Sorry, Ruminations, I don't know how to delete accidentally replying to one of your posts here. I meant to add to the posts about all the evidence of financial motives for murder. I also may be violating the way you are supposed to post links.
I am not an Idaho attorney, have not reviewed any of the evidentiary pleadings or rulings in the case, nor am I familiar with the rules and cases in Idaho that may be relevant. Here, the trial attorney's role is to ask questions in a way that will help the jury and help the witness. Here, IMHO, the witness could have recollected her past testimony/statements, but was inhibited by the passage of time, this witness ALWAYS gets confused when trying to converse with someone (see her own statement, and the impressions of a professional news reporter, below) and her answers have always appeared to be misunderstood by the trial attorneys who ALL then engage in rapid-fire questioning that is slightly off, as if the attorneys know the testimony is garbled but do not know how to help the witness by accessing the past statements the witness had made. An attorney has to identify the times the attorney needs to slow down the proceeding, not speed it up, to get the correct testimony into the record. IMHO, when a motive for murder was involved, the correct testimony is crucial.
In addition to being able to ask clarifying questions, attorneys in a case like this will have people assisting them during trial who are supposed to know the facts inside-out, and have the ability to simultaneously acess useful prior witness stements and exhibits while testimony is being received.
Each trial team should have a person like Annie Cushing. (
Timeline of Events Around the Disappearance of Tylee Ryan and JJ Vallow - Annielytics.com)
When I heard the MG testimony, I knew what she was trying to say and remember, and had my answer to what the testimony was "supposed" to be. I just ran a GOOGLE search for Lori Vallow Insurance $3 Million. see:
Part 2: Melanie Gibb describes zombies, JJ's disappearance and the 'fatal attraction' between Chad and Lori Daybell - East Idaho News):
“I didn’t know about (the shooting) until four days after it happened. She called me and said, ‘Hey, did you see the news?’ … I said, ‘I don’t watch the news,’ and she said, ‘Charles was shot,'” Gibb says. “I’m like, ‘What?'”
Gibb was confused and asked what happened. Lori said Charles had been planning to kill her to cash in on a $3 million life insurance policy. She also said Charles’ sister, Kay Woodcock (who is also the grandmother of JJ, whom Charles adopted), had turned into a zombie and was after her. “She told me (Charles) had about $1 million (in life insurance), and she knew when he passed away, she thought she was going to get the money … but she thought possibly the policy had been switched from her to Kay,” Gibb says.
Unless there was a tactical reason to avoid assisting the witness, which IMHO was absurd once this witness got confused, the trail attorney's team should have printed out and given the prior statements of the witness to the trial attorney to quickly review -- during direct, or at a minimum prior to re-direct. Hopefully the data analytics/trial support person on the team will get better (or get more help) as the trial progresses.
I will not pretend to understand how the people in this Idaho courtroom have been or will be handling Idaho Rules of Evidence Rule 612 (Writing or Object Used to Refresh a Witness's Memory) or the extensive case law in that state involving the presentment of evidence to a jury. I cannot see the trial team in action, so maybe he/she/they were trying to signal their attorney at the point the witness needed help. Clearly, the trial team has methods to quickly access all the discovery and all the outside data sources, including websleuths.com, throughout the trial.
