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CNN Live Event/Special

Judge Confirms Preliminary Hearing for Paula Poundstone

Aired September 05, 2001 - 12:15   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.
COLLEEN MCEDWARDS, CNN ANCHOR: We want to get you right now to Santa Monica, California, where Steven Cron the attorney for Paula Poundstone, she and he have just come out of a courthouse there. Let's listen.

STEVEN CRON, PAULA POUNDSTONE'S ATTORNEY: I wish I could tell you. The judge wanted us to brief that, and we're going to be look out for what's best for Paula, what's best for family and best for her children, and those will be the factors that we'll consider when discussing that with the judge you.

QUESTION: Met with the prosecuting attorney, what did you talk about it?

CRON: The weather, dodgers, stuff like that. We talk about lots of things, and not anything that I would discuss in public.

QUESTION: Issues concerned about as far as the public being invited?

QUESTION: About the public being invited into the courtroom?

CRON: Yes?

CRON: Just protection of the children involved, protection of Paula, protection of her family. Those would be the issues we're concerned about.

QUESTION: Are you expecting to go to trial?

CRON: There are always discussions. Whether anything will come of it, I can't tell you at this point.

QUESTION: Considering the lower evidentiary standard of the prelim, What are the thoughts of this being disposed of before trial?

CRON: Well, I've said from day one, and nothing his changed, that Paula is not a child molester, and Paula is not guilty of lewd conduct charge, and there is nothing that I've in the evidence that has changed that. Whether a judge would find that there's enough evidence in a preliminary hearing to get past that, that's something I don't know.

QUESTION: So it's your expectation, the preliminary hearing will go forward?

CRON: At this point, it's scheduled and as far as I know it will go forward.

QUESTION: Open to a certain degree at least, people will be able to come in from the start and go witness by witness?

CRON: Something that hasn't been decided, and I don't know.

QUESTION: In your ideal world, would it be closed?

CRON: My ideal world it would never occur. So it's hard to say. I just want to look out what's best for everybody involved.

QUESTION: Paula, how is the treatment going?

CRON: It's going great.

You didn't think I would let that slip by, did you?

(LAUGHTER)

CRON: No, seriously, she's doing well, I just asked her not to say anything. She's got a lot of things going on. And so for now, I'll speak for her, if you don't mind.

Great, they're doing really, really well.

Yes?

QUESTION: Could you talk about possible career plans after rehab, after all this is over?

CRON: I expect that she's going resume her career, and, you know, catch up from where she left off.

Anyway, that's about it. As I said, there's not much new, and thank you all for coming. And we're all set.

MCEDWARDS: All right, you have been listening in live to Steven Cron, the attorney for comedienne Paula Poundstone. That meeting lasted about a minute. It was expected to be a procedural matter. The judge confirmed the preliminary hearing for Paula Poundstone, which is set to begin September 11th. Again, she is charged with child endangerment and lewd conduct, has been in treatment since those charges were laid.

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