Retrial for Sentencing of Jodi Arias - Day 9

[geevee]

Hi to all the smart, sharp and funny minds here.
I'm sorry if you might have the impression that I'm taking advantage of your precious thinking without contributing.
It's hard for me to get actively involved in the discussion. First of all: it's only a short time ago I discovered this case and I am still completely speechless about the abysmal evilness JA seems to incarnate. It's beyond all I could ever have imaginated. It's totally confusing for me.
Secondly, I am in a kind of linguistic confusion as my first language is german, I'm living actually in the french part of Switzerland, I just came back from a several months trip to Patagonia and now I'm spending hours and hours reading your fascinating posts. I've been watching most of the videos of the trial but as I'm a complete layman there are things that I don't really understand and I'm also not able to remember all the details... too much for my small brain
So if it's ok for you, I'd love to continue reading your brilliant comments here; it allows me to learn so much and if ever I think I have something to contribute, I'll post. Promised!

Welcome to the wild side, Susza! Glad to have you a-board.

 

[bsk]

Hi to all the smart, sharp and funny minds here.
I'm sorry if you might have the impression that I'm taking advantage of your precious thinking without contributing.
It's hard for me to get actively involved in the discussion. First of all: it's only a short time ago I discovered this case and I am still completely speechless about the abysmal evilness JA seems to incarnate. It's beyond all I could ever have imaginated. It's totally confusing for me.
Secondly, I am in a kind of linguistic confusion as my first language is german, I'm living actually in the french part of Switzerland, I just came back from a several months trip to Patagonia and now I'm spending hours and hours reading your fascinating posts. I've been watching most of the videos of the trial but as I'm a complete layman there are things that I don't really understand and I'm also not able to remember all the details... too much for my small brain
So if it's ok for you, I'd love to continue reading your brilliant comments here; it allows me to learn so much and if ever I think I have something to contribute, I'll post. Promised!

A lot of us are just thinking out loud, mostly to express frustration - in my case via snarkiness most of the time. I'd call it (attempted) humor, but my wife would disagree. People here are very friendly so feel free to jump in any time. There are always moderators around to give any of us who are getting out of bounds a kick in the butt, but there give us more leeway than we probably deserve.

Hey this case must have you hooked since it's the middle of the night over there!

Edited: I should have added that the contributions from the lawyers here are greatly appreciated!

 

[BritsKate]

I think damaging one's self-esteem is a very subjective thing. My daughter is 14 going on 35 (and in the I know more than you ever will Mom phase). She's brilliant at art and photography. Since she was about 4 years old I've told her she can't grow up to be a princess and probably not a supermodel or pop diva - but if she works really hard at developing her natural talent, she may find a job she loves that makes her happy. I don't care if she works at McDonald's as long as she's content. I try to keep it real with my kids.

So...am I pragmatic and realistic? Or abusive and damaging her self-esteem by not wanting her to chase a fairy tale for half her life before being heartbroken? Rhetorical question - but I think Fonseca is very misguided with what damages self-esteem and to what extent.

JMO and FWIW

 

[TexMex]

So..six hours and a few emails were read, video testimony established that Travis and Jodi had a spat on a road trip and a young Morman girl Travis was dating objected when he grabbed her butt? Pretty great mitigation stuff, right?

 

[Frigga]

William Pitts @william_pitts ·
Fonseca: "you don't like knowing someone's cheating on you, it doesn't feel good." pretty sure the jury knows that. #JodiArias

... oh for the love of God!

 

[bsk]

I think Juan will be able to rehabilitate most of this garbage by reading other emails and by filling in timelines and facts that have been glossed over.

I don't think they will tune out JUan. LOL He will not let that happen. He will swoop in and define the timeline, how SHORT the relationship was. How long he dated Deanna. His reasons for backing off from JA. Her move away and then BACK to Mesa. Her cray cray coming out. When they get the fuller version and see the bigger picture, the DP will be back on the table, imo.

I think the jury will be thinking all of the above. How their OWN relationships would look bad if we were to read private emails. And how they fought in past relationships and how they played the field, and how they had booty calls or were booty calls until they learned better. Everyone fought on road trips and got angry over stupid stuff and hid sexual trysts and treated others poorly and cheated in one way or another. I don't think ANY of what was shown in these long boring emails rose to any level of mitigation. NONE of it justified his being slaughtered and none of it justifies her escaping the ultimate justice, jmo.

Don't you expect a lot of "You mean that bastige* wasted days on this when it was this simple?" thoughts among the jurors during cross?

* You had to have seen Johnny Dangerously.

 

[AZlawyer]

From WAT:

Wild About Trial @WildAboutTrial · 12s 13 seconds ago


Witness testimony reiterating that TA's behavior towards #JodiArias, keeping her a secret, was cruel & unfair.

Hold on. Let me grab my handy-dandy scales of justice and put JA's cruelty to TA over here on this side (stabbing/slashing/shooting) and TA's cruelty to JA over here on this side (acting like she was a , which she was)...CRASH! Oh shoot, I broke my scale. No contest I guess.

Except...nothing was going on worth recording.

No kidding. Why would anyone record the audio of a video recording being played in court that can be located easily in a dozen places on the internet because it was live-streamed at the time?

 

[krkrjx]

Well, that sounds like fun. I'm always in a "linguistic confusion" as well. I'm "Portuguese/Spain" speaker living in The Netherlands, who rants in English on websleuths lol. Everyone's nice and ignores my grammatical and spelling mistakes so don't even worry about your english!

Nali, you don't have grammatical errors--I must confess I have been sneaking in to your posts and deleting most of the commas.

:dance:

 

[bsk]

So..six hours and a few emails were read, video testimony established that Travis and Jodi had a spat on a road trip and a young Morman girl Travis was dating objected when he grabbed her butt? Pretty great mitigation stuff, right?

Also, instead of Snow White we're getting Jekyll and Hyde; and instead of Napoleon we're getting T-Dogg. Great summary otherwise.

 

[gcharlie]

Sigh.

What exactly was the point of today's testimony? I'm sure the jury must be wondering this as they go home for a long weekend. This is highly unconventional for a penalty phase to be able to go into the level of minutia that has been allowed here.

As we watch tweets from the court, I keep reminding myself that this is a fresh jury with limited knowledge of the case and so I try to look at it through the testimony that has been offered so far. What they know is that Travis Alexander was horrifically murdered. They have seen the autopsy pictures, which must be indelibly imprinted in their minds. They have not heard any story of self defense in the court room and Nurmi suggested a snapped defense in his opening arguments.

His opening arguments also pointed to abuse and sexual deviancy. Yet what has come out so far in court does not measure up to the claims made in his opening arguments. Jurors have to be confused and wonder where this is all going and what might be coming up next, because Nurmi has not delivered so far. Some of the emails presented in court will resonate well with most jurors, in that Travis acknowledged very early on that CMJA was not the one for him and that he had discussed this with her. Certainly her journals and the phone sex tape back up that she knew they were not marriage material for one another, yet they both continued a physical relationship with eyes wide open.

This jury is mostly female and described as being young. It is hard for me to understand where Nurmi is going with this unless the bombs have yet to be dropped. Martinez still has cross and his rebuttall witnesses.

My heart breaks for his family to have to go through all of this. The only saving grace is that some of what came out in the past few days actually shows that Travis was a good and open guy, which the jurors have seen.

 

[Nali87]

Nali, you don't have grammatical errors--I must confess I have been sneaking in to your posts and deleting most of the commas.

:dance:

O/T: So funny that you said that- I'm writing a paper with an American exchange student and according to him, us Dutch people LOVE using comma's. I wrote an introduction for our paper and the first sentence was like 5 lines long with lots of comma's. He almost had a heart attack.

 

[Nali87]

What I want/wish JM would do..

- Play the interview tapes. What shy woman lacking self esteem wants to be viewed by millions on national television?
- Ask the good Dr. some very pointed questions: "Does she know anyone that's never said a hurtful thing to another human being? Or someone who's never been too hard on himself in an e-mail? Has she ever met someone who's never ever yelled in anger or in frustration? If she believes there's anyone out there who doesn't keep what goes on in their own home or an aspect of themselves a secret? If it's "wrong" to date women casually?"
- Ask her if someone deserves to be stabbed, shot and have his throat slit for everything she says TA has done "wrong"?

 

[Tiger09]

I wonder if "I'm innocent no jury will convict me" smile, pose. And "I smiled in my mug shot because Travis would have wanted me to." Inside Edition interview will be played. To be bookended with the interview with Troy Hayden "If I were found guilty, I'd want the death penalty. "

Will the jury hear that among T Dogg, Nurmi's lies, Arias fan fic, and other defense tales. But hey, Jodi started this. With Inside Edition and 48 Hours.

 

[salberg7]

Well, Nurmi ran out the clock. No cross until Monday. I think this witness' testimony could have been done in one day, cross by Juan today and onward and upward Monday. Doesn't Nurmi have other cases, or is this his only one? This trial is moving ridiculously slow. Waste of precious time & money. We know Travis was a normal 30 y/o male with a healthy SEX drive, and Jodi was a booty call. Doesn't negate nor justify the fact that she murdered him in cold blood. Also sounds like the DT has abandoned self defense as a defense and have chosen CMJA "snapped" because Travis treated her so badly.

 

[katydid23]

Sigh.

What exactly was the point of today's testimony? I'm sure the jury must be wondering this as they go home for a long weekend. This is highly unconventional for a penalty phase to be able to go into the level of minutia that has been allowed here.

As we watch tweets from the court, I keep reminding myself that this is a fresh jury with limited knowledge of the case and so I try to look at it through the testimony that has been offered so far. What they know is that Travis Alexander was horrifically murdered. They have seen the autopsy pictures, which must be indelibly imprinted in their minds. They have not heard any story of self defense in the court room and Nurmi suggested a snapped defense in his opening arguments.

His opening arguments also pointed to abuse and sexual deviancy. Yet what has come out so far in court does not measure up to the claims made in his opening arguments. Jurors have to be confused and wonder where this is all going and what might be coming up next, because Nurmi has not delivered so far. Some of the emails presented in court will resonate well with most jurors, in that Travis acknowledged very early on that CMJA was not the one for him and that he had discussed this with her. Certainly her journals and the phone sex tape back up that she knew they were not marriage material for one another, yet they both continued a physical relationship with eyes wide open.

This jury is mostly female and described as being young. It is hard for me to understand where Nurmi is going with this unless the bombs have yet to be dropped. Martinez still has cross and his rebuttall witnesses.

My heart breaks for his family to have to go through all of this. The only saving grace is that some of what came out in the past few days actually shows that Travis was a good and open guy, which the jurors have seen.

I was holding my breath at the end. I was certain he was going to leave them with that very caustic email where he called her out so angrily and it was kind of abusive sounding, especially if you were not aware of the BS she pulled on him.

But I was afraid they were going to see a large wall of his curse words towards her, and would have that all weekend. But he ended with a whimper. He ended with the Kindergarten Teacher scolding the way he dated 2 women at the same time, and hurting their feelings. It was like my son's grandmother upset w/ him when she found out he was dating two girls when he was 17. Awkward. But not a justification for slaughter.

 

[Meemaw12]

Here is a pretty good timeline from time JA and TA met

http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/2387245

 

[neesaki]

I mean, in the beginning, the first weeks/months aren't you STILL testing the waters? Until you have that "talk" when you say, "OK I'm interested in you alone and I'm not going to see anybody else", then you really can't claim anyone is being unfaithful. I doubt he was at that level of commitment with Lisa. Or even Jodi, tbh.

Agree with you Nali and all, Travis was so obviously not ready to settle down and get married, but he thought he should be because that's what is apparently expected in this religion. So he was pushing himself, and felt like he should try to fulfill these expectations. But in reality, he was just an inexperienced, somewhat naive young man enjoying life and dating different women. Imo, this strategy of the DT is ridiculous, unless it's to get the jury members to all die of boredom. Actually, I believe their strategy is to drag it all out to the point that they start losing jurors and can get a mistrial, that's what I really think. Which seems way beyond wrong, but then that's just me.

 

[LambChop]

Can someone enlighten this witness that Jodi and Travis were not dating when Jodi moved to Mesa. We all know she moved to be able to manipulate him to get him back under her control. Was it not one of the witnesses who said Jodi invited herself to an event where Travis had no plans on taking her? Jodi does not understand the word "No."

ALV admitted on the stand that her information and evidence that she considered was spoon-fed to her. I do not think this witness is any different. jmo

 

[bsk]

While we're waiting for Juan's turn, we can look back in enjoyment... (about 15 minutes total)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvv-ZwcyID0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJX2dGTPTLg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=asj-6JTsVes

 

[Nali87]

I just realized something. Since the first jury found the crime "cruel", and this part of the re-trial is only SUPPOSED to be about mitigating factors, JM didn't get to highlight all the way TA was brutally murdered. Remember his "end of the rainbow" analogy? This jury won't be hearing any of that...