Wilson concludes his questioning of Kinsey. Defense attorney Jim Griffin is up for cross-examination.
Kinsey, under questioning from Griffin, says he doesn’t disagree with what Sutton - the defense expert - tried to do, just with the degree of certainty at which Sutton claimed the shooter couldn’t have been 6-foot-4.
Griffin establishes that Kinsey is being paid somewhere in the realm of $7,500-$10,000 for his consulting and testimony on this case.
Kinsey: “I’m a Baptist, so if I didn’t charge something, my friends and family would talk bad about me.” Laughter in the courtroom.
Kinsey and Griffin are going back and forth about the trajectory of the shotgun blast that killed Paul. I'm getting a head start on my story for the day.
Griffin questions how a pellet could have gone upward through Paul's shoulder, neck and head before lodging itself high up in the feed room. Kinsey doesn't seem to understand the question. To him, it's obvious that the upward trajectory of the shot took the pellet there.
The defense is suggesting Paul was shot downward, exploding his skull and sending pellets, blood, brain matter and bits of skull back toward the shooter and up high on the feed room door/walls.
Kinsey doesn't buy it. On the shotgun pellet up high: "It didn't turn around and come back out of the top of his head, I can tell you that.”
Griffin: There was no effort by investigators to find and identify the shooter’s footprints. “There’s a shooter somewhere.” Kinsey: “I agree with that.”
If you're looking for a witness to carry you through a criminal trial in Walterboro, you could do worse than finding an extremely smart, well-trained expert with a heavy southern accent and good manners.
Griffin: Our expert witness, Tim Palmbach, didn’t put the shooter inside the feed room the way y’all demonstrated, did he? Kinsey: I thought he did. We’re going to demonstrate it again. This time, Harpootlian is the victim.
Griffin and Harpootlian just demonstrated a version of the shooting in which the shooter didn't have to be inside the feed room.
Wilson: You spoke with Riemer, who did Maggie and Paul’s autopsies. And you also heard testimony from the defense’s expert, who did not. Which opinion do you like better? Kinsey: “Well, I’ll start by saying I don’t know either one of them from a can of paint.”
Kinsey testifies he doesn't want to argue with a pathologist. That's not his field of expertise. Another good quality in an expert witness: Staying in your lane.
Wilson: “The shooter is running around, and so is the victim. It’s chaotic. It’s crazy.” “There’s no way to know how the gun is being held, it’s shouldered, it’s angled.” Wilson: We can’t say how the shootings took place, exactly. Kinsey agrees.
Kinsey is done on the stand.
The state rests its rebuttal case. The jury is excused for a break.
Judge Newman says we have run out of time to take the jury to Moselle today. He is now conferring with attorneys on both sides privately now. Not sure about what.