GUILTY FL - FSU Law Professor Dan Markel Murdered by Hitmen #17

[Laura930]

Yes, and when he started to sit down, he reached and looked like he was pulling his waistband up (like maybe they removed his belt as well). Here's the video:

Maybe Scooba can say if that is also usual in Fla.

Have any lip-readers analyzed that clip as to what CA is saying to DR?

 

[Ferpo]

My heart goes out to Dan's boys. Don't be surprised if DA/HA/WA pack up shop in SFla and relo out of the country to
escape future potential prosecution. Can't imagine the taunting and bullying they might endure in school here due to CA's conviction.

I kind of suspect this too. From the Justice Department's FAQ on Extradition below, it could buy them significant more freedom time if they found an appropriate country.

How long will it take to extradite the wanted person?

Extradition of persons located abroad can take many months or even years to complete. The United States works with foreign authorities to locate wanted persons and then to request the extradition of the person. However, the extradition case is handled by the foreign authorities in the foreign courts. Once the extradition request is submitted to the foreign government, the United States does not control the pace of the proceedings. Even if there are no immediate legal impediments to extradition, it may take many months or even many years for the extradition request to be heard by the courts and for the executive authority to make a surrender decision.

 

[amicuscurie]

IA with the comments that Wendi just went along with it. I don’t think she actively conspired although she’s the only one who could’ve told them that Dan was gonna be out of town the following day. It sounds like she was ready to resign herself to live in Tally and move on “in peace.” I think she was manipulated by Donna to go a diff way. That 3rd email is indeed telling as others have noted. That woman has been doing this to her children their whole lives. She has an immense amount of control over them even though they are adults. It’s very hard to get out from under that type of narcissistic mothering. JMO

Yep. I want to make it clear she is presumed innocent and not charged with anything. I do appreciate how difficult it can be to get out from this kind of mothering, but there would hopefully be a line one would not cross, as an officer of the court. This is the only life her children have ever known, with their grandparents and uncle. They’re 13 and 14 now and 10 years is most of their lives, percentage wise. Speaking generally and not about this specific case, as I don’t know what happens behind closed doors, family loyalty is strong, and children in general are easier to control and find it much more difficult to resist or see the problems in their family of origin. I feel for the Markels and do want them to have a relationship with the boys, but that might not be possible right now.

Carl seems very focused on Wendi (105 reasons!), and her culpability, and he never seems to recognize the issues we have discussed here as to any potential evidence against her and whether it is sufficient to charge her. As I’ve also mentioned, his brother has a blog about parental alienation, and Carl might have become interested in this from that angle. I’ve got to say, parental alienation was the LEAST of Dan’s problems, in retrospect.

 

[amicuscurie]

I enjoy STS and basically agree with the topline that the Adelsons are morally culpable and (mostly) legally guilty. Unpopular slight dissent though: I think the podcast has gotten way too pro-prosecution. Steinbeck and others are clearly hardcore law and order folks, which is fine and a valid perspective, but the intensity of their views without any dissent tends to make the show an echo chamber that lacks nuance.

For example, the 100 odd reasons Steinbeck has that Wendi is guilty strikes me as dramatic overstatement. Many of the "reasons" are analytically poor or repetitive. Most of them are debatable inferences along the lines of "Wendi acted this way but an innocent person would have acted differently." This is the weakest kind of argument in favor of guilt because it wrongly assumes that there is a correct or categorically "innocent" way to behave, when in fact human reactions are idiosyncratic and often counterintuitive.

I wish the discussions were more tightly disciplined by the relevant legal standards. For Wendi, who did not pull the trigger, the question is whether she can be convicted on an abetting or conspiracy theory. Either way there has to be some concrete act that aided the commission of the crime. So all the evidence of her consciousness that the plot was afoot, however morally damning, is not relevant. There may be such an act (most likely IMO that she appeared to be confirming Lacasse's travel plans in the parking lot after the yoga breakup) but the question of her guilt turns on that issue, not on debatable inferences about her consciousness of the plot.

Keep in mind also that the "Best Guests" also agreed emphatically that Katie would not testify and that if she did she would get shredded on cross examination because of her prior inconsistent testimony. They were dead wrong on both counts. In fact, she did testify and stood up well to Rashbaum (helps to be telling the truth for a change). I was 100% convinced by STS's take on this issue given their expertise and intensity, but when the exact opposite happened it reminded me that being emphatic is not the same as being right.

Again, I like and often listen to STS and I appreciate their focus on this trial. This is more just in the manner of construcitive criticism--I'd like to see more balanced/measured takes.

Agree. You Tube is great, but it also seems like anybody can call themselves a legal expert these days. Even me, poor lawyer that I am! I’m going to start a podcast called “Bad Lawyer.”

 

[justice1960]

Excellent points. Agree. I just think that WA will be able to cast enough reasonable doubt to not get the conviction necessarily. Carl Steinbeck, jury trial, mentor, is excellent with all of this. He has like 150 reasons why she should be indicted. He's been on surviving the survivor and his own channel. I do have my doubts, though in terms of getting at minimum a hung jury on her. I still am not sure on HA knowing in advance. I believe he did, but I don't think the evidence will clear reasonable doubt.

DA is going down, but I am concerned that because she is older now, she will start showing up in a wheelchair and an oxygen mask lol. Anything to get out of it.

We see that some phone records cannot be discovered so many years later. That's the problem with waiting so long on this case. If they could have access to the ‎WhatsApp messages, that would be a treasure trove. That would

Excellent points. Agree. I just think that WA will be able to cast enough reasonable doubt to not get the conviction necessarily. Carl Steinbeck, jury trial, mentor, is excellent with all of this. He has like 150 reasons why she should be indicted. He's been on surviving the survivor and his own channel. I do have my doubts, though in terms of getting at minimum a hung jury on her. I still am not sure on HA knowing in advance. I believe he did, but I don't think the evidence will clear reasonable doubt.

DA is going down, but I am concerned that because she is older now, she will start showing up in a wheelchair and an oxygen mask lol. Anything to get out of it.

We see that some phone records cannot be discovered so many years later. That's the problem with waiting so long on this case. If they could have access to the ‎WhatsApp messages, that would be a treasure trove. That would really get the goods on Wendy. But I don't think it's possible almost 10 years later.

really get the goods on Wendy. But I don't think it's possible almost 10 yea

Boy - that was a quick verdict! Did not expect it!

And THANK YOU all for all the info!

You are a very dedicated person Niner... Very well organized and thanks for all that you and Seattle1 do!

 

[Laineybin]

OH EM GEE! I signed out right after the jury went to deliberate and have been working non-stop on a work deadline. I check in 20 minutes ago and am just overwhelmed! I am relieved to see some justice for Dan and his family.

 

[Wishbone]

Yep. I want to make it clear she is presumed innocent and not charged with anything. I do appreciate how difficult it can be to get out from this kind of mothering, but there would hopefully be a line one would not cross, as an officer of the court. This is the only life her children have ever known, with their grandparents and uncle. They’re 13 and 14 now and 10 years is most of their lives, percentage wise. Speaking generally and not about this specific case, as I don’t know what happens behind closed doors, family loyalty is strong, and children in general are easier to control and find it much more difficult to resist or see the problems in their family of origin. I feel for the Markels and do want them to have a relationship with the boys, but that might not be possible right now.

Carl seems very focused on Wendi (105 reasons!), and her culpability, and he never seems to recognize the issues we have discussed here as to any potential evidence against her and whether it is sufficient to charge her. As I’ve also mentioned, his brother has a blog about parental alienation, and Carl might have become interested in this from that angle. I’ve got to say, parental alienation was the LEAST of Dan’s problems, in retrospect.

It's as laughable to me as Charlie's extortion story that Wendi would not have knowledge of the plot to murder Danny and do her part to facilitate it. In previous scenarios mommy Donna made sure to fill her in on her evil imaginings and methods to manage Danny. It was up to Wendi whether or not to implement any given plot. The final plot needed Wendi's approval and IMO she gave it and helped bring it to fruition. Donna did not do anything on her own without Wendi's approval and help.

 

[amicuscurie]

It's as laughable to me as Charlie's extortion story that Wendi would not have knowledge of the plot to murder Danny and do her part to facilitate it. In previous scenarios mommy Donna made sure to fill her in on her evil imaginings and methods to manage Danny. It was up to Wendi whether or not to implement any given plot. The final plot needed Wendi's approval and IMO she gave it and helped bring it to fruition. Donna did not do anything on her own without Wendi's approval and help.

Speaking hypothetically, how could someone think that going into a police station after someone has been murdered and saying “my brother often joked about hiring a hit man but would never do it” would throw the police off the scent? What would be the actual purpose of such a statement?

ETA- nobody would have found this out but for the police interview. Unless the Tv repairman spoke. But, again, hypothetically, why would someone make this statement to the TV repairman?

It would have taken longer to find LaCasse but for the police interview as well.

And now I’m sounding like Carl.

 

[Blue Shakehead]

I enjoy STS and basically agree with the topline that the Adelsons are morally culpable and (mostly) legally guilty. Unpopular slight dissent though: I think the podcast has gotten way too pro-prosecution. Steinbeck and others are clearly hardcore law and order folks, which is fine and a valid perspective, but the intensity of their views without any dissent tends to make the show an echo chamber that lacks nuance.

For example, the 100 odd reasons Steinbeck has that Wendi is guilty strikes me as dramatic overstatement. Many of the "reasons" are analytically poor or repetitive. Most of them are debatable inferences along the lines of "Wendi acted this way but an innocent person would have acted differently." This is the weakest kind of argument in favor of guilt because it wrongly assumes that there is a correct or categorically "innocent" way to behave, when in fact human reactions are idiosyncratic and often counterintuitive.

I wish the discussions were more tightly disciplined by the relevant legal standards. For Wendi, who did not pull the trigger, the question is whether she can be convicted on an abetting or conspiracy theory. Either way there has to be some concrete act that aided the commission of the crime. So all the evidence of her consciousness that the plot was afoot, however morally damning, is not relevant. There may be such an act (most likely IMO that she appeared to be confirming Lacasse's travel plans in the parking lot after the yoga breakup) but the question of her guilt turns on that issue, not on debatable inferences about her consciousness of the plot.

Keep in mind also that the "Best Guests" also agreed emphatically that Katie would not testify and that if she did she would get shredded on cross examination because of her prior inconsistent testimony. They were dead wrong on both counts. In fact, she did testify and stood up well to Rashbaum (helps to be telling the truth for a change). I was 100% convinced by STS's take on this issue given their expertise and intensity, but when the exact opposite happened it reminded me that being emphatic is not the same as being right.

Again, I like and often listen to STS and I appreciate their focus on this trial. This is more just in the manner of construcitive criticism--I'd like to see more balanced/measured takes.

Totally agree. I was initially a fan of Carl Steinbeck's analysis and suspicious of Tim Jansen's. Carl seemed to have a strong grasp of the facts whereas Tim was coming in as a Tally legal expert and obviously had not spent his spare time studying every possible detail of the case. Tim also had met with Rashbaum and seemed preferential to the Defense and so that got my antenna up. Tim was offering up insider information based on his local sources like "Magbanua's proffer is a nothing-burger, she didn't give them anything, etc." How could that even possibly be true - she was in the middle! At one point, Steinbeck aggressively called out Jansen and questioned his ethics and morals.

But over the past several months and especially during the trial, I have done a full 180 on both men. Tim Jansen has been completely honest and reliable. He was right about Magbanua's proffer and he was open to the possibility of the Defense putting on a strong case. But once Jansen saw the Defense strategy, he was completely shocked and his analysis changed - including the possibility of Katie testifying. And despite having been unsure about the State's ability to charge Donna - after he saw the evidence in this case, some of it new - he wondered aloud how she was not arrested already and believes they have enough and will charge her. But some of the new evidence in this case can also be interpreted as exculpatory for Wendi....and he has pointed it out. I see Tim Jansen as a very experienced and smart defense attorney but also a very principled person. No agenda. He just calls "balls and strikes" as he sees them.

As for Carl, I would just say that I would have a lot more faith in his ability to prosecute Wendi Adelson if he could figure out how to get his laptop and microphones to work. I like his passion and we are mostly on the same team, but if I had to pick an attorney to prosecute or defend this case, I am going with Tim Jansen over Steinbeck 100% of the time.

 

[Wishbone]

Speaking hypothetically, how could someone think that going into a police station after someone has been murdered and saying “my brother often joked about hiring a hit man but would never do it” would throw the police off the scent? What would be the actual purpose of such a statement?

ETA- nobody would have found this out but for the police interview. Unless the Tv repairman spoke. But, again, hypothetically, why would someone make this statement to the TV repairman?

It would have taken longer to find LaCasse but for the police interview as well.

And now I’m sounding like Carl.

She threw out a lot of names and various people during her interview. Maybe she was just pointing her finger at anyone but herself to keep the law from looking at her. Pointing them in the wrong direction which was any direction but hers.

 

[Weki]

I enjoy STS and basically agree with the topline that the Adelsons are morally culpable and (mostly) legally guilty. Unpopular slight dissent though: I think the podcast has gotten way too pro-prosecution. Steinbeck and others are clearly hardcore law and order folks, which is fine and a valid perspective, but the intensity of their views without any dissent tends to make the show an echo chamber that lacks nuance.

For example, the 100 odd reasons Steinbeck has that Wendi is guilty strikes me as dramatic overstatement. Many of the "reasons" are analytically poor or repetitive. Most of them are debatable inferences along the lines of "Wendi acted this way but an innocent person would have acted differently." This is the weakest kind of argument in favor of guilt because it wrongly assumes that there is a correct or categorically "innocent" way to behave, when in fact human reactions are idiosyncratic and often counterintuitive.

I wish the discussions were more tightly disciplined by the relevant legal standards. For Wendi, who did not pull the trigger, the question is whether she can be convicted on an abetting or conspiracy theory. Either way there has to be some concrete act that aided the commission of the crime. So all the evidence of her consciousness that the plot was afoot, however morally damning, is not relevant. There may be such an act (most likely IMO that she appeared to be confirming Lacasse's travel plans in the parking lot after the yoga breakup) but the question of her guilt turns on that issue, not on debatable inferences about her consciousness of the plot.

Keep in mind also that the "Best Guests" also agreed emphatically that Katie would not testify and that if she did she would get shredded on cross examination because of her prior inconsistent testimony. They were dead wrong on both counts. In fact, she did testify and stood up well to Rashbaum (helps to be telling the truth for a change). I was 100% convinced by STS's take on this issue given their expertise and intensity, but when the exact opposite happened it reminded me that being emphatic is not the same as being right.

Again, I like and often listen to STS and I appreciate their focus on this trial. This is more just in the manner of construcitive criticism--I'd like to see more balanced/measured takes.

100%. I’m not a fan of Carl Steinbeck’s views. You’ve already nailed all the reasons why so I won’t get into it. It’s uncomfortable to be critical of the prosecution when there’s so much pro-prosecution advocacy by the guests and chatters. A balanced, nuanced view is more interesting. John Singer is pretty good and I wish they’d have him in more.

This is why I really enjoy Lawyer You Know. He doesn’t pander to his audience and calls it as he sees it.

 

[Blue Shakehead]

Something we haven't spent much time talking about, given the potential it had. We spent years and years waiting on the Magbanua proffer. And I can't imagine a scenario where that proffer could be worse than what it was. What an absolute disgrace.

 

[userunnamed]

Speaking hypothetically, how could someone think that going into a police station after someone has been murdered and saying “my brother often joked about hiring a hit man but would never do it” would throw the police off the scent? What would be the actual purpose of such a statement?

ETA- nobody would have found this out but for the police interview. Unless the Tv repairman spoke. But, again, hypothetically, why would someone make this statement to the TV repairman?

It would have taken longer to find LaCasse but for the police interview as well.

And now I’m sounding like Carl.

So I am thinking WA was aware she had told that 'joke' to other people, including JL, and she was engaging in
pre-emptive behavior. A way of getting ahead of a situation and controlling the narrative. She had to have known JL would be interviewed as well as other people--she's an attorney herself and this is a huge crime.

I think it was all calculated. Pre-emptive mitigation is basically what she was implementing. The goal is to create a plausible explanation for the evidence that does not incriminate the suspect. And as we saw, this strategy did not work out for her brother.

 

[amicuscurie]

She threw out a lot of names and various people during her interview. Maybe she was just pointing her finger at anyone but herself to keep the law from looking at her. Pointing them in the wrong direction which was any direction but hers.

dbm

 

[justice1960]

Yep. I want to make it clear she is presumed innocent and not charged with anything. I do appreciate how difficult it can be to get out from this kind of mothering, but there would hopefully be a line one would not cross, as an officer of the court. This is the only life her children have ever known, with their grandparents and uncle. They’re 13 and 14 now and 10 years is most of their lives, percentage wise. Speaking generally and not about this specific case, as I don’t know what happens behind closed doors, family loyalty is strong, and children in general are easier to control and find it much more difficult to resist or see the problems in their family of origin. I feel for the Markels and do want them to have a relationship with the boys, but that might not be possible right now.

Carl seems very focused on Wendi (105 reasons!), and her culpability, and he never seems to recognize the issues we have discussed here as to any potential evidence against her and whether it is sufficient to charge her. As I’ve also mentioned, his brother has a blog about parental alienation, and Carl might have become interested in this from that angle. I’ve got to say, parental alienation was the LEAST of Dan’s problems, in retrospect.

Agree. You Tube is great, but it also seems like anybody can call themselves a legal expert these days. Even me, poor lawyer that I am! I’m going to start a podcast called “Bad Lawyer.”

Exactly! I think this is a good summary of how it could’ve gone down. I still think, unfortunately, that there is not a lot of hard evidence against Wendi, perhaps because of the dynamic and how they wanted to protect her. They probably knew that merely knowing about a crime and not doing anything is not itself a crime, (she’s a lawyer), and so they purposely did not ask her to do any of the planning, payment, etc.

EXCEPT — that one email to Dan, asking if he would be home July 18. Cell tower data shows that email was sent when they were all near the family’s apartment in Miami Beach. I believe testimony was that it was the weekend of Harvey’s birthday, after the first attempt had failed. The text itself is not a crime; after all, they shared custody and probably sent a lot of texts like this. That’s what A’s might have thought at least. (“You’ll just say you were texting him about custody, that’s not a crime.”). But coupled with the timing, and the cell tower data, it may be enough to implicate her.

Also, LaCasse’s story about how the TV was broken is suspicious, particularly the timing, but even he does not say he really knows how it was broken, only that it didn’t appear to be damage inflicted by a child’s toy. Maybe there is more.

Driving by the scene after the fact is not a crime, unless perhaps it could be show that it was done somehow in furtherance of the conspiracy, like for the purpose of confirming it had been done so that payment could be made. Not sure that is the case.

This brings up something I’ve noticed throughout this case. Charlie seems to think that as long as they’re talking in code, or “only sitting in a car”, or “only rented a car,“ etc., that there’s no evidence of a crime that can be traced to them. He only looks at each action and concludes it’s “technically” not a crime. You can hear him rationalize like this on the Dolce Vita tape. I don’t think he realized how it looked, taken all together. I don’t think he knew as much about how evidence works, or how police work, as he thought he did on those tapes. I don’t think he understands the concept of circumstantial evidence. A lot of people think circumstantial evidence is not enough. You always hear “that’s just circumstantial“ as if it’s not enough. But you learn in law school that circumstantial evidence IS evidence. In fact, there’s usually not a lot of direct evidence, such as fingerprints, the gun, a videotape of the person doing the crime, etc. Many cases are made on circumstantial evidence. If you’re not familiar with trials and police work, you don’t know this.

very informative, thanks!

 

[amicuscurie]

So I am thinking WA was aware she had told that 'joke' to other people, including JL, and she was engaging in
pre-emptive behavior. A way of getting ahead of a situation and controlling the narrative. She had to have known JL would be interviewed as well as other people--she's an attorney herself and this is a huge crime.

I think it was all calculated. Pre-emptive mitigation is basically what she was implementing. The goal is to create a plausible explanation for the evidence that does not incriminate the suspect. And as we saw, this strategy did not work out for her brother.

Agreed. It just doesn’t seem very wise as a strategy. Better, in the first place, not to say the stuff to other people that you need to preemptively mitigate. And it seems unreasonable not to have known that the strategy would draw suspicion on the brother, preemptive or not. And LaCasse might not have been interviewed right away, although I suppose he would have eventually. Magbanua was never interviewed or even approached, despite the fact that the police were given Charlie as a lead. They didn’t even ask to interview Charlie, or investigate his life, which is unbelievable to me given all Wendi and LaCasse were saying. It took them a while, and lots of tower dumps, to find Magbanua, when interviewing even one friend of Charlie’s could’ve gotten her. She might have talked, this was way before the bump. Who knows?


If you have no knowledge, and you talk, it might not hurt you. If refuse to talk, it looks bad. But not as bad as if you have knowledge and you talk in an effort to seem like you don’t know anything. In that case, however bad it looks to say nothing and demand counsel, it is still the better thing to do. It’s hard to speak as though you don’t know what you know.

 

[cottonweaver]

Donna's EmailsSteven B. Epstein Author

www.stevenbepstein.com

The third email is really telling.

Thanks for that.
I will take a look. I couldn't see them on his site initially but I did see he links to his past interviews, some of which I've seen before.
( I might buy the book, it doesn't put me off that he didn't find evidence of WA's involvement, it was pretty early on that he wrote the bulk of it and as you & others have said, more & more evidence will be revealed with each trial.)
Since I first viewed her Isom interveiw I've always thought she was involved. As per implausibility of CA/Rashbaum's Defense theory - it's implausible to me that the Princess's ex was murdered without her explicit permission
Problem is that she's even more conniving than the pair of them

 

[amicuscurie]

Thanks for that.
I will take a look. I couldn't see them on his site initially but I did see he links to his past interviews, some of which I've seen before.
( I might buy the book, it doesn't put me off that he didn't find evidence of WA's involvement, it was pretty early on that he wrote the bulk of it and as you & others have said, more & more evidence will be revealed with each trial.)
Since I first viewed her Isom interveiw I've always thought she was involved. As per CA/Rashbaum's theory - it's implausible to me that the Princess's ex was murdered without her explicit permission

Not so much permission as acquiescence.

 

[justice1960]

Speaking hypothetically, how could someone think that going into a police station after someone has been murdered and saying “my brother often joked about hiring a hit man but would never do it” would throw the police off the scent? What would be the actual purpose of such a statement?

ETA- nobody would have found this out but for the police interview. Unless the Tv repairman spoke. But, again, hypothetically, why would someone make this statement to the TV repairman?

It would have taken longer to find LaCasse but for the police interview as well.

And now I’m sounding like Carl.

IMHO. The TV repairmen were LR and SG. Why else would WA be going down Trescott Dr with her "latex's" body be sitting in a Honda Civic idling in his Garage? No wonder she turned around and skedaddled like a scared rabbit... After seeing the police tape.

 

[Wishbone]

Not so much permission as acquiescence.

Without her help the others would not have had the details they needed for the hit. IMO she helped and facilitated the murder. I just hope the state can prove it.