Objection!: How High-Priced Defense Attorneys, Celebrity Defendants, and a 24/7 Media Have Hijacked Our Criminal Justice System

by Nancy Grace

  T H E H I G H - H U R D L E

  S T A N D A R D O F P R O O F

  Possibly the biggest difference between celebrity cases and lower-profile cases is the incredibly high standard of proof that juries require before convicting a household name. There is no doubt about it: Jurors tend to favor a well-known person. I’ve considered the problem of two-tiered justice for a long time. There is one standard for us regular folks and another, lower standard for celebrities. I think I know why. It’s really pretty simple: Jurors think they know the star. Whether it’s the professional athlete, the television personality, the singer, the pop-culture icon—they’ve all been invited into our homes on many occasions.

  We’ve watched them over dinner, spent our Friday and Saturday nights with them, and even had our morning coffee together. It doesn’t seem to matter that this is all happening over the airwaves. When someone is literally invited into our home on many occasions, even if it is on a small TV screen, we know that person—or at least we think we do.

  I’m guilty of it myself. I find myself shocked at various charges. I nearly fell over when Rosie O’Donnell became embroiled in a lawsuit against the publisher of her now-defunct magazine—I wanted her to win.

  I’d always believed that Paula Poundstone was a loving and caring mother, and before she was charged with lewd acts against her foster children in 2001, I had laughed right along with the comedienne many a time. I cried with Winona Ryder during Girl, Interrupted because she was so poignant, sad, and brave all at the same time. It seemed impossible 2 4 0

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  that this Academy Award–nominated actress could be involved in a scandalous shoplifting incident. I’ve sung out loud to “Galveston” and

  “Wichita Lineman” along with Glen Campbell as I whizzed down the in-terstate, and I had a hard time reconciling the singing cowboy to the di-sheveled man in the book-in photo when he was picked up for drunk driving. I’d be the worst juror! I know what it’s like to hear bad things about stars you have really loved. You just don’t want to believe any of it.

  It’s normal, but that is not what Lady Justice demands. Jurors must be deprogrammed from what they held to be true and must be forced to look at facts they may not like. It results in an additional burden for the prosecution—a burden it may not be able to surmount with only the simple truth.

  Then there are those jurors who think they are somehow befriend-ing the celebrity after the trial by rendering a not-guilty verdict. It’s as if they think they’ll be invited over to the mansion after the trial.

  Hello—that is not happening! Then there are the other jurors, the ones who are chasing a free trip to New York City and appearances on the Today show or Good Morning America. Are the odds of their getting the trip, the dinner, and the Broadway show greater if there’s an acquittal—

  not a conviction?

  There is, no question, a higher burden of proof on the state when trying a celebrity. Here are a couple of cases to prove my point.

  S E A N “ P . D I D D Y ” C O M B S

  Known as “Puff Daddy” at the time, Combs was charged in 1999

  with criminal possession of a firearm after a shoot-out at a packed Manhattan nightclub. Several people suffered injuries as a result of the shooting. At the time of the incident, police said the shots were fired by nineteen-year-old Jamal Barrow, a rapper known as “Shyne” who was a Combs protégé. Combs and his then-girlfriend, Jennifer Lopez, fled the club after the incident with two other men in Combs’s Lincoln Naviga-tor. When officers stopped the car after it ran a red light, they found a pistol on the front seat—but no one in the car would claim ownership.

  O B J E C T I O N !

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  All were arrested for possession of a weapon and possession of stolen property. After several hours of questioning, Lopez was let go and no charges were filed against her.

  As Combs headed to trial, his spokesman said that the rapper and his girlfriend were “victims of circumstance.” But this was not the first time that year Combs had had a brush with the law. Months before the nightclub incident, the music man–turned–clothing designer was accused of beating an executive while arguing about a music video. That time Combs pled guilty to a harassment charge and was ordered to undergo counseling.

  Faced with fifteen years in jail if convicted on four counts of weapons possession and one count of bribing a witness, Combs tapped Johnnie Cochran and Ben Brafman to represent him. The two-month trial was filled with theatrical moments. Every day presented enough photo ops to keep the city’s tabloids in headlines. The defendant turned up in his best suits, with his mother and a host of celebrity supporters in tow. In court, Combs took the stand in his own defense, vehemently denying all charges. The day the verdict was announced, he spread snapshots of his two young sons in front of him on the defense table as the jury came back into the courtroom. When the forewoman (who had to wipe away tears from her eyes) announced the not-guilty verdict, Combs fell into Cochran’s arms. Outside, he told reporters, “I feel blessed.” He immediately cleaned up his act, began doing charity events, changed his name to P. Diddy, and thanked his lucky stars—and his defense lawyers!

  W O O D Y H A R R E L S O N

  Even after watching a video of Harrelson proudly planting marijuana seeds, a Beattyville, Kentucky, jury acquitted the big-screen star for possession of marijuana in August 2000. Prosecutors thought they had a lock on the case, with several state’s witnesses taking the stand, not to mention that video. Instead of facing twelve months behind bars and a $500

  fine, Harrelson spent most of the day signing hundreds of autographs.

  Harrelson has starred in films like Natural Born Killers and The 2 4 2

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  People vs. Larry Flynt. He is best known by millions of television viewers, very likely including the twelve jurors, for his role as the lovably clueless bartender in the eighties hit television series Cheers. I wonder if twelve of those autographs he signed were for jurors at his trial?

  W A R R E N M O O N

  In 1996, after a full thirty minutes of deliberating, a starstruck jury acquitted Minnesota Vikings quarterback Warren Moon of viciously assaulting his wife, Felicia, in 1995 at the couple’s mansion. Their terri-fied seven-year-old son ran to the phone and called police to save his mother. When they arrived, Felicia Moon had obvious and visible injuries. She told police that her quarterback husband had beaten her.

  Prosecutors used a new Texas law to force Felicia to testify against her husband, even though by the time of trial she no longer wanted to. That Texas jury set a heck of an example for the little boy—the seven-year-old son who was brave enough to stand up to an NFL quarterback. Final score: Celebrity Factor: 7, Justice: 0.

  J A Y S O N W I L L I A M S

  As he lay dying from a shotgun blast to the chest, Gus Christofi carried an item on his person that only a few veteran courthouse watchers in the trial of NBA star Jayson Williams may remember, but in my mind it said it all. Inside the limo driver’s pocket was a camera.

  Poor Gus Christofi, just like the jurors, was starstruck. The guy didn’t want much—just to be close to a star he was working for that night. As he drove Williams from place to place, as Williams drank more and more and made fun of his driver for the night over and over in front of his buddies, the evening spiraled to its deadly conclusion. All Christofi wanted was to maybe snap a few pictures with the famous NBA great who’d hired him. Two years later, Williams was acquitted of the top count by a starstruck jury. Christofi’s sister ran from the courtroom crying. The rest of Christofi’s family had little to say. Perhaps that’s because they received $2.75 million as a result of a civil suit they’d O B J E C T I O N !

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  filed against Williams before the criminal trial had even empaneled a jury.

  What did the Jayson Williams trial teach me? I learned a lesson when Williams bought his own version of a high-priced Dream Team, paid off Gus Christo
fi’s family, and cried on cue on ABC’s 20/20 when Barbara Walters asked him questions. I learned that no matter the facts, no matter the law, no matter the pain and suffering of the victims, if the celebrity factor is in the courtroom, get ready for the fight of your life.

  From videotapes of the crime to cuts and bruises on the victim, evidence too often plays second fiddle to the celebrity factor.

  The increased standard of proof is real, not just perceived, and it plays out in case after case and trial after trial. The answer? I believe that additional jury instructions at the back end of the trial from the judge to the jury are absolutely essential, advising them that all defendants are equal under the law and should be considered so during jury deliberations. In addition, more carefully orchestrated jury selection to weed out the starstruck must be implemented. The lawyers in celebrity trials must choose twelve jurors more interested in justice than in dinner with a star.

  O U T G U N N I N G T H E S T A T E

  The New York Post got it right with the two-inch headline MONEY

  TALKS on the heels of a 2001 scandal among the rich and famous in the Hamptons of Long Island when the über-wealthy Lizzie Grubman posted bail for running down a group of innocent bystanders outside a trendy nightclub for the East Coast elite. New York City’s hottest young public-relations woman backed her Mercedes SUV into a crowd outside the club after arguing with a bouncer over a parking spot and reportedly calling him “white trash.” Sixteen people were injured, and Grubman was charged with assault and leaving the scene of an accident.

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  The poor little rich girl managed to play possum until she could no longer successfully be tested for intoxication. By the time she was located at a friend’s house two hours after the assaults, her lawyer had arrived and advised her not to speak with police. She was later released on just $25,000 bail. At her 2002 trial, she of course got a lenient sentence: in and out of a dormitory-style facility in a few months. Her latest project: starring in a reality show focusing on her glamorous life among Manhattan’s rich and famous.

  O. J. Simpson’s Dream Team started a trend in contemporary celebrity trials. How many lawyers does it really take to defend one person? Simpson aside, there is definitely a tendency to hire “teams”

  of lawyers to outman the prosecution when there’s a celebrity defendant. In Robert Blake’s case, before the trial even started he’d already been through three fleets of lawyers, including Tom Mesereau, now representing Michael Jackson, as well as Harland Braun, a high-powered and high-ticket criminal lawyer. He went through fleets of lawyers in order to assemble his own Dream Team. Meanwhile, the judge continued to grant delays for the defense so Blake could find just the right lawyer. In other words, one who will do whatever Blake wants.

  The prime example of assembling a defense “team” would be Michael Jackson. Jackson paid through the nose to retain two of the highest-profile criminal lawyers in the country—Ben Brafman, of Sean Combs’s acquittal fame, and Mark Geragos. Then, in an erratic move following the formal grand-jury indictment, Jackson fired two of the most sought-after celebrity lawyers around and hired another, Mesereau.

  It is well known that in the Kobe Bryant case, the defense team papered the district attorney’s office with countless motions that were spit out of the word processor as quickly as they could be dreamed up. Many of them were pointless, but it took multiple man-hours for the state to respond. There’s no question that money plays a major role in high-profile cases. Celebrities can afford to hire a battery of attorneys and investigators to prolong trials. As the prosecutor’s workload mounts, the defense O B J E C T I O N !

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  sits by, happily racking up their billable hours. Trials that normally require three or four days in court mushroom into months or even worse.

  With celebrity comes wealth, and wealth buys more bodies at the defense table: investigators, experts, and consultants as well as other key players like videographers, publicists, and Web-site specialists.

  Celebrities get the edge in the courtroom not only because of their fame but also because of money—pure and simple. These are just a few examples to make the point that, while everyone should hire the best defense attorney he or she can, clearly, in the aforementioned cases, the goal was to overpower the prosecution. Guess what? It worked.

  L I M O V E R S U S P A D D Y W A G O N

  ( I T ’ S A L L I N H O W

  Y O U G E T T H E R E )

  The headiest combination ever forged is fame and fortune. If you have them both, you can apparently get anything and get away with everything. When it comes to interrogating, arresting, booking, and getting court dates for celebrities, what police really need is a social secretary, what with all the scheduling conflicts, special requests, and hair and makeup requirements that come into play.

  When most offenders are suspected of a crime, they are located by cop or canine, thrown down on the ground, handcuffed and hauled to jail for book-in, and fingerprinted. Once in custody, defendants are kept in a holding cell until they make bond (on less serious crimes) or wait for a bond hearing, which occurs within seventy-two hours. In contrast, think about what happened when Michael Jackson was “arrested” for multiple counts of alleged child molestation. Jackson’s lawyers negotiated a time convenient for the star to be chauffeured to the police station of Jackson’s choice at the time and date of his choice. He literally got curbside service book-in. He was escorted into the station by his then-lawyer Mark Geragos, allowed to use the bathroom in private, then booked. His 2 4 6

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  mug shot is complete with hair and makeup artfully applied (not my style, but hey, I’m not the King of Pop). Nobody else gets that!

  And consider this: Celebrities accused of a whole range of offenses, from murder to rape to child molestation, manage to walk free on bail when the average person could never post and be released if faced with the same charges. Stars even get to leave the country after being charged with a crime. You want to scoot down to the Caribbean with a child-molestation charge hanging over your head? Fat chance!

  But Jackson made it to London after his arrest.

  Privileged punks have also gotten bond when the average guy would not have. Andrew Luster, the heir to the Max Factor cosmetics fortune, was charged in 2003 on eighty-six counts for drugging, raping, and sodomizing women while they were unconscious. Despite being a clear ongoing threat to the community and having the resources to flee the country, he made bond. But then—uh-oh—he somehow managed to leave the country and ended up in Mexico. As a no-show in court, he was tried “in absentia”—in his absence—after he took off. In February 2003, Luster was sentenced to 124 years in state prison and ordered to pay $1 million in restitution. Duane Chapman, an innovative bounty hunter nicknamed “The Dog,” tracked Luster down and turned him over to the authorities. Finally, he’s back in the United States and in jail, where he belongs.

  But it’s not just about celebs getting bond or preferential consideration at bond time. At many court appearances, special arrangements are made for the celebrity. Security is often brought in so no one will

  “bother” the star. The court appearance is planned with precision tim-ing. The celebrity is in and out of court with little or no muss or fuss.

  Here’s a reality check: Criminal calendars normally last for hours at a time. Hence, the orchestration for celebrities to be ushered in and out of the courthouse at their convenience is quite an ordeal. If this is to become standard operating procedure, the courts really are going to need to hire event planners.

  Fame and fortune are at play when there are no consequences for O B J E C T I O N !

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  what many judges would call contempt of court. Routinely, I had defendants who did not show up on time for calendar call, and by the end of the calendar. Every single one was placed in bond forfeiture. In other words, they lose the bond they posted and are faced with waitin
g in jail until their trial date.

  Some celebrity defendants don’t even have to show up to court, by agreement with the judge. Kobe Bryant did not have to appear at every court hearing regarding his case. I assure you that other rape defendants across the country must be in court for each and every hearing, motion, or arraignment calendar, or their bonds will be forfeited and they can consider the matter behind bars until trial time. Not so for the stars.

  Aside from preferential treatment at book-in or calendar dates, there is the matter of delay in charging. Stars seem to be able to drag out the inevitable until it better suits their schedules. The most blatant example of this in recent memory has been Robert Blake. His wife, Bonny Lee Bakley, was fatally shot on May 4, 2001, a block from the L.A. restaurant where the two had just eaten dinner. Blake’s alibi was widely considered to be completely incredible. When police arrived on the scene, Blake had gunpowder residue on his hands and had made no attempt to save his wife as she lay in his car dying. Their relationship was in great turmoil at the time of her death, and allegedly Blake had tried to hire others to kill Bonny in the past. For well over a year, no one was charged. Had it been you or me, we would have been hustled off to jail in little or no time. To top it all off, Blake didn’t cool his heels in jail waiting for trial, but was out on bond. The last time I saw him, he was outside the courthouse giving an impromptu performance, singing “Over the Rainbow” while strumming a guitar in front of a television camera. In October 2004, my friend Dominick Dunne reported that Blake was deep into trial prep, getting custom-made pinstripe suits to wear in front of the jury!

  Likewise, in February 2003, legendary record producer Phil Spector brought home actress Lana Clarkson after the two met one evening at the House of Blues in Los Angeles, where Clarkson worked as a hostess.

  The next morning, Spector’s chauffeur reported to police that he’d heard 2 4 8

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  gunshots coming from Spector’s house. Inside, Clarkson was found shot to death. It took nearly a year for Spector even to be charged. He immediately pled not guilty and was freed on bail. The list of celebs who enjoy a long delay before charges are ever filed is incredible. It’s almost as if police are afraid to charge them—or maybe they’re just starstruck, too.