weekend discussion: discuss the trial here #154

[leebee52]

Trying to catch up on last night's posts. Only have way through but wanted to say something about the "weird" jury questions that many find disturbing and or pro defense. I'm not Einstein (hehe) but I've been around, believe me. I've learned to read between the lines more than hear the words that are spoken. The questions we're talking about in my mind were more about validating in the specific juror's mind what they were thinking about JA. Like the camera washing to hide evidence. The question sounded more to me like the juror wanted to hear someone like Dr. D say what they were thinking. We will never know if JA washed it on purpose or not. The juror who asked the tiger/bear thing...same thing. Juror wanted someone like Dr. D to validate what they were thinking but just used a strange way to ask it. I think the jurors like Dr. D and her calm no nonsense way of explaining things.

 

[Chester_from_THM]

Oh, thanks for reminding me, I need to go look.
I love that guy!



ETA: published 4/19 - I haven't seen this one b4
Janeen DeMarte , Jodi Arias Trial , Rejected Juror Questions , scary elevator ghost - YouTube

Absolutely hilarious, Dana. Thank you for sharing.

The stuff he finds in the trash can, then the juror questions that got thrown out. Just so funny!

 

[Alexander family fan]

http://youtu.be/4h0fje33320

It does not matter, if Jodi was traumatized by murdering Travis, or if she cannot recall portions of how she murdered him. Even her own defense expert said most people convicted of such crimes show signs of both.

The only thing that matters is she planned it, and she did it. The state has proved both.

 

[raisincharlie]

I look at her this way. She is young in-experienced but smart. Her job is to do everything by the book, spend the allowed amount of time and get the heck out. Make no mistakes, keep everything squeeky clean, administer some worthless tests and let the prosecutor mop it up at trial. This Dr. was not out to do any deep well thought out analysis....just do her job.

I rather think the opposite is true. Dr. DeMarte appeared to me to be extremely intrigued with the fact that Jodi had 7 out of 10 elevations, where the norm may be 1 or 2. I do believe she gave this considerable thought but was requested to minimalize it to something realilty based that a jury could understand and accept. I would be very surprised if the good Doctor did not expend some personal time really pawing through the results searching for a better understanding of what the worthless tests really meant. Seems like a shrink's dream, something worthy of exploring and understanding.

 

[InALandFarFarAway]

JA doesn't strike me as somone who can change gears quickly when something doesn't go as planned.

Agree 100%. She's a controlled control freak so for a personality like hers, the murder could only be premeditated.

She's convinced she's the smartest person on earth but her "plan" had holes. She didn't factor in the many things that can go wrong because in her mind, her plan was flawless and nothing could or would go wrong.

When the bottom fell out, she went into a tailspin because she has a romanticized version of everything, including murder. And of course, it was Travis' fault for fighting back, creating a bloodbath and causing her to abandon her Master Plan.

And she was running on empty after that.

 

[Sleuth5]

Can you just imagine standing in that house, with all that blood and TA's dead body and trying to process that? I do not know if JA is able to feel panic (maybe so, since it is about herself), but she must have been frantic.

Stuffing TA into that tiny shower, trying to clean up, remember everything, and get out of the house before getting caught. I hope the horror of those few moments haunt her for the rest of her miserable life. I do not think she was bothered by killing TA but I hope that she remembers scrambling like a hunted rat to save her own skin forever.

I know what you mean, Paintr, but I don't think Jodi has any real sense of conscience. She isn't going to be haunted by what she did. Unfortunately, I think she's just going to enjoy thinking about how she gave Travis his just desserts for the rest of her life. In my view, it's one of many reasons she ought to spend her life in jail (assuming she escapes the DP.)

Of course, the primary reason is that she cut the throat of a living person from ear to ear all the way to the spine. I'm afraid that act alone is sufficient for either death or LWOP in my estimation.

:cow:

 

[Love Never Fails]

Wow, awesome post and you said it better than I could but I ITA. I have had the same niggling worries about those same questions. I hope my worry is for naught or that those questions all belong to one person who then doesn't make it to the final jury cut or that they keep an open mind and are persuaded by logic in the end..but I'm with you on hearing doubt in some of those questions

Jodi is guilty. She already admitted it. It wasn't self defense. She is a very mentally deranged person. I have believed she was guilty since hearing on the news years ago that a man was stabbed by his girlfriend 29 times, had his throat slit, and was shot in the head. I thought, OMG, how sick can this girl be? There is NO reason, no excuse to overcome that.

After all these weeks of trial, and this week of Dr. d's testimony, I am finding I have more questions than answers. And NONE of it comes from the defense team.

I keep wondering why the judge has kept so much testimony out of this trial? Why is so much prejudicial? Are they all, I mean ALL trying to get a lesser charge for Jodi?

I love, love JM. He is brilliant. But so much testimony has been left out. Why? The jurors are intelligent. But now after Dr. D, and the only diagnosis of BPD, how does a jury sentence her to death?

I too think there is a juror, maybe more than one, who has questions. Don't misunderstand, I believe 1000% she will be found guilty of premediated, first degree murder. And she will be punished for her crime.

Jodi may receive LWOP. In the end, she will have to answer to God. I would like to believe she would become repentant and remorseful and apologize to Travis' family and friends, and the people of Arizona, for the denials, the lies and the slaughter, all she has put them through.

 

[leebee52]

Yes, agreed, the camera questions bother me MORE. I posted on this earlier, so sorry to repeat but I'll say it again...does someone really think there was NO PLANNING/ORGANIZATION involved concerning the camera? The defense has brought up the camera in the washer so many times that maybe it's sticking with one juror. But I just don't get it. If Jodi/Wilmott are trying to say she wasn't planning her "escape," then why wouldn't Jodi just have left the camera out in the open or on the nightstand...so what was the point of putting it in the washer? I hope Juan really hones in on exactly what steps were involved in the cover-up...i.e. solution for not tracking blood through the house, getting rid of evidence, sheets and camera in washer, pictures deleted, having all her clothes/belongings (if she really brought anything in) already out in her car, etc. etc..

The bottom line on the camera is this....regardless of why it was in the washer to begin with, everyone KNOWS it was JA who put it there and it was JA who killed TA. Deleting pics is obviously a way to get rid of something. JA admitted to getting rid of the murder tools, except for the knife but again, obvious she was attempting to get rid of evidence. The recovered pictures from the memory card tells it all regardless of what JA says. I think JA was in a big rush to get out of TA's house for whatever reason. She might have heard a noise and panicked. Who knows.

 

[sacrablue]

I rather think the opposite is true. Dr. DeMarte appeared to me to be extremely intrigued with the fact that Jodi had 7 out of 10 elevations, where the norm may be 1 or 2. I do believe she gave this considerable thought but was requested to minimalize it to something realilty based that a jury could understand and accept. I would be very surprised if the good Doctor did not expend some personal time really pawing through the results searching for a better understanding of what the worthless tests really meant. Seems like a shrink's dream, something worthy of exploring and understanding.

My Mother took 4 worthless tests about depression she was suffering before shooting herself in the heart with a 38 pistol.
After much trials and tribulation we found a compasionate well experienced Dr. at Jackson Hos that knew what she was doing. Her diagnosis was much different, in depth and 100% correct and She saved my Mother's life after numerous attempts of suicide. It takes the right person, allot of experience, allot of on the road knowledge and a little luck.

 

[Love Never Fails]

I actually just posted about those things! lol

I do think there are a couple of jurors toying with the DT because they're bored or they want to break the monotony by watching JW appear relieved only to watch the deer-in-the-headlights eyes immediately reappear.

I believe an analytical thinker would understand Dr. D's theory without reducing it to that level. Not to say it was a stupid question. It wasn't. Those who understand the points she made regarding trauma and PTSD understood it clinically and could either accept it or not. They needed more information to understand and those questions did not bother me.

The bear/tiger question indicated to me that the person either didn't understand the distinctions between the two or did understand it but was not in full agreement with how it was applied to Jodi. It made me think that person viewed Jodi as being disturbed in a way that would not make her criminally responsible and anything outside of that was splitting hairs.

But again, that's how *I* reacted to the question.

ITA. Seemed to me the bear/tiger question was inappropriate.

 

[Becky Sharp]

It would have been nice to have had a camera embedded into the table that JA kept lying on.

That face up close??? <Shiver>

 

[raisincharlie]

I actually just posted about those things! lol

I do think there are a couple of jurors toying with the DT because they're bored or they want to break the monotony by watching JW appear relieved only to watch the deer-in-the-headlights eyes immediately reappear.

I believe an analytical thinker would understand Dr. D's theory without reducing it to that level. Not to say it was a stupid question. It wasn't. Those who understand the points she made regarding trauma and PTSD understood it clinically and could either accept it or not. They needed more information to understand and those questions did not bother me.

The bear/tiger question indicated to me that the person either didn't understand the distinctions between the two or did understand it but was not in full agreement with how it was applied to Jodi. It made me think that person viewed Jodi as being disturbed in a way that would not make her criminally responsible and anything outside of that was splitting hairs.

But again, that's how *I* reacted to the question.

BBM - I suspect one is more likely to survive a bear attack over a tiger attack (i.e. the Champawatat tigress killed over 200 people before being driven out of Nepal). Tigers mean to kill. Bears are more inclined to react in protection.

 

[InALandFarFarAway]

good morning! i'm in the 'she put it in the washer on purpose' camp. >snip<.

And this is how it's going to be in the deliberation room.

They'll all agree on some things and vehemently disagree on other things like we're all doing.

The most important thing for the jurors is that they all agree (AS WE DO) that she thought it through even if it wasn't a well-thought out plan. In other words, PREMEDITATION - FIRST DEGREE.

Once they establish that within the first 15 minutes, they can relax and make the defense pay for killing good brain cells by taking a few days to debate whether she threw the camera in the washer on purpose or if it was an accident.

:floorlaugh:

 

[kayice]

Maybe Jodi thought out the guns/knives on her mental check-list, got to dump those right away. The camera, she didn't think about...she might have improvised when she had sex with Travis, took the pics...still trying to change his ever-loving Cancun mind.

A gun and knife would be easier to toss and certain people of society would pick those things up and keep it. (Easier to throw a knife and small gun in the desert though).
Now a camera, same thing, but there were a lot of photos of Travis not deleted. She cannot risk someone seeing that once he is found. I think she was running fast out of time, making fast decisions because even though she planned her murder out and alibied before and after, murder never goes off as planned...this was Jodi's 1st murder, we think...and she was repeating the pattern (rental-gun-knives) already when arrested. No room for gas cans with the boxes of books in her trunk?

 

[leebee52]

My Mother took 4 worthless tests about depression she was suffering before shooting herself in the heart with a 38 pistol.
After much trials and tribulation we found a compasionate well experienced Dr. at Jackson Hos that knew what she was doing. Her diagnosis was much different, in depth and 100% correct and She saved my Mother's life after numerous attempts of suicide. It takes the right person, allot of experience, allot of on the road knowledge and a little luck.

I suffer from complex PTSD which took me YEARS to find out and it came from taking those tests, whatever the tests were, it's been about 5 years since I took them. I STILL have not found anyone for therapy of any kind. The doctor who administered the tests was great but his kind of therapy did not revolve around extreme sex abuse things. Later I was referred to a psychiatrist who much to my shock was only about prescribing drugs...no therapy whatsoever and couldn't even tell me who does that kind of therapy. I've been to zillions of psychologists but for me, they were more like cheerleaders...saying things like "that was then, this is now" which doesn't do anything for me.

 

[cecybeans]

Jodi overlapped several personality disorders irrc. Personality disorders/BPD/ are common..people with them are common and everywhere. I'm a chef and let me tell you my profession is filled with wonderfully creative, self-avowed disordered /genius/ bordeline/bpd / youname it. Artisic souls, CEOs, Surgeons, fighter pilots...a fine line everywhere. Jodi is different.... along the lines of Bundy imo, but less intelligent. Her true diagnosis prob won't be heard until after trial when the restrictions are off. I think most people do in fact understand BPD and I'm sorry if you have had to listen to a few who are clueless. Ignore them if possible bc there will always be friends elsewhere

ITA - her BPD may have helped her rationalize and obsess about killing TA, but it certainly can't explain all the "duping delight" expressions and her smirks of pride when listening to those sex tapes and the lack of affect throughout or the macabre interest she has in photos of her handiwork (both at interrogation and in the courtroom). She almost treats them like trophies. She's got a wide streak of psychopathy running through her, imo.

 

[raisincharlie]

My Mother took 4 worthless tests about depression she was suffering before shooting herself in the heart with a 38 pistol.
After much trials and tribulation we found a compasionate well experienced Dr. at Jackson Hos that knew what she was doing. Her diagnosis was much different, in depth and 100% correct and She saved my Mother's life after numerous attempts of suicide. It takes the right person, allot of experience, allot of on the road knowledge and a little luck.

I am sorry for this but am glad you were able to find someone capable.

 

[rose222]

good morning! i'm in the 'she put it in the washer on purpose' camp. that camera had some weight to it and i don't see how she missed it with some towels and socks. i think she's dumb like me and thought it would destroy it, and the bleach was added for extra measure to remove the blood that was on it. like washing his body off, i think she was trying to remove her DNA from the scene.
in fact, adding the bleach, TO ME, shows thinking and planning---specifically to destroying DNA evidence, and it's the REASON i think the camera was in there intentionally.

there was blood all over the walls and she didn't know her palm had touched it or where, IMO, and without knowing how to find a print, she couldn't clean it up. she wasn't worried about the hair or other prints, because she'd been in the house and didn't think they would be enough to put her there that day. she didn't know there was a hair with a root.

and i don't think she washed the sheets. i think TA did that some time that day. they were found in the dryer so i think he'd already done that before she ever got to the laundry room with the load she put in the washer.

the only truth i think she told was that she killed him. other than that, i don't believe anything she's said.

Great post.

 

[kscornfed]

IMO, the next victims of Jodi were probably Sky/Chris Hughes. That's what the 9mm was for.

The DT has brought them up numerous times because their client wants them to.

the only reason they keep bringing up chris and sky is because of that one email exchange where they chide TA about how he's treating JA. and that was VERY early----jan, 2007, when they had just met her and JA was whining to sky about him not committing. like everyone else in that circle, it took them a bit to figure out who she really was. at that point, they didn't know.

it's been taken out of context only because it's a tidbit the DT thinks looks good for their murdering client. i was hoping we'd hear from the hughes in rebuttal, but maybe there's a good reason we won't.

 

[TexMex]

:fence:

I was lurking and had to log in to ask did she really take cash from him? She is really a piece of work. :facepalm:

Poor Jodi. The "thieves" who stole the gun from grandpa took "a twenty and a ten" from her room!

Then the dang ninjas took "four twenties" from the back pocket of her jeans" :banghead: