It's been difficult to get a real sense for how things are playing out in the courtroom this time around, without the television coverage we are dependent on the written words and observations of those who are in the courtroom. It's not remotely the same because when you are watching for yourself, you can pick up on things other people may not feel are important. One thing is certain, this trial has gone into triple overtime and is bordering on nasty. Attorneys on both sides are alleging misconduct and Arias' new computer expert's "bombshell" revelations and allegations about what has been described as thousands of porn files that were deleted from Travis Alexander's laptop has been center of this storm.
I'm no computer expert, and even the terminology is somewhat Greek to me, but apparently the Defense's Motion to remove the death penalty as an option due to prosecutorial misconduct largely centers around these thousands of deleted porn files discovered on a clone of Travis Alexander's laptop while it was being examined by defense expert Bryan Neumeister last summer. Neumeister and the defense claims that there were thousands of files containing child porn, photos of child porn existed on the laptop before being deleted - allegedly by the State and/or Juan Martinez. During Arias' trial, the State's expert testified that no pornography was found on Travis' computer. These allegations only came up after Neumeister was brought in to examine a clone of the original computer, which the State's expert argued was an "altered clone". Big difference between an exact clone and an altered one.
The defense says the State mishandled and destroyed this key evidence, that State strongly denies doing any such thing and suggest the defense expert is the one who tampered with evidence on the altered clone. Bryan Neumeister was brought in during the time when Jodi Arias was acting as her own attorney. That alone makes the timing of everything suspicious in my own mind, as I believe Arias is willing to do anything to paint Travis Alexander as a sexual deviant who was into child pornography. Remember, many believe Arias submitted letters written to her supposedly by Travis that apologized to her and basically admitting that he was into that kind of stuff, but those letters were copies and not originals - in the end they were inadmissible because they could not be authenticated and many people believe they were forgeries. Many people also believe Arias pressured Matt McCarty (spelling?) into falsely testifying about things he had no personal knowledge of, and thankfully in the end he did not testify which speaks volumes about the validity of Arias' claims.
These arguments have been made out of the presence of the jury. Dubbed "Porn Gate" by the media, the defense is banging their fists that blatant prosecutorial misconduct has occurred and this sham of a trial should be stopped because it is based on false information. Do they really think Jodi Arias should be set free because they have an expert who claims there was deleted porn files on a clone of Travis' laptop? The very word "clone" is cause for suspicion. A clone is not the original evidence, and in this case how can it be authenticated and how did THIS expert find so many deleted files that weren't previously detected? Something is rotten in Denmark. I read somewhere that Jodi is or was reading the book about Casey Anthony "Presumed Guilty", written by Jose Baez - her attorney. Could she have gotten the idea to go after the computer after reading or hearing how Anthony's team found an expert who showed the State's expert on the subject of chloroform searches on the Anthony computer was false? That was actually very relevant information in that case. But still that case was very different from this one.
So the defense makes these very serious prosecutorial misconduct allegations about destroyed evidence, conveniently said evidence was only ever viewed by the defense. It no longer exists. A lot of finger pointing on both sides, who deleted what and when. Can any of it be proved or disproved? The State scored big-time when they got a expert witness to testify that those "thousands of porn files" were not actually files at all. Rather, they were links to "possibly questionable sites" but not porn or photos as the defense has claimed. Then in what I'd say was a Perry Mason moment, the State got expert witness Perry Smith to testify about the existence of an "Incinerator" program that was discovered in the Recycling Bin of the altered clone that Bryan Neumeister examined! This seemingly solidifies the States argument that they didn't view, delete or tamper with any pornography files on the original hard drive of Travis' computer. All of the alleged files and deleted files Neumeister testified about were on the cloned copy ("altered clone") and the Incinerator folder that was found in that Recycling Bin could not have existed on the original hard drive because the program did not even exist when Travis was alive! The topper: at 10:16PM on October 22, 2014 somebody attempted to manually delete the Incinerator program. It wasn't Travis Alexander, and it wasn't the Mesa PD or the prosecutor's office. Porn-Gate case closed.
Even after their deleted porn theory went down in flames, Nurmi continued to argue that misconduct occurred: "this case is more about prosecutorial misconduct than it is about evidence". Evidence, they call this evidence? If you are going to allege that the State and their prosecutor and police force tampered with, destroyed, deleted or altered a computer - you damn well better have strong proof to back up those claims. The defense looks pretty shady if you ask me. Yet there are those that firmly believe this is enough to set Jodi Arias free and give her a pass on murder. Juan Martinez does not and did not take the allegations of misconduct against his office lightly. He allegedly lit into the defense team, focusing on mitigation specialist Maria de la Rosa or "Cougarlucious" as she is better known as in the world of Twitter.
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| Maria de la Rosa - aka "Cougarluscious" |
This should be very easy to validate and prove. I truly and sincerely hope that if and when this trial is finally put to rest and Arias is sent to prison, the State of Arizona and/or the Bar Association takes a good, long look into the actions and activities of the mitigation specialist. Many people believe she is deeply involved in Arias' financial ventures - yes I said it, financial ventures, from the inmate who claimed she didn't have enough money to even file for bankruptcy while directing her supporters to which website their cash donations would be safe going to. As mitigation specialists are independent contractors with Maricopa County, there are professional standards they are expected to comply with. From the Maricopa County website, one such clause reads:
2.1.2.4.8 No Additional Compensation. Contractor may not solicit or accept
private or additional compensation of any kind from any source
including fees, costs or any other form of present or future
compensation, in any matter that relates to or arises out of a
pending assignment or representation.
Here is a link to the entire document: http://www.maricopa.gov/OPDS/Assets/Documents/Legal_Service_Contracts/Service_Provider_Contracts/11075-c.pdf
I hope everything that has occurred with Jodi Inc. is completely scrutinized and examined, including a nice long audit from the IRS into unpaid taxes of these businesses and undeclared income Arias has been taking in since her incarceration in 2008. I've said it many times before and I strongly believe Arias has been attempting to hide or divert this income and hasn't paid one red cent in taxes on any of it. That would seemingly make MDLR an accessory to money laundering if she is touching that Pay Pal account and diverting the funds to the Arias family for future use by Jodi. MDLR was paid hundreds of thousands of dollars for her work on this death penalty case, yet they've had such a problem with their mitigation case and getting people to testify. Maybe Cougarlucious should be putting in more time and effort on that than leaking information to the media, bloggers or anybody else on social media as it has also been alleged.
As for the trial, court is expected to resume on Monday the 15th. There is no word on who will be testifying on Jodi's behalf - as you will recall, the defense filed motions to have witnesses testifying in private, out of public view and that ruling was overturned by a 3 judge panel. Will they ultimately take the stand? You know what I say? If they don't, that's Jodi Arias' problem. Do you remember that Scott Peterson had to get his college golf coach or instructor to come in as a character witness? That's pretty deep on the depth chart as far as character witnesses are concerned!! That's after current friends and family, old friends and acquaintances - an old golf coach or instructor? Still, Scott's trial went on and the jury came out with a verdict. That trial was just as big as this one, with just as much media coverage and just as much of a circus environment as Jodi's. So if Jodi's witnesses won't testify, that's on her. Not the State of Arizona's problem. What do they want, witness protection? What is this, a mob trial? New identities, police protection? Come on, really? If I were a friend of Jodi's and I was asked to testify truthfully, what would I have to fear? I'd testify truthfully for someone I believed in, regardless of what the public thought about me or about the defendant. I believe something else is at play here. You either believe in her or you don't. Nobody is going to crucify you for your thoughts and feelings about your friend or family member. The truth shall set you free, testify!!
