I’ll be posting some insights from Mark Hardiman on his recent victory in Fort Lauderdale. Here’s the first part.
Looking back on this lengthy trial, were there any watershed moments for the defense?
Sure. The most unusual development was that the government kept calling cooperating witnesses whose testimony would support the defense.
Three physicians, two of whom had pleaded guilty to drug dealing charges, testified that they believed that they were practicing medicine in good faith when they started prescribing appetite suppressants over the Internet based on their review of a patient questionnaire, but without a face-to face encounter with patient. Obviously, that testimony put a bit of a dent in the government’s theory that this conduct was criminal drug dealing.
Similarly, Theo Antoniou and Emmanuel Antonio, the two business owners who pleaded guilty to drug dealing [but were recently allowed to withdraw their pleas], both testified that they thought what they were doing was legal at the time. In fact, Theo testified that he still believed that he innocent on trhe day of his arrest and that the website questionnaire and ordering system he designed was so safe that they were losing business.
I’ve never been in a trial when so many government cooperators went completely south and supported the defense. And it created the distinct impression that innocent people may have pleaded guilty because they had been bullied into doing so or had simply decided that they couldn’t take on the federal government.
I personally found that pretty disturbing, especially in the case of one cooperating physician, Steven Millette, who had received a 44-month sentence, but testified that he had no criminal intent whatsoever.
April 8, 2009 at 8:18 am |
Interesting news. Do you think the outcome of this trial will have any affect on the Lacour trial in FL or the Affpower trial in CA that are currently going on?
April 8, 2009 at 2:16 pm |
That’s a good question. As you can imagine, the lawyers in both those cases are scrambling to see if they can take advantage of the Hernandez outcome. It’s certainly worth trying and we’ll see how we do.
April 9, 2009 at 7:24 pm |
As a juror on the Hernandez case I felt as though Theo Antoniou and Emmanuel Antonio were trying to please the prosecution with their testimony. I feel as though Dr. Millette was intimidated by the government into pleading guilty because he testified that if he was found not guilty the government would retry him in different jurisdictions until they got a conviction.
April 10, 2009 at 9:08 am |
I thought Jude dropped his laywers and is going solo ?
April 11, 2009 at 11:57 pm |
That does seem to be the case. No one in the courtroom for him. That’s a tough row to hoe.
April 17, 2009 at 10:39 am |
Jude LaCour did drop his attorney two weeks before trial when it became apparent that his attorney was refusing to file motions on Jude’s behalf. Also, Jude discovered that his attorney was not preparing for trial – his attorney had not interviewed a single witness, served a single subpoena, or prepared a single exhibit. For anyone interested, check out Jude’s official pro se site to see exactly what a railroad job this is!
Jude filed his one and only request for a continuance in order to prepare for trial himself. The judge denied this and forced Jude to go to trial having never seen a single page of discovery, interview witnesses, serve subpoena’s, or prepare exhibits – they’ve kept him incarcerated (based on perjured testimony at his bond hearing) for this very reason.