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Jane Velez-Mitchell
Jodi Arias Testimony Continues with Prosecutor Questions
Aired March 13, 2013 - 19:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
JANE VELEZ-MITCHELL, HOST: Do not miss a single, solitary second of Jodi`s testimony. This has been a wild day. What a fierce war of words. The ultimate battle it`s been between Jodi and the prosecutor. I`m Jane Velez-Mitchell. Let`s step back into that courtroom and listen to what`s going on now.
KIRK NURMI, JODI`S DEFENSE ATTORNEY: ... transgressions?
JODI ARIAS, MURDER DEFENDANT: Yes, I did.
NURMI: And what transgressions specifically are we talking about?
ARIAS: We`re talking about sexual sin.
NURMI: OK. And sexual sin being those acts that you engaged in with Mr. Alexander, correct?
ARIAS: That`s correct.
NURMI: And we`re not talking about any other sexual sin with anyone else, since you became a member of the Mormon church, correct?
ARIAS: That`s correct. Travis was the only person that I was with during that time.
NURMI: OK. And were you -- as it relates to Mr. Alexander, were you encouraged to go to the bishop to talk about these transgressions or not talk about these transgressions with the bishop?
ARIAS: Travis discouraged me.
NURMI: And as it relates to these transgressions and following the doctrine, after Mr. Alexander died, did you ever go to your bishop or a bishop and speak of these transgressions?
ARIAS: I did talk to him about the sexual transgressions, but I was not in a position where I submitted to him about what actually happened on June 4.
NURMI: I`m sorry, the last part of that was what? I just didn`t hear it.
ARIAS: What happened on June 4 would also be a transgression, and I didn`t talk about that with him. But I wanted to talk about all the sexual sin we were engaging in throughout most of our relationship.
NURMI: And another question about photographing the injuries you incurred on June 4. Do you recall being asked that question?
JUAN MARTINEZ, PROSECUTOR: Objection. The question involved the injury to the neck, not what happened on June 4.
JUDGE SHERRY STEPHENS, PRESIDING OVER TRIAL: Approach.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: There`s Jodi Arias` defense attorney on what you might call a mop-up operation. But the big question tonight: how did prosecutor Juan Martinez do?
Let`s debate it with our expert legal panel, and we`re going start with Jordan Rose out of Phoenix, Arizona. What say you?
JORDAN ROSE, ATTORNEY: I think he did amazing. He -- the more he questioned her, the more inconsistencies came out. And he had a demeanor today that was just perfectly suited. He wasn`t all over her; he wasn`t attacking her, but he got his points across, and he did the incredibly strong job of pointing out that she is just a liar.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Twenty seconds, Adam Swickle, for the defense.
ADAM SWICKLE, ATTORNEY: I don`t know how you can say that he wasn`t walking all over the courtroom. This was the most aggressive attempt to discredit a witness that I`ve ever seen.
I don`t think you need that particular tactic in order to do that, and I think what you`ve seen is the difference between the defense attorney whose demeanor is a lot more even keeled than a prosecutor, and that`s dangerous. It can backfire.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, I think we`ll all agree with that, that prosecutor Juan Martinez is much more aggressive in his questioning. But this is his last chance at this defendant in terms of having her on the stand to grill her. Let`s listen in.
NURMI: ... spoke a bit. As it relates to injuries that you suffered in your neck in April of 2008, did you ever take photographs of those?
ARIAS: I don`t think any were captured in the photographs. I was wearing makeup. I never took any photos specifically to photograph the bruises and his fingerprint -- fingermarks.
NURMI: And what was the last part of what you said?
ARIAS: The fingermarks that he left.
NURMI: And "he" referring to Travis Alexander, correct?
ARIAS: Yes.
NURMI: OK. Why not? Why didn`t you document these injuries?
ARIAS: Well, it`s something that I wanted to forget, not something I wanted to focus on and remember. It has a lot to do, again, with love/attraction, and I would have never thought of incriminating Travis.
And it`s not anything that -- I felt like, by photographing something or documenting it or writing it down, it solidifies it, and it brings it more into -- well, it was very much reality, but it solidifies it more and begets more of that stuff. And that`s something that I was hoping would go away, and -- and I believed it would end after I moved away.
NURMI: Believed what would end?
ARIAS: The physical violence.
NURMI: You also mentioned earlier that you were ashamed of these injuries. Is that part of the reason why you wouldn`t photograph yourself?
ARIAS: Yes, I was definitely ashamed and embarrassed. And I just didn`t want people to look at me differently, because I put up with that or went through that or somehow it was my fault, because I elicited that from Travis. And I felt like -- I was just ashamed, like we -- I didn`t want people to know that he did that to me is all.
NURMI: And you believed that those injuries were your fault?
ARIAS: Well, I was afraid that I would be perceived that way, and sometimes I did feel like I did things that provoked him.
NURMI: No further questions.
STEPHENS: Mr. Martinez, any follow up?
MARTINEZ: In regards to your relationship to Matthew McCartney, in that relationship, ma`am, the question was asked whether or not you were broken up at the time that he was seeing Bianca. Do you remember that?
NURMI: Objection. Mischaracterizes the question.
STEPHENS: Overruled.
ARIAS: He asked -- I think -- I don`t know -- the question was asked if it`s possible that he perceived that. But no, we weren`t broken up.
MARTINEZ: Is it the truth -- do you know somebody named Alice Ovulett (ph)? You do know somebody by that name, right?
ARIAS: Yes, I do.
MARTINEZ: She`s someone who`s assisting in your defense, right?
ARIAS: Correct.
MARTINEZ: She`s a social worker, right?
ARIAS: I don`t know all of what she does.
NURMI: Objection. That mischaracterizes her.
STEPHENS: Sustained.
MARTINEZ: Isn`t it true that you told her that you and Mr. McCartney were already broken up at the time that you confronted Bianca, yes or no?
ARIAS: I did not tell her that. We broke up afterwards.
MARTINEZ: Pardon?
ARIAS: We broke up after...
(CROSSTALK)
MARTINEZ: ... what you`re saying. I`m asking whether or not you told Ms. Ovulett (ph) that you and Mr. McCartney were broken up at the time he started to see Bianca.
NURMI: Asked and answered.
STEPHENS: Overruled.
ARIAS: Not when he started, but he continued to after we broke up.
MARTINEZ: So you weren`t broken up at the time that he started to see Bianca is what you`re saying?
ARIAS: That`s correct.
MARTINEZ: And you didn`t tell that to Alice Ovulett (ph)?
ARIAS: No, I wouldn`t have. We were still together.
MARTINEZ: All right.
And with regard to the transgressions, you indicated that you did go seek or speak to a bishop, right?
ARIAS: Regarding the sexual transgressions.
MARTINEZ: And you also said that you didn`t tell them everything, so you lied to him, right?
NURMI: Objection, beyond the scope of the question.
STEPHENS: Overruled.
NURMI: Argumentative.
STEPHENS: Overruled.
ARIAS: I did not confess that I was the person responsible for Travis`s death.
MARTINEZ: So you lied to him, right?
ARIAS: Well...
NURMI: Objection, argumentative. Asked and answered.
STEPHENS: Sustained.
MARTINEZ: You didn`t tell the whole story then, right? That`s what you said, right?
ARIAS: That would be accurate.
STEPHENS: Any more questions from the jury?
Counsel, please approach.
Ladies and gentlemen, that is all for today. Tomorrow morning, 10:30 a.m. Please remember the admonition. You are excused. Have a nice evening.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, there it is, an historic moment. Jodi Arias finishes her marathon time on the witness stand, 18 days. And you saw it a second ago. She went like this -- whew! -- like, "Did I get through that?"
I`ve got to go to the body language expert, Patti Wood. I don`t know if you saw that.
PATTI WOOD, BODY LANGUAGE EXPERT: Yes.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: She literally took a visual sigh. Tell us about that.
WOOD: Absolutely. We sigh out, we cough out, we clear our throats to get rid of negative emotions. And very interesting. She hasn`t done this till the last three days of this trial. So really unusual for her to show that.
Also, you saw the tightening of the eyes when the prosecutor came up again to start questioning her, and the mouth got really, really tight in fear, as well. So we close down when we`re fearful. Again, very unusual for Jodi.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: And I`ve got to say, I mean, this is really something for the record books. I certainly have never seen this kind of a marathon session on the stand.
I want to go to Beth Karas, correspondent, "In Session." You have cover so many criminal trials. Have you ever seen anything like this? This is extraordinary.
BETH KARAS, CORRESPONDENT, TRUTV`S "IN SESSION": No, I have not. Eighteen days of a defendant on a stand? I don`t think I`ve ever seen 18 days of any kind of witness, let alone the one accused of a capital murder. She took the stand on February 4. And I`ve got to tell you, the mood was hallelujah, when the lawyers had no more questions. She is finished.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Yes. I`ve got to tell you, I was breathing a sigh of relief. I`m not inside the courtroom. I can only imagine the stress for everyone involved.
I mean, I`ve got to go back to Patti Wood, body language expert. When you`re hearing somebody being grilled, it kind of hits you on the cellular level. I`m listening to this all day, taking notes. And I said to some of my staffers -- we were talking; I said, "Are you getting stressed out? Because it`s making me feel stressed."
WOOD: Yes.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Does that have an impact on the...
WOOD: Absolutely.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: ... obviously, the family members going through hell. The jurors, the lawyers, everybody is stressed out.
WOOD: Yes. And it`s interesting. Deception actually affects your central nervous system. So the more she lies, it actually stresses out the listener`s central nervous system.
So -- and interesting today that quite often she answered really, really quickly, and had quite a bit of energy and still showed a smirk when that prosecuting attorney was questioning her at the beginning of the day today.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, let me tell you something, Juan Martinez went after Jodi like never before. This was his last chance to grill her, and he went in on how she got this knife. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARTINEZ: The real operative phrase, "I`ll (EXPLETIVE DELETED) kill you, bitch." You remember that one, right?
ARIAS: Absolutely. The threat on my life, I remember it.
MARTINEZ: So even though your computer may have frozen as to everything else, that`s the one thing you do remember, right?
ARIAS: I recall that specifically.
MARTINEZ: And then you got up and then the fog started to come in, right?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: And prosecutor Juan Martinez so sarcastic about the fog. "The fog rolls in," he says. Let`s debate it with our legal panel. We start with Jon Lieberman.
Was it too aggressive? Was it over the top? Did it feel like Juan Martinez had lost control and was just plain old angry?
JON LIEBERMAN, HLN CONTRIBUTOR: Not at all. Let`s tell it straight. This was Juan Martinez`s finest day in the courtroom of this trial.
You have a client on the stand at this point, lying for sport. You can see that she`s enjoying coming up with these lies in her head, and frankly, it`s disgraceful. It really is. It`s embarrassing to our entire system.
And what we saw out of Juan Martinez was meticulously breaking down how implausible Jodi Arias`s story is. How in 62 seconds she couldn`t have done everything that she said she did. How she remembers, in great detail, how she gingerly steps into Travis`s closet, but then she doesn`t remember if the gun is in a holster. She doesn`t remember if it`s loaded or not. At this point, it is ridiculous.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Jon Lieberman, we`re going to break down all of that sound in a second.
But Adam Swickle for the defense, yes, it would seem almost transparent that she was changing her story. You could almost see the wheels turning in her head from moment to moment as he tried to corner her. And then she would just -- she would just make a little turn to explain it, almost like a child telling a fairy tale.
SWICKLE: Well, I think that`s actually a good point from the defense. She is somewhat of a child. And I think the defense has brought that out.
But when it comes to this aggressive tactic, I`ve got to tell you, I`ve tried a lot of cases. I can be very aggressive and boisterous and loud, as I`m sure you can tell from the shows that I`ve done. However, there is a time to do it and a time not to do it.
And what I found interesting, listen to the last few questions that he just asked her. He was still aggressive. He was still meticulous. But he wasn`t physically aggressive. He wasn`t ranting and raving around the courtroom.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Yes, he went out with a whimper, Jordan Rose. I have to give -- I have to give the defense that.
ROSE: He went out with a whimper, but the last question where he said, "So you shot him in the head?" I mean, that`s unforgettable. That`s perfect.
ARIAS: All right. We`re just getting started. Tons -- tons to debate. So many more moments from court. We`ll play them all, all the key moments for you right now. Stay right there.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STEPHENS: "Did you ever voice any concern to Travis about being uncomfortable with some of his sexual fantasies?"
ARIAS: Yes, there was one fantasy that he wanted to do, which was pulling off on the side of a freeway exit and having sex on the hood of a car. And I was -- I told him that that would be impossible. I couldn`t even think of an exit where that could be accomplished.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARTINEZ: You`re body slammed. You get away. You go down the hallway, you go in the closet, you get the gun, you go into the bathroom again. You then turn around and point the gun. You shoot him. He goes down. He`s still hollering at you, saying, "(EXPLETIVE DELETED) you, you bitch." And then, after you`re able to get away, you go get the knife, and he ends up at the end of the hallway, all in 62 seconds, that`s what you`re telling us?
ARIAS: No, that`s not what I`m saying.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Was that prosecutor, Juan Martinez`s, finest moment as he presented what he calls an impossible scenario? Essentially, it sounded more like a closing argument. He confronts her in a question form, but it`s a rhetorical question.
He`s saying there`s no way that you could have done all of that in 62 seconds. And the camera that`s there accidentally taking pictures shows that it all happened in 62 seconds.
Let`s debate it with our expert legal panel, starting with Jordan Rose. Was this the coup de gras? Was this the checkmate on Jodi Arias?
ROSE: I think it was. Because you know, you started out in the trial, and you`d ask, "Hey, folks, do you think there`s going to be a hung jury? What do you think?" And I would say yes, maybe they`d hang because she`s a pretty girl, and they feel sorry for her.
But throughout the course of this and today, ending in that bang, you kind of feel there is no sympathy for her. There`s no love with -- you know, from the jury saying "I can`t kill this -- I cannot possibly put this woman to death because I just love her."
She`s just such a liar. And even if those guys on the jury were at one point going, "Ooh, cute girl, want to date her," now they see downside: danger, risks, psycho. And it`s just blaring. And Juan Martinez, the prosecutor, just blew that up today.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Yes. But Adam Swickle, I`m getting to this point about the 62 second. To me, I said, "Aha, this is the smoking gun, the checkmate, the coup de gras," whatever you want to call it, the moment where he presents her with her scenario and says, "This is impossible. You can`t stab somebody 29 times, slit their throat, shoot them, drag their body and do all this in 62 seconds."
SWICKLE: Well, actually, I think you can do that in 62 seconds. I`ve seen a lot of cases where this kind of violence, this kind of an aggressiveness can happen in a split second. So the concept that you couldn`t have done all this in 62 seconds, what it makes it seem like is because you go through point by point by point.
And many times what you`ll see a prosecutor do or a defense attorney is you`ll have them look at the clock. And if you look at the clock and you follow 62 seconds, you will see, really, how long 62 seconds can be.
LIEBERMAN: Hey, Adam, if things were that frantic, why wasn`t anything in the closet disturbed at all?
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Very good point.
SWICKLE: Because he wasn`t fighting with her -- but he wasn`t fighting with her in the closet. That`s where she was able to run and go.
And I find it interesting that that`s exactly what Juan Martinez is doing. He`s not asking so many questions, and I think you pointed this out earlier. He`s not asking so many questions. He`s giving his closing statement. And I was very surprised that it was actually allowed to go on as long as it was, because it was purely argumentative. It wasn`t her -- his questions and her answers. It was just him ranting and raving about his theory of the case.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: OK.
LIEBERMAN: No. It was argumentative -- Jane, just quickly, it was argumentative, because he pointed out at least three times today where Jodi contradicted what she said 30 seconds earlier. That`s why it`s argumentative.
SWICKLE: No, his questions are argumentative.
LIEBERMAN: You cannot just sit on the witness stand and lie and contradict yourself.
SWICKLE: You know that the way in which he produced himself or presented himself was purely argumentative. At no point in time did she ever become aggressive towards him, which would have justified this behavior.
LIEBERMAN: Yes. She`s an emotionless -- she`s an emotionless...
(CROSSTALK)
SWICKLE: ... to know if the jury is convicting her or acquitting her because of it.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Listen, on the other side --
LIEBERMAN: She`s an emotionless liar, that`s why.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: We`re going to break down the 62 seconds for you. You judge for yourself. And we`ll take your calls. Can somebody do all this horrific destruction to another human being in 62 seconds? Stay right there.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ARIAS: He was kneeling down in the shower. I don`t remember. He was like -- if this was the shower and the sink is over here, I was like right here, taking pictures. And I don`t really know what happened after that exactly, except -- except I think he was shot.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Husband had a tripped planned for Hawaii, but I asked if we could instead take a road trip and come down here and see if we could come into the courtroom.
Her on the stand when she`s crying, it appears that she`s crying, but there`s no tears. Or you`ll see where she gets very catty and goes back and forth with the prosecutor. And so you kind of see a different side of her than the glasses and little timid bangs that she kind of portrays. So it`s very interesting. I`m just hoping that his family gets justice.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: I believe I heard that woman say she begged her husband to take her from, I think, Seattle down to see the trial in Arizona. The Jodi Arias trial has now turned into a huge spectacle. People waiting in line like an amusement park to get a see in this courtroom.
Take a look. We`re going to show you some of the lines. There they are. And what does this remind me of? It reminds me of the Casey Anthony trial. Very, very similar. Take a look at that. People fascinated by this case. It has touched a nerve.
This now is the Casey Anthony case. You can hardly tell the difference, except there were some fisticuffs at the Casey Anthony case, and I remember that well, because I was right there.
Let`s go out to the phone lines. Mark, New York, your question or thought? Mark, New York.
CALLER: Yes, how you doing?
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Good.
CALLER: My thing is I want to give our condolences out to the Alexander family, first of all.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Yes.
CALLER: But my thing is, you know Jodi, when she was on the stand and she was talking about the glasses with the license plates in the parking lot and she could not read license plates because of the glasses. She didn`t have glasses. She was near-sighted. But yet when she was on the stand, she kept lifting her glasses up to read everything, as if she didn`t need glasses anyway. You know, that was kind of mind-boggling to me.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, you make a fascinating point, Mark. I`ll bring in Beth Karas. We`ve seen a lot of photos of Jodi Arias in happier times, so to speak, before she killed Travis Alexander. You don`t see her in glasses. Suddenly, these glasses pop up.
And we`ve all seen her look over the glasses to read, which is, you know, it`s humorous.
KARAS: No, that`s -- that would be appropriate.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Yes.
KARAS: That would be appropriate, because I`m nearsighted also, and so that means I need glasses for far. I need glasses for driving, for looking distances. I don`t need them for reading. So -- so if she`s nearsighted, she indeed doesn`t need them for reading. Some people actually need them for both. They get bifocals.
But if she was nearsighted, then she could not have driven. She says she couldn`t make out that a license plate was just some feet behind her car when she was in Pasadena on the evening of June 3, 2008. So Martinez later said, "Well, then, how were you driving?"
"Oh, I could make out signs." No way. My eyes aren`t that bad, but I cannot read a sign until I`m up on it. I would never drive without contact lenses or glasses.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Well, I agree with you.
KARAS: That`s her problem.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: I cannot drive without glasses, because my eyesight has gotten bad, but the point I`m making is you didn`t see her with glasses ever in any photos. Usually people who are nearsighted, you`ll see them in some kind of photo with glasses.
KARAS: Right.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: We never saw that. And then to use that as an excuse for the license plate -- 10 seconds, explain the license plate issue.
KARAS: Well, she -- she was found with her license plate upside down the day after she killed Travis Alexander. She was stopped by police in Utah. The state believes, I think, that she removed the license plates when she went in the house to have sex and then kill Travis Alexander. So no one could identify "ooh, this strange car, here are the plates" in the driveway. And in her haste to leave, she put the back one on upside down. The front was in the back seat of the car, the front plate.
But she said some skaters, roller skaters, roller bladers were playing a joke on her outside of a Starbucks in Pasadena when she was still on her way to Arizona, and they took one plate off and turned the other one upside-down as a joke. That`s what she says, and the state says differently.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: My interpretation was that the state believes she had turned the license plate upside-down so that, if they were looking for her, they wouldn`t -- they wouldn`t be able to read the license plate because it was upside-down. But whatever.
KARAS: Yes.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: The idea that these coincidental roller bladers would be messing with her license plates. You know, one too many "co-ink-ee- dinks," as they say.
So much more to debate from another big day in the Jodi Arias trial. Once again, we`re going to break down that 62 seconds on the other side.
And at 8, Nancy Grace talks to a friend who survived a hold up with Travis Alexander. We`ve shown you video of Travis talking about that. Nancy at 8 Eastern.
And on the other side, more crucial information. Break it down with us.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARTINEZ: The real operative phrase, "(EXPLETIVE DELETED) kill you, bitch," you remember that one, right?
ARIAS: Absolutely. The threat on my life I remember.
MARTINEZ: Right. So even though your computer may have frozen as to everything else, that`s the one thing that you remember, right?
ARIAS: I recall that specifically.
MARTINEZ: And then you got up, and then the fog started to come in, right?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JODI ARIAS, ON TRIAL FOR MURDER OF TRAVIS ALEXANDER: It all happened very fast, and it all seemed to happen all at once.
JUAN MARTINEZ, PROSECUTOR: You`re the only one that knows about this memory stuff.
SHERRY STEPHENS, PRESIDING JUDGE: Regarding shaking memory, foggy reaction.
MARTINEZ: The way you describe that, it`s impossible for the killing to have happened in that manner, isn`t it?
ARIAS: That`s according to you.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All this fictitious, crazy story is something she made up.
MARTINEZ: All in 62 seconds? That`s what you`re telling us? You still don`t know where the knife is, do you?
ARIAS: I remember that, dropping the knife and (inaudible), but it goes blank after that.
STEPHENS: How is it possible you remember such details from those days, if you had a foggy memory?
ARIAS: Do you remember that you just said that a minute or so ago?
ARIAS: I ran. And he was still conscious. He was alive.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As he tries to get away, she finishes him in the hallway and drags him back.
ARIAS: There`s a huge gap. And the most clear memory that I have after that point is driving in the desert.
STEPHENS: After all the lies you have told, why should we believe you now?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
JANE VELEZ-MITCHELL, HLN HOST: 18 days and done, moments ago Jodi Arias stepping off the witness stand after a marathon, marathon series of days upon days of testimony, not before the prosecutor, however, cornered her, saying Jodi`s version of that just does not add up because she had a very short amount of time to kill Travis. 62 seconds to be exact, based on what the camera accidentally captured at the start of the confrontation, and then at the end of the killing when it inadvertently went off again.
We`re going to break it down. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARTINEZ: You are body slammed, you get away. You go down the hallway, you go in the closet. You get the gun. You go into the bathroom again. You then turn around and load the gun. You shoot him. He goes down, he`s still hollering at you, and saying "(EXPLETIVE DELETED) kill you, bitch". And then, after you`re able to get away, you go get a knife and he ends up at the end of the hallway, all in 62 seconds, that`s what you`re telling us?
ARIAS: No, that`s not what I`m saying.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Let`s break it down. 5:30 p.m. this is the last photo of Travis alive. Then 5:31 we see the first accidental photo, the one where Jodi supposedly dropped the camera. Then just 62 seconds later, Jodi is seen standing over Travis` bloody body. It`s a murky photo, but that`s what everybody pretty much agrees is the case. That Jodi Arias is standing over Travis` very bloody body.
Now, the prosecutor is saying there`s no way that brief amount of time would allow for Travis to body slam Jodi in the bathroom, for her to run down the hall then go into the closet then grab the gun, then run back into the bathroom, then shoot Travis, then run down the hallway again to find the knife, then stab Travis 29 times, slit his throat in the bedroom, and then drag his body back to the bathroom where that final shot was taken 62 seconds later. He`s saying Jodi`s version of events is impossible. There is Travis Alexander, where his friends found him several days later, his body stuffed in the shower.
Let`s debate it. I thought that was one of the strongest points for the prosecutor. Jordan Rose for the prosecution, attorney out of Phoenix, Arizona -- what say you?
JORDAN ROSE, ATTORNEY: There`s simply no way that in that small time period she could have done all the things that she claims to have done. Stepping on the rack to get in the closet without disturbing anything in the closet and then finding this gun that`s in a holster or not in a holster and making all these decisions in her mind -- it just makes no sense. It`s incomprehensible.
And I think the way the prosecutor walked everyone through this -- and let`s remember it only took him a short period of time today to do that -- I think it was very clear that there`s no way this could have happened as she says it did.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Adam Swickle for the defense?
ADAM SWICKLE, CRIMINAL DEFENSE ATTORNEY: I don`t know how anybody can say that. In order to make that determination, you have to have evidence. Juan Martinez did a good job in a certain sense of giving his closing argument during his cross-examination. He made a conclusion that it was impossible.
Has anybody testified? Did anybody take measurements of the distance? We`re not talking about a mansion here. And we just need -- your prosecution just made an argument that nobody could think about all these things during that period of time. That`s not accurate. She wasn`t thinking during this.
(CROSSTALK)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: You know what just occurred to me? You know what just occurred to me? I think the prosecution may have made a mistake by not taking the jurors to the crime scene. I remember during the Casey Anthony case --
SWICKLE: Good point.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: -- the first time I went down to the Anthony house and realized how close, drove within just a couple of seconds around the corner and that`s where Caylee`s body was found it was like a revelation to me. I was like, oh my God, this all makes sense now. This is literally in her backyard.
Beth Karas, do you think that that might have been a strategic error? They do have the ability to put these folks in a bus and take them to the crime scene.
BETH KARAS, CORRESPONDENT, "IN SESSION": Yes, you know, I don`t know. I don`t know that I would call anything an error here. I do think that the prosecutor operates on a level above a lot of us, quite frankly. This is a man who has had 300 trials and I think that he thinks out of the box and he thinks like three steps ahead of all of us, frankly. I mean I`m amazed at Juan Martinez -- I`ve got to tell you.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Yes. I think he`s doing an excellent job. I mean my God, I would just be -- I`m trying to take notes of what he`s doing and I`ve got stacks of paper up to the ceiling. Jon Leiberman?
JON LEIBERMAN, HLN CONTRIBUTOR: Well, it will all make sense. Mr. Martinez`s methods will all make sense during closing. You`ll see that, I guarantee it.
But Jane, a key is this. If Jodi Arias is in fear of her life, and she doesn`t know whether or not the gun is loaded, why would she go to the closet for an unloaded gun if her life was truly hanging in the balance?
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Oh, yes.
LEIBERMAN: It just defies logic.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: We`re going to get to that, where she says Travis told me the gun was not loaded. But I took the gun and pointed it at him to stop it. Well, why would it stop him if he knew the gun wasn`t loaded?
But she says something in the middle of that, oh, yes, but he loaded it in December. She has that way of just throwing those one-liners in, but will that constitute reasonable doubt? Who knows?
Your calls and more of the stunning testimony on the other side.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STEPHENS: After all the lies you have told, why should we believe you now?
ARIAS: Lying isn`t typically something I just do.
STEPHENS: Answer the question as it`s stated.
ARIAS: It`s hard, because I don`t think I have memory issues.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARTINEZ: So you grabbed this gun that he has told you was unloaded and you go into the bathroom, right?
ARIAS: That`s right.
MARTINEZ: And you point that gun, right?
ARIAS: Yes.
MARTINEZ: You know what guns do, right?
ARIAS: Yes.
MARTINEZ: So if you thought it was unloaded, why are you pointing it?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: It`s such a great point, especially when he supposedly told her the gun was unloaded. But in response, she said, "Well, he loaded it in December." Again, is she a pathological liar and just comes up, pulls this stuff out of thin air when she needs to? The jury will decide that.
The prosecutor also hammered Jodi about shells in Travis` closet where she claims she just leapt up to grab the gun so that she could defend herself. Check this interaction out.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARTINEZ: These are really nothing more than resting shelves, with shelves that rest on four metal pegs. Did you know that the rating on these shelves was 40 pounds and you`re saying that your foot just hit the edge of this shelf, right?
But actually if you would have put your foot right there at the edge, ma`am, wouldn`t that shelf, the way you described it, if you just put it here on the left which is what you told us, wouldn`t that shelf have tipped over?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: See this is a great common sense argument. We all have shelves like there or have had them at one point where there are these little pins that they`re falling down because if you just them too heavy they tip over and yet she slips like Tinkerbell, goes up there and grabs this hypothetical gun without disturbing anything. Look how clean and neat this closet is. Wouldn`t some of those shoes be overturned if that really happened?
Let`s go out to the phone lines. Sonny, South Carolina, your questions or thought -- Sonny?
SONNY, SOUTH CAROLINA (via telephone): Hi, Jane, how are you doing today?
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Good, thank you.
SONNY: Good. My question is when Jodi went into the closet and she put her right foot on the shelf, her left hand to pick herself up, why nobody checked for fingerprints for the left hand.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Oh, excellent question. Beth Karas, I thought this myself as I was hearing this testimony. I was like, wait a second, if she really did touch that cabinet wall there, wouldn`t her fingerprints have been right there and wouldn`t the prosecution have brought that up, that if they weren`t there, you didn`t touch it, honey.
KARAS: Yes, but you know, remember she said she used to clean there and she used to clean up on those shelves. So her fingerprints could be there from cleaning, right? And her fingerprints and here you`d expect to be in various places in the house because she used to live there, also.
Granted, it hadn`t been for a few months. But there could be an explanation. Fingerprints, you can`t really tell the age of them when you lift them. However, it is a good question. And we may see more dealing with this whole issue in rebuttal.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: You know, as I watched this unfold, and I`ll bring in my expert panel again, I`m reminded of Casey Anthony. Because at this point in the Casey Anthony case, everybody was saying what they were saying about this case, what they are saying, with the exception of the gentlemen for the defense that this is an open and shut case. It`s a slam dunk. Checkmate, whatever phraseology you want to use. It`s over.
And we know what happened with Casey Anthony. Are we perhaps reading in too much to the juror`s minds? Because at this time, at this juncture, even though Casey didn`t take the stand, but at this stage of the Casey Anthony trial, all the talking heads were saying she`s done, she`s convicted, it`s over for her. I`ll throw that at Beth Karas.
KARAS: Well, you know, there`s a huge difference between this case and that case. And that is that Jodi Arias was on the stand for 18 days. Casey Anthony never took the stand. She always denied killing her daughter. She never gave an explanation until Jose Baez said in an opening statement there was never a kidnapping. She was never missing. This child drowned accidentally in the pool. It was all an accident.
And so that`s a huge difference. I mean people thought all the pieces were there in this entirely circumstantial case against Casey Anthony and that the jurors just didn`t do their job. But this is a very different case where she says she admits it but she was justified.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Beth, I see a commonality here, because the tables were turned. I mean up until the trial, she was sitting behind bars for a couple years when Jodi Arias came up with this idea of self-defense. Originally she had said I wasn`t there --
KARAS: True.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: -- then the ninja thing --
KARAS: Yes.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: -- and then suddenly self-defense just like -- and I`ll throw this to Adam Swickle -- with the Casey Anthony case, where is Caylee. Zenaida Gonzalez took the child -- yada, yada, yada. Then on the first day, oh, never was kidnapped, the child drowned.
SWICKLE: Absolutely. Absolutely, I agree with what you`re saying in a certain sense that it doesn`t really matter why you think somebody is going to be guilty or not guilty in the sense of predicting what`s going to happen. So whether it was Casey Anthony not taking the stand or Jodi Arias taking the stand, everybody said it was a slam dunk case. Everybody said it was over.
And you`ve got to be careful with those kinds of predictions because I have to tell you in all the cases I`ve tried, I never try to predict what a jury is going to do. Just like the questions that you just got from your caller, nobody thought about that. I haven`t heard that one time yet about the fingerprint, but it`s a great point and it would have solidified for the defense or for the prosecution certain arguments.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Ok. Quickly, Jon Leiberman?
LEIBERMAN: For the record, I came out on this program and said I didn`t think Casey Anthony was going to be convicted.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Oh, what an opportunity for self-promotion.
LEIBERMAN: We`ll talk about that later but listen there are a lot of differences here. Number one, we are getting a window into the jurors by the questions that they`re asking, and clearly the questions are leaning in a large part against Jodi Arias.
Second thing, there`s not the hurdle of figuring out who killed Travis. She admits killing Travis, so that`s another hurdle that`s different than with Casey Anthony -- it`s a completely different case. Lots more evidence in this case.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: We`re going to take a break. On the other side, that infamous -- well, at least for this case -- law of chastity.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ARIAS: Sometimes we would argue and if sex followed that immediately after the argument, it signaled the end of the argument. There were times like when he wouldn`t let me leave and I left finally and he called me to come back and I came back and we had sex and we were done fighting. So it changed the mood, the atmosphere, the energy, and it put him in a better mood.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: We`re all over this case and we`ll bring you the very latest tomorrow. So Beth Karas, you are there at the courthouse. What is up next?
KARAS: Well, the defense has only called eight witnesses so far in 21 days of their case. Now, we do expect one of their two expert witnesses tomorrow, their ninth witness, either the domestic violence expert, Alice La Violette (ph) or the psychologist, Richard Samuels. It may be Dr. Samuels. And he`ll we think give an opinion that she suffered from PTSD.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Post traumatic stress disorder.
Well, Patti Wood, body language expert, was she PTSD on the stand today?
PATTI WOOD, BODY LANGUAGE EXPERT: No. She had the opportunity still to show the body language of a victim. Instead her need to control and be powerful -- she exploded out at answering each question. She still did that pivot and present body language and she still had that smirk on her face.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Yes. She is definitely not crumbling this time around. I only really saw her crumble once when he said were you crying when you stabbed Travis Alexander? That is when she broke down and hid her face behind her hair.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
VELEZ-MITCHELL: 18 days, Jodi Arias is finally done. Adam Swickle should she have taken the stand? Good idea or a mess for her?
SWICKLE: She had no choice but to take the stand in this case because it is a self defense case and especially when there are no other witnesses who can necessarily corroborate certain emotions, certain things that happened. You can have cases of it where there is a witness who can testify to certain behaviors or words. But in this case she had no choice and the defense had to put her on.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: Jon Leiberman?
LEIBERMAN: Yes, I agree with Adam. Look, they had to put her up there. I do believe today Mr. Martinez took away from her any credibility to the self-defense offense and I think in closing he will tie it up neatly with the premeditation and I think she is done.
VELEZ-MITCHELL: I think it was a bad day for Jodi Arias but I wonder about the jurors` desire to continue to ask her questions. If they are absolutely sure that she is a pathological liar who is lying about everything, why continue to engage? I haven`t figured it out.
But I`m sure Nancy will. She is up next.
END
