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Bryant Attorneys Likely to Skip Preliminary Hearing

Aired October 09, 2003 - 13:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Let's bring you up to date. Kobe Bryant, just arrived at the Eagle County courthouse in Colorado. He's now behind closed doors with his legal team, the judge, the prosecuting team, all there, to discuss the possibilities of a pretrial hearing. The question is, whether Mr. Bryant and his team will elect to opt out of that hearing. It is up to them to decide whether to press forward at this juncture.
And we're joined now by our legal expert Jeffrey Toobin who knows a little something about all these matter former federal prosecutor and counselor of some great note. Jeff Toobin, I know you're not a betting man, but if you were, what would you place money on, hearing or no hearing today?

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: I bet no hearing, Miles. I just don't see the upside for the defense in having this hearing. They are not going to win, we know that. This case is not going to be dismissed. So all that they will accomplish will be getting evidence that is by definition, incriminating to their client on the public record and available for distribution.

Now, one thing we should note is that in about 45 minutes there will be a behind closed doors hearing involving the judge and the lawyers from both sides where the defense will ask that certain evidence presented today be shielded from even the public. We know there are no cameras in the public. But they would hold this -- they want essentially a secret session for that evidence.

If they win that, if the defense wins the judge's agreement to keep the evidence secret, then I think there is some chance that they would go ahead with the preliminary hearing. But I don't think they're going to win the request to keep the defense secret -- to keep the evidence secret. So I just don't think we're going to go forward with the hearing today.

O'BRIEN: So in other words, they'll ask the judge to shield the most damaging evidence potentially and then press on if they could. And judges of course have a lot of latitude when it comes to these kinds of things. Is there much precedent for that sort of modified public hearing?

TOOBIN: There is precedent for judges keeping evidence secret that they believe will really prejudice a jury pool. And obviously, you know, we are very concerned about a fair jury here and this is a relatively small community. They've got a lot of information about this case. Certainly, any specific information about the alleged victim's statement to -- on video, Kobe Bryant's statement on audiotape, the photographs. If any of that is distributed it will receive wide, wide attention. Those are the kinds of things that really might prompt the judge to agree to keep it all under wraps.

O'BRIEN: All right, so there are a few twists and turns yet in all this. We're obviously going to keep very close contact. Just give us a little tick tock. There are certain deadlines when decisions have to be made, right?

TOOBIN: Well, let me start with literally tick tock, today. 12:15, local time, which is about 45 minutes from now, the lawyers go behind closed doors with the judge to determine what evidence is public or not.

Forty-five minutes lawyer, 1:00, local time, that's when the preliminary hearing is supposed to start. We still don't know whether it will take place. I think it's very likely those of us in the courtroom, when we're waiting for the lawyers to come out, we won't know. I think at 1:00, the judge will either say to the prosecution, OK, call your first witness.

Or the defense will get up and say, we waive this hearing, let's move to the next stage of the process, let's move this case from county court, which is the lower court where we are now to district court, where the jury trial will take place. That's the real tick tock of today.

If the case is so-called bound over, which means if the case moves to the district court, there will be 30 days to an arraignment where Kobe Bryant, again, enters a plea of not guilty and his bail is set.

At that point there will be a schedule set for motions and there are going to be a lot of motions in this case, possibly change of venue, motions to get access to medical records of the alleged victim, motions to introduce those medical records into evidence.

Then we'll start to see how long until a trial. And based on what I've heard from Colorado lawyers, we could be easily talking six, eight, nine months down the road.

O'BRIEN: In other words, about the length of an NBA season?

TOOBIN: Well, you know, that's right, Miles. And that, of course, is not -- not a trivial concern here. Kobe Bryant wants to play out the season. He wants -- he hopes that the Lakers will be playing well into the playoffs.

So it does seem possible that given the way the case is proceeding and given the usual case of Colorado justice, he may well be able to play throughout this NBA Season, even with the playoffs, before this case goes to trial.

O'BRIEN: Jeff Toobin, watching things for us in Eagle, Colorado. Stay close. We appreciate it.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com






Aired October 9, 2003 - 13:30   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Let's bring you up to date. Kobe Bryant, just arrived at the Eagle County courthouse in Colorado. He's now behind closed doors with his legal team, the judge, the prosecuting team, all there, to discuss the possibilities of a pretrial hearing. The question is, whether Mr. Bryant and his team will elect to opt out of that hearing. It is up to them to decide whether to press forward at this juncture.
And we're joined now by our legal expert Jeffrey Toobin who knows a little something about all these matter former federal prosecutor and counselor of some great note. Jeff Toobin, I know you're not a betting man, but if you were, what would you place money on, hearing or no hearing today?

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: I bet no hearing, Miles. I just don't see the upside for the defense in having this hearing. They are not going to win, we know that. This case is not going to be dismissed. So all that they will accomplish will be getting evidence that is by definition, incriminating to their client on the public record and available for distribution.

Now, one thing we should note is that in about 45 minutes there will be a behind closed doors hearing involving the judge and the lawyers from both sides where the defense will ask that certain evidence presented today be shielded from even the public. We know there are no cameras in the public. But they would hold this -- they want essentially a secret session for that evidence.

If they win that, if the defense wins the judge's agreement to keep the evidence secret, then I think there is some chance that they would go ahead with the preliminary hearing. But I don't think they're going to win the request to keep the defense secret -- to keep the evidence secret. So I just don't think we're going to go forward with the hearing today.

O'BRIEN: So in other words, they'll ask the judge to shield the most damaging evidence potentially and then press on if they could. And judges of course have a lot of latitude when it comes to these kinds of things. Is there much precedent for that sort of modified public hearing?

TOOBIN: There is precedent for judges keeping evidence secret that they believe will really prejudice a jury pool. And obviously, you know, we are very concerned about a fair jury here and this is a relatively small community. They've got a lot of information about this case. Certainly, any specific information about the alleged victim's statement to -- on video, Kobe Bryant's statement on audiotape, the photographs. If any of that is distributed it will receive wide, wide attention. Those are the kinds of things that really might prompt the judge to agree to keep it all under wraps.

O'BRIEN: All right, so there are a few twists and turns yet in all this. We're obviously going to keep very close contact. Just give us a little tick tock. There are certain deadlines when decisions have to be made, right?

TOOBIN: Well, let me start with literally tick tock, today. 12:15, local time, which is about 45 minutes from now, the lawyers go behind closed doors with the judge to determine what evidence is public or not.

Forty-five minutes lawyer, 1:00, local time, that's when the preliminary hearing is supposed to start. We still don't know whether it will take place. I think it's very likely those of us in the courtroom, when we're waiting for the lawyers to come out, we won't know. I think at 1:00, the judge will either say to the prosecution, OK, call your first witness.

Or the defense will get up and say, we waive this hearing, let's move to the next stage of the process, let's move this case from county court, which is the lower court where we are now to district court, where the jury trial will take place. That's the real tick tock of today.

If the case is so-called bound over, which means if the case moves to the district court, there will be 30 days to an arraignment where Kobe Bryant, again, enters a plea of not guilty and his bail is set.

At that point there will be a schedule set for motions and there are going to be a lot of motions in this case, possibly change of venue, motions to get access to medical records of the alleged victim, motions to introduce those medical records into evidence.

Then we'll start to see how long until a trial. And based on what I've heard from Colorado lawyers, we could be easily talking six, eight, nine months down the road.

O'BRIEN: In other words, about the length of an NBA season?

TOOBIN: Well, you know, that's right, Miles. And that, of course, is not -- not a trivial concern here. Kobe Bryant wants to play out the season. He wants -- he hopes that the Lakers will be playing well into the playoffs.

So it does seem possible that given the way the case is proceeding and given the usual case of Colorado justice, he may well be able to play throughout this NBA Season, even with the playoffs, before this case goes to trial.

O'BRIEN: Jeff Toobin, watching things for us in Eagle, Colorado. Stay close. We appreciate it.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com