Former Co-Worker Claims Arias Was "Obsessed"

A woman who used to work with Jodi Arias while she lived in Palm Desert spoke out about Jodi Arias on Jane Valez Mitchell this afternoon.  Former co-worker "Veronica" (didn't want to give her last name) spoke to JVM today and provided interesting insight into the Jodi Arias she knew and worked with.  

She described Jodi as being "absolutely obsessed" with Travis Alexander - leaving multiple messages for him, and even driving to Arizona after getting off work to see him. When asked about her observations about Arias, Veronica said "all that's missing was a rabbit in a pot on the stove" - referencing the "Fatal Attraction" movie starring Glen Close.

She said that Arias was determined to get Travis Alexander and have a family with him.  When asked about her courtroom persona she said that Jodi always had a "flat affect" - she could get into trouble at work and have absolutely no reaction.  Sound familiar? JVM asked her if she believed Arias was bothered that Alexander was going to take another woman to Cancun, she said "oh yes, that threw her into a tizzy". Veronica was never contacted by the prosecution and isn't involved in the trial or case, but she did comment that she absolutely believes Arias was capable of the premeditated murder of Travis Alexander.  She was that obsessed. 

Naturally this is one person's observation and not proof of anything.  I believe HLN does their homework before they allow somebody to come on their show, so chances are "Veronica" did in fact work with Arias and she seemed to have a strong opinion based on the things she heard and saw working with Jodi Arias.  Interesting.

More observations were made today as Arias seemed to change her commentary around Travis to glowing words of love. She was defending him in many cases, and it has been suggested that the defense team has a copy of their expert witnesses reports on Arias and are now tweeking her testimony to better match that of a battered woman.  Trial resume tomorrow morning.

Redirect of Jodi Arias - Snoozefest Heats Up

Am I the only one having a hard time staying awake during Kirk Nurmi's redirect of Jodi Arias? The jury has got to be so tired after hearing Jodi Arias talk for 14 days straight. Attorney Kirk Nurmi has such a slow way of questioning Arias and it feels like he is discussing the same things as he previously did on direct. It's my understanding that on redirect, he is only supposed to cover things that were brought up under the cross examination.

Nurmi has tried to have Arias clarify the issue with the injury to her left ring finger. Juan Martinez challenged Jodi Arias's story that she received that injury after being kicked by Travis Alexander during a fight on January 22, 2013 by displaying a photo of Arias and her sister Angela - the photo was taken in May of 2008 and Jodi has her arm around Angela's neck, her left hand is clearly displayed and there is no visible "bend" to that finger. He suggested that Arias broke or injured that finger on June 4, 2008 while she was assaulting and killing Travis Alexander.  

Arias testified today that she believes that when she arrived at Ryan Burn's house in Utah on June 5, 2008, she had cuts on her right hand, not her left. She now says she cut the right hand on a broken glass at Travis Alexander's house. I don't recall her saying she had cut her hand on a broken glass at Alexander's house, only that she cut her hand on broken glass at work. At least when she picks a theme, she sticks with it! She also testified today that she had "other injuries" when she arrived at Burn's house in Utah, but they were covered by clothing. She said "I had injuries on my feet and other areas that weren't visible".  Nurmi then had her hold up that left hand again to show the jury, and it seemed even more bent today than last time she raised it.

Nurmi reviewed Arias's previous sexual history with her for the jury, and compared the activity in those relationships to the activity during her relationship with Travis. After Jodi Arias admitted that she enjoyed their sexual relationship as much as Travis did under cross examination, Nurmi is trying to establish that she didn't always enjoy the sex acts. He had her explain some of the acts that she found painful - without going into too much detail here. The trial today has been littered with sidebars and objections from Juan Martinez.  Nurmi seems to sound even more condescending than he did during direct - you can almost tell by the way he pronounces the prosecutor's name that he doesn't like him much!

They have cleared out the jury for 10-15 minutes - I'm not sure why, but I am starting to wonder if the defense is doing their client any favors by dragging this out. That jury has to be getting weary and tired by now. I understand a woman's life is at stake here, but it's really in their best interest to ask a question and move on! Nurmi tends to provide way too much history behind each question and it makes for slow moving testimony. There's a huge difference between the feel in the courtroom last week and today. Juan Martinez kept things moving, asked specific questions and aside from a few days of sparring with Jodi Arias he kept the flow moving forward.  Nurmi is going sideways.  YAWNNNNN......

After the short recess, the defense went back to their original playbook of trashing the victim.  This time, they did it with a multimedia presentation of that audio tape (the sex tape) from May of 2008. They edited the previously entered exhibit and put together clips of what Travis Alexander was saying on that call, complete with the words displayed on the large screen in the courtroom.  They are once again attempting to paint Travis as the sexual deviant, the one who was experienced and aggressive and used Jodi Arias to fulfill his kinky fantasies. At some point the jury is going to grow tired of hearing about sex sex and more sex. What this redirect should be about is what was going through Jodi Arias's head on June 4, 2008 at 5:30PM? Where did that "mortal fear" she described come from? Why did she feel she had no other options available but killing him? Let's hope this is a smart jury. They can decide whether or not the sexual aspects of this testimony matters and how much weight to give it. This may backfire on them if they continue down this path without explaining the mortal fear.

Arias then testified about those journal entries that the prosecutor honed in on during cross examination. Kirk Nurmi pointed out, and Jodi Arias confirmed that there were some pages missing from the black journal we have seen in court. He asked her to explain why there were missing pages. Arias claims to have ripped out several entries that were "giving her grief". She claims that Travis Alexander had read her journal on several occasions - and according to her, she ripped out entries that related to a date or weekend she spent with another man. She further elaborated that after she began having an interest and studied "The Law of Attraction", she no longer wanted negative entries in her journal, so she removed several pages where she had wrote about suicide. 

Arias and Nurmi also used "The Law of Attraction" to explain why she never wrote about those violent encounters she had with Travis, nor did she mention the alleged January 21, 2008 incident where she claims to have walked in on him. She testified that her journals were not private (because Travis had read them), she didn't want to get Travis into any legal problems or problems with his church and again "The Law of Attraction" teaches to focus on the positive qualities in your partner. She seems to have an answer for everything today. Unfortunately, they still don't make sense.  Just when I thought I was going to fall asleep after the lunch break, all of this happened.

Travis Alexander has 3 sisters and a brother in court today.  The few times the camera panned to them, it was hard to miss the siblings rolling their eyes as Arias testified.  Can you blame them?