Absolutely. Juan did a very good job and he got the conviction, but I feel like his closing arguments should have made even clearer that these texts were out of character for Travis and were in response to something Jodi had done to him. This is where it helps to at least have an outline of what you want to say in your closing arguments. It leaves open the door that, even if there isn't any proof of physical violence, there is this "evidence" of emotional violence.
Some things I really wish Juan had hit on more:
1. Travis had never talked to anyone, even Jodi, that way before those two texts exchanges in May. Travis did not have a history of verbal abuse or degradation.
2. That means, especially based on the verbiage, that they were in response to something that really angered and hurt more than he had ever been hurt and betrayed before. He even says words to those effects.
3. Another thing that I really wish was made very clear was, while Jodi had been messing with Travis for a while before May, it definitely appears that after she moves away at the end of April, her stalking behavior had escalated rapidly. Before, perhaps Travis felt like he could handle her, that it really wasn't that, and that Jodi was so sweet and apologetic, (and would gas light to make him feel like the crazy one), that he forgave her and let her back into his life. He also just seems like he couldn't get over her and she made it impossible for him to do so. He may have on some level felt flattered by it.
But in May she was spiraling out of control and she was taking Travis with her. She was hacking his stuff left and right keeping tabs on him then innocently confronting him with the information. He finally clued in that the only way she could have gotten that info was by snooping through his personal accounts and convos. She would delete messages from other people to him. She would send several "accidental" texts and emails to him intended for other men with a little "whoopsie." It is not OTT jealousy that got him upset at that, it's that Jodi would just not leave him alone and he could see the game she was playing. My god, ANYBODY would have responded with some of the vitriol that he unleashed on her. He could have handled it better but he was at his wit's end. If you ever been at your wit's end with somebody, and you just want to explode on them, and when you finally tell them what you think of them, they just gas light and minimize your feelings ("ok, whatever drama queen," or "Well, I am sorry, I was just telling everyone what an awesome guy you were," without ever actually addressing what he's angry about and playing innocent), you are just going to get even angrier and angrier and yes, Travis' words got even more vitriolic. I don't blame him. He was trying to get through to her. Poor Travis didn't know that he was dealing with a sociopath who got off on setting him off and then getting him even angrier. She loves that.
May is also when he had begun telling his friends that Jodi was scaring him. He told a girl just weeks before his murder that he was afraid of Jodi. Her behavior clearly had gone from, in his eyes, a girl with an intense crush to someone whose behavior had grown frightening and erratic. She recorded the phone sex convo with him. Her journals reflect an all out obsession and some kind of plot that was unfolding but she was quite vague. They also reflect an inner rage and instability. Even in her text to Ryan Burns she just goes on and on and on about Travis.
Travis seemed to frame these expressions of fear around semi sarcasm. But at the heart of it people could see that Travis was genuinely uneasy and scared of her. He was probably in a place where he felt like there was no one to talk to and nothing he could do about her. That's hell. And it's sad to me when ALV talks about a cycle of abuse because that is exactly what poor Travis was trapped in and he was trapped in a situation that he probably felt he couldn't get out of.
So, in short (haha), yes, I had really, really wished that Juan had made it more clear what was going on and what spawned this reaction from. Anyone, like Foreman, looking to exonerate Jodi in any way he can (and the fact that he couldn't just speaks to the strength of the evidence and the way Jodi's testimony really worked against her), can look at these texts as a mean, scary guy set off on poor sweet little Jodi who's trying to keep him calm. I don't know how this could be evidence of an escalation of abuse in general as Jodi lived in Cali and could have just not talked to him or messed with him. They are evidence of a man at the end of his rope trying to make the psycho stalker leave him alone. So it should have been hit on very hard because that was the crux of the "verbal abuse."
And there were only two instances. So it's just even more silly to me. The defense went over them over and over and over and over and over again, so as to make it seem more frequent and severe then it really was. Juan should have diffused that by saying it wasn't a frequent occurrence at all, but only two text exchanges that happened at a time where Jodi's stalking behavior had escalated and Travis was growing increasingly frustrated and scared of her. And only weeks later, he was dead.
I have thought about this before, lol.
ose anyone know if JM opening or closing arguments are transcribed anywhere? I have been trying to find them instead of watching the video's because my kids get mad at me. They are like it's over stop going thru it again you're not a lawyer and she is convicted. Kids don't get it! lol :blushing:
