements of Horn and Mini Horn during their 'testimony cross' statements made during GAL Michael Meehan time on the stand or in the crazed and chaotic imo closing presentation of Horn. FWIW I trust the statement of Atty McGuiness vs that of Atty Jon Schoenhorn and most definitely vs Atty Pattis! I guess folks will have to decide who they feel has the most credibility but I think the Jury made their determination and voted to convict MT unanimously.

Its a neat tool of disinformation imo worthy of things seen variously in history going back to WWII imo. Pattis for whatever you think of him was a student of history and understood the power of a public narrative on behalf of his client. Pattis also knew once he saw the AAs for FD that the facts of the case weren't on his side and so imo he worked what he could and so he manipulated and managed the press even with the 'gag order' in place.

Sadly I wish I could say the State of CT Attorneys learned anything about how they had their jury pool tainted and clocks cleaned by Pattis and the long string of FD and MT attorneys. IMO they got lucky with the jurors in the MT trial but my guess is that there will be one time sometime in the future where they won't get lucky and that the tainted jury pool will have an impact.

I hope the State of CT judiciary folks look at the issue of media manipulation and act proactively to impose a gag sooner in high profile cases but I'm not holding my breath as the manager of Attys Manning and McGuiness knew about the media manipulation in the Troconis case and operated with it for 5 years and DID NOTHING even though he complained bitterly in his motions about Schoenhorn leaking via exhibits to his motion to Judge Blawie and Judge White.

The Judges did nothing to help in the case of the MT trial either as so the MSM Media Circus continued and we saw Schoenhorn and Atty Michael Rose leaking confidential medical information about JF to not unsurprisingly, the Stamford Advocate and Lisa Backus. Won't even go there on the personal PR machine of MT and the Troconis Crew, Shannon Miller aka self appointed "Seeker of Truth" on her social media as in her case imo the less said the BETTER!

MOO
 
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I completely agree with you. In fact, before I dug into why the Defense felt the need to dangle it into thin air every 5 minutes, I wondered why the State didn’t try to demystify it -without trying to bring it into evidence (which wasn’t really an option), but IMO, the State contributed to its intrigue on a certain level.

Obviously - not many people (at least non-felons), know what is in the report; but, like you said, was there anything so damning one way or another that the verdict would have hinged on it?

I personally doubt it - I don’t know what were the credentials of the doctor, which side engaged the doctor, is the doctor an expert who testifies on the regular; the doctor left the stand? Good grief.

I don’t know if the State could have, or just declined, to take on the credibility of the report and the author without getting into the substance - if the court would have allowed that. It’s the worst piece of non evidence just to the extent it caused confusion.

I have read multiple accounts of the report - that “FD was the better parent”; to there was no evidence Jennifer was inclined to self harm - and that consequently, the report was more indicative of foul play v Gone Girl.

If the report had come in - my guess is the State and Defense positions would have likely canceled each other out.

But - I would have liked it if the State had been more aggressive in asserting that this custody report is a red herring. But that strategy could have also backfired, so I think the State, knowing way more than we, made the right decision to focus on the irrefutable evidence and not the Greek salad.
FD paid the Herman 20,000 for the report and 8,000 for him to testify. The doctor deemed FD fit and JF unfit. So go figure…
 
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Luft Interview post trial:


Quotes from Interview:

Following Michelle Troconis’ seven-week trial in Stamford, close friend and spokesperson for the friends and family of Jennifer Dulos, Carrie Luft, opened up about the trial, evidence and Jennifer in an exclusive interview.

“It was an almost indescribable experience, as you can tell from my lapsing into silence,” Luft said about the trial. “I mean, for me, I think I was experiencing this disbelief in that I don't know that I believed that that day would ever come, and like the solemnity and seriousness and ritual of the court and the legal process, and of the jury presenting their decisions, it was it was profound.”

Luft noted the sheer amount of evidence, saying the trial will have an impact on her, as well as Jennifer's friends and family, for a long time.

“I may have already used the adjective epic, but it was, it was epic. It it was fascinating to have the body of evidence illuminated piece by piece meticulously and systematically over the entirety of the prosecution's presentation," Luft said.

Luft also said that some of the evidence was incredibly difficult to look at. She and a small group had been privy to some photos of evidence collected along Albany Avenue in Hartford, but she said to see it in real life was hard.

“And that was incredibly affecting. You know, like I said, it made seeing her clothing just left, no question as to what had happened to Jennifer and seeing her clothing and knowing that that's what she wore, that's what she wore on the morning that she dropped her kids off at school, and that we've never seen her again. And it was it was brutal to witness,” Luft said.

Luft went on to say it was essential for jurors to understand the horrific acts done against Jennifer.


As she has throughout the process, she also thanked investigators, jurors, the judge and state prosecutors following the massive case they had worked on over years.

“I know that Jennifer was always at the forefront of their minds, as you know, as they tried this case, as they walked each of the witnesses through testimony and as they presented the evidence, they were doing it on behalf of Jennifer and on behalf of her family and her kids," Luft said.

She also hopes the attention will continue to stimulate appropriate leads for investigators to follow up on.

“I guess I believe that there are some people who may have been involved in this situation who do know more than they've ever let on, and I hope that that comes to light," Luft said.

She was also asked about the five Dulos children, and while she couldn’t offer much because of the private nature of their lives, she could offer a small bit.


When asked about Gloria, Jennifer's mother, and her willingness to take the stand as state prosecutors' last witness, Luft offered a bit about courage.

“For Gloria, she was incredibly brave to get up there on the stand, but I think she decided that it was right and necessary," she said.

As the trial ended, Luft also noted she would like people at home to recognize the victim in the case, Jennifer, as the person she was.

"She was all about love. She loved her children so immensely. She always wanted to be a mom,” Luft said. "She was not just some photo online. She was a real, incredible, vivid, hilarious, wonderful person. And I think that's part of what gets lost, understandably, in the trial. The victim ends up being this sort of emptiness or an absence around which everything in the legal process is taking place."

She said somewhere down the line, one way she has considered as a positive way to remember Jennifer would be to give her writings, new life.

“You know, she was incredibly accomplished. She's a great writer, a really powerful, wonderful, hilarious thinker. So, you know, I think down the road, it would be wonderful if some of her work could be given more life,” Luft said.

But in the immediate future, she said Jennifer would never want anyone to go through what she endured. And Luft said she expects Jennifer would have championed causes like domestic or intimate partner violence, to prevent situations like Jennifer's.

“It's important to note that this case has received a disproportionate amount of coverage, and I realize I'm contributing to that by speaking to you right now. But there are so many people whose stories are not being told, whose stories, when they go missing, don't get covered, you know, in that crucial window of time when it might be possible to find them if they are still alive and, you know, tragically, for those people who are murdered by their partners, that their stories are not being told, I think that needs to change,” Luft said.
Eloquent. She spoke for Jennifer.
 
Wow- hate to admit that this chronic air-lovemaker has one point.

The prosecution probably should not have said that this case was "about" Jennifer's children. True that: the trial was about Michelle being guilty or not guilty.

It's hardly like JS didn't do similar- trying to communicate his clients motherhood as much as possible, which also has nothing to do with the evidence and guilty or not guilty.

But he is right. Like a broken clock.

MOO
No. No. No. He’s grasping at straws now.
 
FD paid the doctor 20,000 for the report and 8,000 for him to testifying. The doctor deemed FD and JF unfit. So go figure…
He could have placed a hidden camera in or outside of her home during that last outdoor picnic with the children so he could be certain she left her home. Or perhaps even hid a “kill bag” with a weapon, taser or mace and other items behind a tree on the property.
 
He could have placed a hidden camera in or outside of her home during that last outdoor picnic with the children so he could be certain she left her home. Or perhaps even hid a “kill bag” with a weapon, taser or mace and other items behind a tree on the property.
The one time he's early for something. It was no accident.

He might've been two hours early for all anybody knows.

Dry run from Waveny. Scope out where to dump the bike, how to approach Welles on foot. A garage bay may have been open that day... he could have sneaked in and unlocked the access door...

What he did we may never know but it seems certain he was up to no good.
 
FD paid the Herman 20,000 for the report and 8,000 for him to testify. The doctor deemed FD fit and JF unfit. So go figure…
I get your point, but the sealed report probably did not deem JD " unfit." If it had, those words would likely have appeared on Troconis' laptop for the world.

Michelle had to know she had only one chance at this broadcast. She would have picked what she thought was most advantageous. A Dx. Is nothing without additional information about its impact. "Unfit," would be quite the impact. If the dx is a personality disorder, a mood disorder, and intestinal infection, or a hangnail, it is freaking serious if the impact is a parent becomes "unfit."

We don't know the contents of the report. But I think it is a very reasonable assumption it did not find Jennifer "unfit."

I know you don't think so either. But I feel like you might be misunderstood.

MOO
 
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