The Jodi Arias Death Penalty Retrial (Sentencing): Day 13 - "A Juror's Perspective".
The Courtroom is seated as soon as the Jury sits down. It is quiet. I look to my left and see only eight or nine reporters present. Normally, the media seating is very full. I took that as a bad sign after seeing Dr. Fonseca walk past me. It was a sign that she would be on the stand most of the day. There was no camera on the left side, it's telephoto lens normally jutting outward.
Juan Martinez was dressed in a dark gray suit with a light blue shirt complimented with a gray patterned tie. His hair was perfect. He looked focused. Expectations were high after his pursuit of Dr. Fonseca at the close of Day 12.
He walked over to his table and looked at his legal pad, waiting a moment for Dr. Fonseca to get settled. She always looked over to the Jury as if they were good friends. She nodded her head at them and straightened her clothes. She looked ready to tackle this Prosecutor named Mr. Martinez.
Juan walks in short steps back and forth as he questions her. He does not look at the Jury but does face toward them at times. He paces four feet forward and then four feet back. Sometimes, his hands are in his pockets, his suit coat folds resting over his wrists. He looks to the ground a lot. Other times, he crosses his arms across his chest as he asks questions. Sometimes, while he is waiting for an answer, he rests his chin in the crook of his hand. His brow is slightly furled in intensity.
He speaks clearly and succinctly. His questioning is pointed and directional. He does not show empathy for anyone he questions. Even his own witnesses are not spared empathy. He is sharp and quick witted. His questions are a foundation to a piercing question. He knows the answers to the questions he asks. He is direct. He goes after the truth. He always gets the answer he expects. He never goes down a dark hallway into unknown territory and always goes up a lighted stairwell toward the sunlight of information.
He is like watching a great tennis player as he serves the ball.
He imperceptibly takes a breath, looks at his target and swings with his eyes in the distance at where the ball will land. The snap of the ball on the racket is much like when he fires a question. It is crisp, clean and directional.
Dr. Fonseca reminded me of someone on the stand today and I couldn't put my finger on who it was.
"You were able to review all the documents in this case?" Juan Martinez asks her.
"I reviewed voluminous amounts of information," she answers. "I saw video tapes, read documents and studied...."
Juan cut her off. "You went on the internet? Am I correct?"
"Well," she said looking at the Jury instead of him. "In my line of work, you have to consider a lot of information. Now what I found..."
"Yes or no!" Juan barked.
"Well, yes," she answered.
"You reviewed some photographs?"
"Yes."
"You also reviewed testimony of witnesses who have testified?"
"Objection," Kirk Nurmi interrupts.
It was the first of many sidebars all day long. Juan would ask a question. There would be a sidebar and the cycle would continue through almost all the ensuing questions.
"Do you remember when you last testified in Court?" Juan Martinez asks her.
"I really can't respond to that, Mr. Martinez," she answers. She lets the "r" in Martinez roll from her tongue as if to emphasize a Latin influence,a showing respect. She always rolls the "r" to the point where it almost sounds condescending.
She continues while looking at the Jury. "I find that it would be a mis-characterization of what I might say or have said. It is...."
"So, you don't remember when you last testified," Juan remarks as he goes to the Prosecution table and pulls out a document. "Let's listen to what you said."
"Objection!" Nurmi says.
Back to the sidebar, sometimes called a bench conference. White noise plays over our heads so that we can't hear what is being discussed.
"You did see an interview with the Defendant, did you not?" Juan continues after the break.
Dr. Fonseca curls her brow in thought. The Court waits while she thinks about it. "I think I might have seen two interviews from 2009...."
"You seem to be having problems with your memory," Juan points out.
"Your questions are unclear, Mr. Martinez." She rolls the "r" again.
"I can't be expected to remember everything," she answers. "There were thirty one boxes of evidence. I believe I went through thirty of the boxes. There were the interviews and, at least, twenty to thirty CD's. It's difficult for anyone to remember exact dates. I can give months or dates, more or less, but I can't be accountable to every date and time,"
Juan would let her do that at times. She would ramble on and on about things that had nothing to do with the question. I think he did this to show that if he didn't force an answer, she would ramble on forever. I felt that it drove him crazy to listen to her misdirection and mumblings.
"Would it be important to know when their relationship started? The relationship between the defendant and Travis Alexander?"
"Can you repeat the question, Mr. Martinez?
Juan moved on. "Do you think dates on documents are important?" he asks her.
""Well, Mr. Martinez, that misrepresents my response. You have to understand that the documents were voluminous," she responds looking toward the Jury.
"Are you saying you can't remember if a document is at the beginning or end of month?"
"No, I really can't."
Juan looks at her and crosses his arms on his chest. He has stopped pacing. "Didn't you testify to dates and times on documents?"
Dr. Fonseca goes into a litany of nothingness. They are thoughts spoken aloud that have no end. The Jury looks at her but no one is taking notes. Even the second Juror down is not taking notes and she always can be seen buried in her legal pad, pen scribbling.
"Your research experience is mostly of Juveniles, is it not?" Juan asks.
"No, Mr. Martinez. It is of all ages. The kernel of my research has a substantive base of juveniles but I research all aspects of sexual deviancy and its relevancy in certain situations. There are times when one must take this knowledge and work toward an identifiable goal..."
Juan paces back and forth while she says nothing.
Judge Stevens looks on in rapt interest.
I am in my seat taking notes but there are no notes to be taken on what she says because it is not only subjective, it has no substance. They are meaningless words and answers to questions never asked. I am getting frustrated and I can bet the Jury is doing all they can do not to show an expression.
"You created a risk assessment tool, did you not? You created MEGA?" Juan asks.
"Um, I don't want to go down slime highway," she answers as if Juan had asked some horrific and sleazy question.
Juan shows no emotion despite the answer she gave. He is going in a direction. "Isn't MEGA an acronym for a very long term?"
"It's complicated," she answers. "It stands for Multiplex Empirically Guided Assessment. I just stick with the term MEGA because I find that people can understand it and I don't need to write it all the time because there is a kernel of reasoning that supports using other terminology."
Juan has a look in his eye as if he is wondering when she will complete her thought and hoping it will be sometime before lunch. "Your assessment involves juveniles from the age of 4 - 19?"
"Yes," she answers.
"But Arias and Travis were not of that age, were they? Isn't that assessment your specialty?"
"I wouldn't use that tool," the Doctor answers smartly.
For awhile, we went down "slime alley".
There were pictures of Travis on the screen at one point. Juan asked her how she knew the said pictures were actually of Travis' anatomy. She didn't have a response worth taking note.
At another point, we read the texts between Travis and Arias pointing to the one where Jodi wanted to be a little girl for him. We got to listen to Arias reach orgasm on a tape. We read more dirty emails.
Dr. Fonseca at one point said that people might find these things as distasteful but collectively, it would not mean the same thing.
I scratched my head while writing it down.
"You are here to give your professional Psychological opinion, is that correct?" Juan asked.
"Well, I'm not licensed to do that in this state," she answers carefully. "I have limitations to what I can..."
"But didn't you give an opinion on what you thought was going on between Arias and Travis?" he asks.
"I've answered the question," she says.
"So you are not going to answer?"
Sidebar. Dirty Jodi Arias text message. Sidebar. Dirty picture on the screen. Sidebar. Another question. Sidebar. Banter. Rambling. Sidebar.
Still, Dr. Fonseca has managed to say nothing the length of the day. She was like a caged animal going in circles while Juan Martinez toyed with her. He would poke at the cage and she would go in another circle in her cage.
Juan attacked and she deflected.
Every time she said "Martinez" with the roll of the "r", it got on my nerves.
I watched the Jury the whole day and by early afternoon, no one was taking any notes.
Juan's questions destroyed her credibility. Her fact finding didn't exist. Her memory was wishy-washy. She would show anger and contempt by responding with such statements as "I couldn't be expected to know everything."
It was interesting that she could remember all the details of the Mormon Church when she had been a witness with Kirk Nurmi only days before. It was odd that she thought nothing of sequencing and the importance of dates such as the fact that behavior of Travis came out long after he had been murdered. It was bizarre that suddenly nothing had anything to do with the dynamic of their relationship.
Dr. Fonseca was combative and hostile throughout the day. She had memory problems. She couldn't understand what Juan Martinez was driving at. She looked at the Jury as if to receive empathy for her position but only saw stoic faces in return.
Juan Martinez continued his tirade the whole of the day. He never let up. He never showed sympathy and he never apologized. He attacked like a shark coming out of water.
Her opinions laid on the floor bleeding and squirming.
The Jury saw all of this. I know they tired of it deep in the afternoon as I saw Juror's rubbing their eyes. Another Juror straightened a crook in his neck. One reached over and got a glass of water from in front of her. Others had their heads facing the witness but their stares were blank. I saw a couple them take sneaky looks toward the clock that is behind us.
There is one thing in Arizona that is different from many states. The Jury is allowed to ask questions via a Juror questionnaire form. They complete the form and it is passed to the empty black mesh basket that is available for them.
I was recently on the DeVault Hammer Killing murder case as a Juror for the first half of this year. We used that box almost everyday. Some questions were asked by the Court, others were disregarded. We filled the box when certain Psychologists were on the stand.
It is a bad sign for the defense that the Jury has not asked Dr. Fonseca one question.
The box lays empty everyday at the end of her testimony because they have already made up their mind about this witness. She virtually impeached herself with every nonsensical answer that she bantered at Juan Martinez.
We wrapped up for the day as Dr. Fonseca sat reading a document for fifteen minutes in open court. She read it to herself and we all watched and waited. Scant coughs could be heard about the courtroom. It was almost comforting because nobody wanted to hear any more from her.
Judge Stevens looked at her and waited.
At 4:30, Judge Stevens called it a day.
On the way home, I was trying to think of who Dr. Fonseca reminded me of...
Of course, I thought, she reminded me of when Jodi Arias got on the stand to defend herself in the first trial...
In either case, not one bit of their testimony helped the defense.
At all.
Justice 4 Travis Alexander
Justice for Dale.
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Paul A. Sanders, Jr.
The 13th Juror MD @The13thJurorMD (Twitter)
The 13th Juror MD @The13thJurorMD (Twitter)
