Jackson Trial Update
Wednesday March 9

The 15 year old accuser of Michael Jackson began his testimony this afternoon. The DA hasn't gotten into the details yet of the alleged sexual misconduct. The accuser testified that Jackson wasn't that big a factor in his cancer recovery and said other stars visited him more often. It sounds like he is holding a grudge against Jackson.

"Sometimes he would be told by Neverland staff that Jackson was not home, then spot him on the grounds. On one of those occasions, he said, "I walked into the house and I saw Michael walking toward me and then he acted as if, 'Oh, Crap!."

Today, the accuser backed up some of his brother's and sister's allegations. No surprise there. How he does tomorrow on direct examination will not be the test - he's been prepped for that. Let's wait and see how he does on cross-examination.

The jury in the fraud trial of WorldCom's Bernard Ebbers has deliberated three days without a verdict.

The jury has made a lot of requests for transcripts and videos. They asked for transcripts and videos of Ebbers - including his cross-examination transcript. I haven't read that they've asked for a transcript of Scott Sullivan's testimony.

You can never know how a jury is going to act, but it sounds to me like one or more of them are having trouble with Ebber's testimony that he was not familiar with high finance and had no idea of the company's accounting practices.

If Ebbers is convicted, it will mean the word of a co-operating co-defendant singing for his supper, bolstered only by the closing argument of a prosecutor, prevailed. That's too bad.

If the "dumbing down" defense doesn't work for Ebbers, what chance does Ken Lay have? Probably not much. You can bet his lawyers are watching closely. The "dumbing down" defense seems about as palatable to the public as Charles Graner's "orders from above" defense in the Abu Ghraib prison scandal.

Jackson Trial Update
Tuesday March 8

Under cross-examination today, the younger brother of Michael Jackson's accuser admitted that he has lied:

He admitted lying under oath at a deposition in his mother's suit against J.C. Penney security guards--and said he couldn't remember who told him to lie.

He admitted Jackson didn't show him a sex magazine that just yesterday he testified Jackson had shown him. That admission came when Mesnereau confronted him with the date of the magazine - six months after the family had left Neverland.

He also denied making statements that the psychologist attributed to him in grand jury testimony.

Jackson Trial Update
Monday, March 7

While MSM is reporting the salacious details of the accuser's brother's testimony today in the Michael Jackson trial, Smoking Gun has the documents showing the brother has given three very different and conflicting versions.

The accuser's brother was first interviewed in May, 2003 by LA psychologist Stanley Katz. Katz had been recommended by the mother's lawyer, Larry Feldman. Coincidentally, Feldman and Katz were the lawyer-psychologist duo that spearheaded the lawsuit for the 1993 accuser.

In subsequent interviews, the accuser's brother "tweaked" the details of his story. Not only did the allegations against Jackson become more graphic and serious, the details as to time, place, clothing, etc. vary substantially.

Jackson's lawyer, Tom Mesnereau, should have a field day tomorrow.

by TChris

Speaking of irrational intolerance of minor law violations, the Williamsburg police arrested and handcuffed an 8-year-old boy "who allegedly had a violent outburst in school, head-butting his teacher and kicking an assistant principal, when he was told he couldn't go outside to play with other students." The child deserved a time out for his temper tantrum, not an arrest for disorderly conduct and battery.

by TChris

Why is it so often true that those who insist on strict enforcement of petty laws are themselves the worst criminals? Dennis Rader, who has reportedly confessed to being the serial killer known as B.T.K., is the latest example of hypocrisy gone wild.

He was often seen in his white truck, the words "Compliance Officer, Park City" painted on the side, puttering along at 10 miles an hour, searching for overgrown lawns, overflowing trash cans or dogs wandering past their fences.

"He looked for absolutely everything, and he must have enforced every rule there ever was - just because he could, I guess," said Barbara Walters, 69, a retired auditor for the Internal Revenue Service, who challenged a $25 ticket that Mr. Rader had issued in August 1998, saying her dog, Shadow, was running loose.

Rader was uptight about the slightest deviation from the norm.

Rhonda Reno said she watched one day as Mr. Rader wandered on the lawn of a neighbor who was ill and unable to mow the grass. Walking the grass with a yardstick, she said, he measured for infractions.

In January, we wrote about the murders of a New Jersey Coptic Christian family and how conservatives went on a rampage, blaming Muslims, coming up with slogans like "Jihad in New Jersey."

Arrests have now been made in the case. Two tenants of the family, men who lived upstairs, have been charged. Robbery was the motive, according to police, not religious hatred.

At 12:01 am ET Friday morning, or tonight for those of us in the CST, MST and PST time zones, Martha Stewart will get out of jail, having served 147 days.

A car will take her to the nearby Greenbrier Valley Airport, where she will be flown by private jet to return home to her 153-acre estate in Katonah, N.Y. There she will serve out five months of home detention as she assembles the ingredients for the next course in her remarkable career in the domestic arts.

Dozens of cameras will be on hand every step of the way, beginning with a photo opportunity at the West Virginia airport, where Stewart is not expected to make a statement.

MSNBC is doing a one-hour live special at midnight, ET, and I'll be providing some of the commentary.

And check out this graphic by the New York Times: The value of Martha's stock in her company has risen while's she been in jail. It's now worth $1 billion.

New York Times: White Supremacist's Relatives Are Questioned in Killings

According to a report in Wednesday's Chicago Sun-Times, the authorities are also pursuing telephone calls made to Judge Lefkow's home Sunday night from a correctional facility. Prison and police officials refused to discuss the matter, but one of the judge's daughters confirmed that her mother picked up the phone to find an unknown prisoner on the other end the night before she found her husband, Michael F. Lefkow, and her mother, Donna Humphrey, dead of gunshot wounds in their basement. "Somebody called and you have to accept the charges, and my mom did because, I don't know, she's my mom and she's so trusting," Maria Lefkow, 27, said Wednesday morning.

Chicago Sun Times: Judge fears murders tied to her job. There's now a composite sketch of the second suspect:

Someone should drop a dime on this guy.

If he's not involved, the police need to know so they will keep looking for the murderer(s) of Judge Joan Humphrey Lefkow's husband and mother. If he is involved, he needs to be charged and tried.

I'm not a big fan of composite sketches, particularly those created by software programs and Identi-kits. Eyewitness guru and Professor Gary Wells has a new manuscript which discusses multiple past research studies that have found that participating in the creation of a sketch can impair the witnesses' memory of the perpetrator. Wells recently conducted two new studies and reaches the same conclusion.

The programs currently in use by law enforcement utilize a "particularized" approach...the witness picks out individual facial features which are then combined into a face. This is counterintuitive to the memory process, which operates on a more holistic level.

I'll be over at the Washington Post doing an online chat on the Michael Jackson trial. You can join in here.

Documentary producer Martin Bashir is the first witness.

Chicago Federal Judge Joan Humphrey Lefkow returned home after work and found two bodies in her home.

Lefkow presided over a trademark case against Matt Hale, a white supremacist later convicted of trying to have the judge killed. Hale remains behind bars.

In 2003, the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the denial of a law license for Hale. More details about Hale's attempt to have the Judge killed are here.

Hale was the leader of the former World Church of the Creator (now known as the Creativity Movement).

Update: The bodies have been identified as the Judge's husband and mother. The article says the Judge ruled in favor of Hale in the trademark case, but was reversed by the 7th Circuit. He is set to be sentenced for conspiracy to kill Judge Lefkow in April.