Tag: Law

Today was short and boring. Everyone is trying hard to be patient in waiting for the testimony of the two main witnesses: Joseph Guzman and Trent Benefield, which the guards outside had told us last week was supposed to happen this week. I hope the prosecution’s not running behind.

Today the court heard only from two witnesses: an optometrist who examined Sean Bell’s eyes about six months before the shooting, and a ballistic expert who compared bullets and shell casings he received from CSU people to bullets from the five detectives’ guns to try to determine which bullets came from which gun.

Dr. Daniel Friedman, a 79-year-old Queens optometrist, examined Sean Bell’s eyes in May 2006. Sean had come to him at that time to possibly buy a contact lens for his right eye. Without a correction, Sean’s vision in that right eye was poorer than 20/400, making him extremely nearsighted in that eye, with an astigmatism as well. The vision in his left eye, however, was 20/30, so only slightly nearsighted. Legal blindness, according to the doctor, was vision worse than 20/200. So, without the correction Sean would have been legally blind in the right eye but not the left. The Department of Motor Vehicles only mandates that one’s vision must be at least 20/40 in one eye, so, because of his left eye, Sean would have been able to obtain a driver’s license and drive legally without a correction. He never bought any corrective lenses from Dr. Friedman.

(But, remember, most of the action in the car that night was happening on Sean’s right side). Also, darkness and alcohol may impair ability to see, as was elicited on cross.

Detective James Valenti, a firearms operability and identification expert, went through painstaking detail listing each of the 89 pieces of ballistic evidence — whole bullets, deformed bullets, bullet fragments, and shell casings (which are discharged near the shooter when the bullet ejects from the weapon) — that he was given by Crime Scene Unit detectives, and which of the detectives’ guns each one likely came from. Valenti was able to identify 15 bullets and 46 casings; 28 bullet fragments were too small for him to be able to perform tests on. Looking cursorily through my vast notes, I count — no, forget it, it’ll take me all night to do that — suffice it to say the vast majority of recovered shell casings and bullets were fired from Oliver’s gun — hardly surprising given that he fired 31 of the 50 shots — the next highest number from Isnora’s, and a couple each from the weapons of Detectives Headley and Cooper and Officer Carey.

One thing Valenti said that caught my attention was that Glock guns — the type used by Detectives Isnora and Cooper — only needed 5 1/2 pounds of exertion on the trigger in order to discharge bullets. But under the current New York Trigger Policy, weapons must have at least 10 pounds of exertion on the trigger in order for them to fire. The current Trigger Policy was enacted in order to prevent accidental discharge. It doesn’t seem like there were any accidental discharges here, but in any event, why is the NYPD still using the Glocks if they’re not compatible with current trigger policy and can fire accidentally?

Also, on cross examination by Paul Martin, Detective Cooper’s attorney, Valenti, who has some training in firing weapons, said he was trained to fire both with two hands and with only one, that latter done in certain circumstances (which he didn’t specify). That’s important since it goes to the reckless endangerment charge against Cooper (for the bullet he fired into the Air Train platform). It made me realize there hasn’t yet been testimony presented by the prosecution on how officers are trained to fire their weapons, which I really want to hear. With Cooper, that kind of testimony is necessary, to show that he didn’t comply, that he was therefore reckless, and that’s why his bullet went askew.

But more generally, I really want to hear how officers are trained to identify a threat and how they’re supposed to deal with it. I’m sure the court is going to get some of this testimony in the defense case, but the prosecution has the burden of proof and should be trying to show that the detectives not only fired, but that they did so in a way that was inconsistent with their training and thus reckless. As I mentioned before, a black female spectator from the NYPD said to me early on in the trial while we were waiting outside, “We need answers; I know how it’s done and this is not it.” At this point, I’m hoping the prosecution plans on trying to show what she said.

Yesterday was relatively mild compared to the day before. The court heard only from two witnesses: the surgeon who performed Sean Bell’s autopsy, Dr. Michael Greenberg, and another of the eyewitnesses to the shooting, Jean Nelson, a seemingly honest man whose testimony was similar to that of Mr. Henkerson, who testified the day before, but with added details.

Sean Bell sustained four wounds, one to the right side of his neck, one to his right shoulder, one to his right torso, and one to his right arm. When Dr. Greenberg began going over the path of each bullet and which organs they penetrated, Mr. and Mrs. Bell and other members of the family left the courtroom, Sean’s mother in tears. The two bullets that caused Sean’s death were the first and third listed above, the one that went into his neck, piercing his larnyx and lodging in his upper arm bone, and the one that went into Sean’s torso, fracturing his rib, abdomen, liver, lung, and lodging in his spine. These numbered bullets, by the way, were randomnly assigned by the doctor; it can’t be determined which struck Sean first. Sean sustained five additional abrasions, but the cause of death was the two gunshot wounds to his neck and torso.

Greenberg also testified that he didn’t see any gunshot residue on any of Mr. Bell’s clothing, which means that the gun’s muzzle must have been fired from over three feet away. An “intervening obstacle,” such as a window, would have prevented any such residue from forming on his clothing (although, as the defense attorneys pointed out on cross, if the passenger-side window was blown out, it wouldn’t have stopped the residue from congealing on the clothes). Mr. Bell’s blood alcohol level was 0.16 grams per deciliter, twice the legal limit. There was no presence of illegal substances in his blood.

Jean Nelson, 28 and married with three children, impressed as sincere and direct; he was there to tell it like it is. He had one prior felony conviction, from 1999, for possessing a firearm, which he had for protection. He also had three misdemeanor convictions, all for marijuana possession. Speaking of which, he was the owner of the bags of marijuana found down the street from the scene.

Mr. Nelson, who wore his hair in an impressively intricate pattern of cornrows (just something I noticed because, seriously, the design was like artwork), had known Sean for 5 or 6 years, meeting him through Mr. Henkerson, whom he’d known all his life. He was a member of the musical group the defense is so interested in, which he and the others had formed to make some money.

He’d gone to a club in Manhattan, “Eugene’s” (where he bought the marijuana), earlier in the night on the 24th, returning to Queens around 3:00 a.m., and meeting up with Henkerson, to go onto Sean’s party. He and Henkerson arrived at Kalua at 3:30, too late to go inside, as the bouncer told them the club was about to close. So the two waited outside for their friends. Soon Coicou pulled up in his SUV and a bit later, the club let out. When Sean left, he and Nelson walked toward the edge of the club where Sean urinated before realizing he’d left something in the club and returned to retrieve it.

When Sean emerged from the club, Nelson heard Coicou say to him, “You can’t do this like that. I got money in there.” Sean asked him what he meant. Soon, Nelson saw Coicou back up with his hands in his vest saying “I’ll shoot you.” James Kollore said, “We’ll take that gun from you.” Sean echoed Kollore, saying, “Yeah, we’ll take that gun from you.”

Nelson walked up to Sean, saying, “come on, you’re getting married tomorrow. You don’t need none of this crap. Let’s go.”

Nelson remembered seeing Detectives Isnora and Sanchez in front of the club, but he paid no attention to them.

Nelson, Sean, and the rest of the group walked down the street to their cars, on Liverpool. On their way, Coicou in his SUV passed them very slowly, stopping at the corner to eye them all. As soon as he passed, he sped up down the street and turned at the next corner. Guzman and Sean proceeded to Sean’s Altima and got inside.

Nelson remembered Lt. Napoli‘s Toyota Camry pass by them and stop mid-block, a little after Sean’s car. Nelson noticed two white men in that car, who looked at him, and he concluded they were police. He remembered the minivan driving onto the street too, and concluded that carried police as well.

He then saw Isnora (whom he’d remembered from the front of the club) walk up to Sean’s Altima, holding a gun in his right hand, pointing it downward. “Yo, let me holla at you,” Isnora said to Sean and Guzman, which, to Nelson, meant, “Let me talk to you.” Though Nelson realized the men in the Camry and the minivan were police, he didn’t assume Isnora was as well.

Sean tried to pull out, nearly running over Isnora. Isnora hopped onto the hood to prevent being “squashed,” and went over the car, landing on the other side. Sean crashed into the minivan, then backed up, running into a wall behind him, before coming forward again, hitting the van. It looked like the Altima was just coasting at that point, and bumped into the van. Nelson then heard shooting. He began running South, dropping his marijuana (which he said was only for personal use) on the way. He looked back once before coming to the corner, and when he did he saw another man, a white man, near the passenger-side door of the Altima pointing a gun at that passenger door.

Nelson continued running, hearing someone behind him say, “oh shit.” He heard bullets piercing the fence of the house he ran past. A couple blocks away, he ran into Kollore and Henkerson, and they returned to the scene, now seeing Benefield on the ground, on his stomach, handcuffed.

On cross, Nelson remembered telling prosecutors during an interview on December 2, 2007, that he thought Sean was drunk, and when he’s drunk he’s “hyper.” He also told them Sean doesn’t like people talking to him “in a smart way.”
Defense counsel Anthony Ricco (Isnora’s attorney) asked Nelson on cross whether it made it a bit “tough” to go back to his neighborhood since his perceptions were “a little different” from his friends’. He said “yes.” After he finished cross examination, Ricco said, “thank you very much and good luck to you.” I’m glad he wasn’t hard on Nelson; there was no reason to be, since he seemed so truthful. So now, after getting so upset with him the day before, I like Ricco again.

Today the court heard from Johmell Henkerson, the brother-in-law of Nicole, Sean Bell’s fiance, and an eyewitness to part of the shooting; and the Grand Jury testimony of defendant Detective Michael Oliver, the detective whom the press has focused on the most, as he fired 31 of the 50 shots, though he was not the first to fire.

Up front, I just have to say, I find it unsettling how the prosecution witnesses are being villified. While a witness’s prior convictions are fodder for cross-examination (because legally the judge may use such priors to determine the witness’s overall credibility), the defense attorneys are questioning, and very harshly, about kinds of inflammatory things that have little to no relevance to this case: the witness’s belonging to a rap group in which he created songs about “thug” life (since when is art criminal?); a witness’s long-ago possession of a gun; a witness’s general lifestyle; here, a shooting victim’s vaguely possible criminal activity in that shooting, where charges haven’t even been filed. The issue here, at least regarding the top charges, is whether the detectives were “justified” in shooting. Justification is legalese for self-defense. So, whether they believed deadly force was about to be used against them, and whether that belief was reasonable, from the point of view of a person in the same or similar circumstances. So, making the eyewitness friends of Sean Bell and Joseph Guzman out to be general “bad guys” who have experience with guns has nothing to do with whether the detectives felt threatened right before they shot and whether that threat was reasonable from a person in their shoes. They didn’t know Guzman and his friends beforehand, so it wasn’t like they knew he had a reputation for violence, which could have informed their fear. This was the first time Isnora and Oliver had ever seen Guzman.
Anyway, Johmell Henkerson: he talked slowly and quietly and it was a bit hard to hear him. He also seemed on the verge of tears throughout much of his direct testimony. 30 years old, he’s a medical technician who assists patients with kidney problems, and his wife, Shelby, is Nicole’s sister. He’s known Sean since 2000. Henkerson has two prior felonies, 10 years old — from the mid nineties — one for possession of a controlled substance and one for unlawful imprisonment, and two misdemeanors for loitering.

He met Sean earlier in the evening of November 24th, when they’d celebrated with some egg nog and brandies. Henkerson left to go watch his children while his wife attended Nicole’s bachelorette party. (Another thing made a big deal of on cross: that party was cancelled because the male stripper couldn’t make it, as if hiring a male stripper for one’s bachelorette party has anything to do with whether the detectives thought Guzman had a gun…) Anyway, later that evening, Guzman called him and he picked him up in his Mercedes SUV and brought him to Kalua for the party. However, Henkerson then had an underage cousin with him, who was denied admission to the club. He left to take the cousin home, leaving Guzman there.

Later, he met up with his friend Gene Nelson, and the two of them went back to Kalua, except they arrived so late that it didn’t seem worth paying the cover to go in. So he and Nelson waited outside to meet up with the Bell party. He parked around the corner from the club and he and Nelson walked up to the front entrance and waited for everyone to leave. He noticed Isnora and Sanchez standing to his left, talking. Isnora was wearing a “skull cap,” he said. Soon, Coicou arrived with his big black SUV, the music blaring.

Shortly thereafter, his friends — Hugh, Larenzo, Benefield, Guzman, Bell, and Kollore — all emerged from the club. Bell went back inside because he’d forgotten his hat. When he came back out, he “exchanged words” with Coicou. At one point, Coicou and Bell were standing very close to each other and their body language changed; Sean had been in a good mood when he left the club, but Henkerson now saw that their discussion had “elevated to another kind of situation.”

Coicou had his hands in his pockets, and with one hand, he pointed out at Bell as if he had a gun (Henkerson demonstrated this in the courtroom — he pointed his finger out, through the pocket, as if making clear there was a gun in that pocket and Coicou was aiming it right at Bell.) Henkerson couldn’t hear everything they were saying, but heard either Bell or Guzman say “I don’t give a fuck who you waiting for,” “fuck that bitch you waiting for,” and “I don’t care where the fuck you from.”

Henkerson walked up to Bell and put his arm around him, telling him this guy wasn’t worth it and “let’s leave him alone.” (I have in my notes that Henkerson nearly started to cry at this point, saying, “Sean was in a great mood the whole month; I was trying to bring to him the reality of the situation”). Henkerson also told Guzman they should leave. Henkerson said to Guzman and Bell that Coicou was “holding himself out like he got a gun on him.”

Guzman was mad but decided to let it be and all men began walking toward Liverpool Street. When they got to the corner, Henkerson looked back at Coicou, noticing he was pulling out; he looked at Coicou to “make sure he wasn’t going to do anything.” Coicou drove up to the corner, driving slowly, then turned and made a right onto Liverpool Street, passing them. He then turned right on the next street and was gone.

The men were deciding where they’d go for food, to continue the party. Henkerson had planned to keep Bell with him for the night, until his wedding, so that he and Nicole would next see each other at the ceremony. As Bell and Guzman got into Bell’s Altima, Henkerson spoke with Bell at the window, determining where they’d go next.

Henkerson then saw the Camry driving down the street, carrying a black driver, a white passenger, and a black guy in the back. Before it passed, Henkerson stepped aside, to his right, so that the Camry passed between him and Bell’s car. The men inside all looked at Henkerson, driving slowly and “observing” him, “looking hard” at him. (Had they been looking in the other direction, at Bell’s car, they might have seen Isnora motioning them to the Altima — Isnora had just told them the men in question were getting into a car — but apparently they found Henkerson more suspicious. Why, I don’t know: Henkerson, very slim, almost wiry-limbed, didn’t look the least bit threatening. But not seeing the Altima or Isnora, the Camry continued on).

Anyway, Henkerson looked back at Bell after the Camry passed. He then saw Isnora, the black guy in the skullcap he’d just seen in front of the club. Isnora was walking up (“like he was creeping from somewhere”) behind the Altima. He had a gun drawn.

Henkerson “put two and two together,” realizing the men in the Camry were cops (why else would a white guy be traveling with two blacks in this neighborhood at 4 in the morning?). And cops plus a guy with a gun was a recipe for disaster. “Things could get really ugly,” he thought. He said, “Oh shit, he got a gun.” (On direct he testified he’d said this to himself, but on cross admitted he’d told the Grand Jury he’d said it to Bell and Guzman as well). He did not think Isnora was an officer.
Henkerson decided he and Sean had better “get off the block.” As Bell pulled out, he figured Bell would be okay since he was in his car. Henkerson started running down toward the end of the block. Behind him, he heard an engine revving up, tires screeching, and then gunshots (“a nice amount” of them). When he got to the end of the block, he heard a pause and began to come back, but then the shots started up again.

He turned the corner, and ran in the opposite direction of his car, down a few blocks, winding back up to Liverpool. He’d found Nelson and Kollore on the way. The three men arrived at the top of Liverpool to see Benefield lying on the ground belly down, wearing handcuffs, screaming that he couldn’t feel his legs. The men tried to go back down to where Sean’s Altima was, but were prevented from doing so by officers, who eventually told them which hospital which shooting victim was being taken to.

Henkerson called a cab since “he was in no condition (emotionally) to drive.” The men caught up with Bone, and cabbed first to Jamaica Hospital, where Henkerson (who was crying in the courtroom when he testified to this) saw Bell being operated on, then to Mary Immaculate to visit Benefield and Guzman, then back to Jamaica, where he was told Bell had died. Henkerson then took a cab back back to the club and retrieved his car.

On cross it was brought out that Henkerson had possessed a gun in the past, in the 1996 unlawful imprisonment case. Henkerson said he’s since “moved on with his life.”

It was also elicited on cross that he had been shot in April 2007 on the street of Far Rockaway as he left a restaurant. When asked several questions about that, he noted that he didn’t know what that had to do with this case. One defense attorney asked him why he hadn’t talked to police about that case, and whether it was because he’d had to get an attorney for that case because he was involved in criminal wrongdoing. Defense counsel asked him whether he was testifying in this case to curry favor with the prosecutors so they wouldn’t prosecute him on that case. The judge sustained repeated objections by prosecutors. Defense counsel asked Henkerson if his Mercedes was ever searched on the night of this shooting; Henkerson said no. Defense counsel asked him if the reason he didn’t drive his car to the hospital was not because he was too emotionally disturbed to do so, but because he didn’t want it to be searched. He said no.

At this point, a woman who I assumed was his wife left the courtroom. Words like “bullshit” emanated from the prosecution spectator section.

Later, another defense attorney continued with the line of questioning about Henkerson’s being shot in April 2007, asking him if he had a gun at the time of that shooting. At this point a woman on the prosecution spectator side said something which I couldn’t hear but which was audible to the judge. Cooperman stopped proceedings and called out, “whoever asked that question, leave the courtroom.” The woman got up and left, cursing as she went.

Henkerson seemed genuinely confused whenever asked any questions about the April 2007 shooting or about his own car and why he didn’t drive it.

This is the first time I really got angry with the defense. I think the attorneys are doing a good job of bringing out inconsistencies between witnesses’ trial testimony and their earlier Grand Jury testimony or their prior statements to district attorneys during interviews, getting witnesses to admit things were a lot more nuanced than they’d represented on direct (or, in Coicou’s case, completely different). But, the rap song stuff, the insinuations that Henkerson had some involvement in his own shooting — a case which hasn’t had any kind of disposition, and no discernable relation to this case whatsoever, and the stripper at the bridal shower crap — they have nothing to do with the issues here, they’re meant only to badger and make the witness look like a “bad guy” in general, and those kind of tactics don’t bode well for anyone with any sympathy whatsoever for the Bell family — and you’d have to be heartless not to be one of those people. They really beat up on this witness, a member of the Bell family, and there was no reason to do so. He presented as honest, serious, vulnerable and upset, and not interested in a fight (unlike Coicou, whom they had every reason to go after). Plus, Henkerson’s testimony was not very damaging to the defense.

Okay, briefly Detective Oliver’s Grand Jury testimony:
Oliver, 35, started with the NYPD in 1994, first in patrol as a uniformed officer, then in the narcotics bureau. He’d worked only in Manhattan all the way up to August 2006, when he was assigned to the Social Club Enforcement Unit, first in Chelsea (after Imette St. Gillen was killed), before being transferred to Queens South in October 2006, a month before the shooting. He’d been trained to be an investigator, not an undercover officer, and only in drug buys. In Manhattan, the club initiative’s aim was to close down clubs under the Nuisance Abatement Laws, by conducting drug buy and busts. All activity in Manhattan was centered around drug busts; nothing else.

He had never been to Kalua Cabaret before 11/24/06, the night of the shooting. The undercovers there were primarily to conduct prostitution busts. At the team meeting earlier in the evening, Oliver was assigned to drive the “prisoner van,” with Officer Carey in the passenger seat. Since he’d never been in the area before, Carey told him where to park and directed him around.

When they first arrived in the vicinity, around 12:15, they ate fast food, before proceeding onto the club area, parking a few block away from it. Around 1:15, he saw Sanchez, one of the undercovers, walk by him, toward the club. This signified the operation was beginning, which was confirmed by a radio call from Lt. Napoli, in charge of the operation. He and Carey simply sat in the van until nearly 4:00 a.m., making personal phone calls on their cell phones. At one point, Detective Headley drove by with Napoli, in the Camry, and they exchanged small talk, but he didn’t remember what they said.

Around 3:45, Napoli radioed and said Detective Isnora was in the club and there was a man inside of the club with a gun. That man was wearing a White Sox cap and was heavyset, either black or Hispanic. Oliver waited for further instructions.

Around 4:00, Napoli radioed again saying the man in the White Sox cap with the gun would be exiting the club soon, and for everyone to “move in closer. Keep in tight.” Oliver pulled around the corner, nearer the club, and put on his vest and police shield, which he wore on a chain around his neck. He was nervous: a prostitution operation was one thing; now they were being told someone had a gun, a much more dangerous situation.

Around 4:15, Napoli radioed that the man wearing the White Sox hat was exiting the club and the team should “move in, we’re going to grab him.” Oliver began driving toward the club. Napoli then radioed a third time commanding, “move in, field team.” Oliver proceeded down past the club, and as he did so, looked at the people outside the club for a heavyset black or Hispanic man in a White Sox hat. He didn’t see anyone fitting that description.

At the end of the corner, Oliver made a right onto Liverpool Street. He drove slowly, looking to his left for the White Sox man. He didn’t see him, but instead saw Isnora on the side of the street standing in front of a car. Suddenly, Oliver heard tires screech, and the car ran into him, hitting him head on. He was “in shock.”

He saw three men in that car — two in front and one in back.

That car then reversed and backed into Isnora, causing Isnora to jump. He now saw Isnora had his gun drawn. The car came back at Oliver’s van, hitting him again. Isnora yelled, “He’s got a gun, he’s got a gun.”

Oliver saw the car’s passenger side window blow out. He heard shots. He put his van into park, and got out of the van yelling, “police, don’t move.” He approached the passenger-side door of the car. He saw Guzman begin to raise his right arm, lowering his left shoulder at the same time, as if he was reaching into his waistband. Oliver said he was scared, he didn’t want to die. He shot. Then he had no shots, and he didn’t know why there were no shots firing from his gun. He loaded another magazine into it. He didn’t want to die. It all happened so fast. He shot with the new magazine, and continued firing until he had no more shots left, and no more magazines.

He focused all of his initial shots on Guzman, but at one point, saw the rear window of the car blow out. He then believed the man in the back was firing at him or his colleagues. So, he finished off his rounds shooting at the man in the back, Trent Benefield. He never shot at the driver, Sean Bell.

After the shooting stopped, he told Carry to “cover” him, and he ran to the van and got the radio. He called the central unit telling them shots were fired and “two perps were shot,” and asking them for ambulances and backup units to be sent to the address, which he knew. That radio call was played in the courtroom. He sounded very frantic, but gave a better address and description of where they were than Sanchez had on his 911 call.

Oliver didn’t hear any shouting from Isnora before hearing the Altima’s tires screeched. He may have had music on in the van, but he usually turned off the radio when in pursuit. He never saw Isnora fire.

Oliver said he re-assessed the situation while he was re-loading his weapon. The threat remained, as Guzman was still trying to get his hand up. If he got his hand up, Oliver felt he would be killed. The entire thing happened within seconds. He felt he had no time to take cover from one of the vehicles on the street once he’d left his van.

He never did see Guzman’s hands. It never occurred to him that his fellow officers could have fired. Oliver had only ever fired at the shooting range, never at a person.

“I am trained to eliminate the threat,” he said. “The way to eliminate the threat is to shoot at center mass. Some people die. I have to live with this for the rest of my life. It was the last thing I ever wanted to do.”

Thursday the Court heard the Grand Jury testimonies of both Detective Gescard Isnora, the Undercover who was the first one to shoot, and Detective Marc Cooper, charged with reckless endangerment for firing the bullet that went into the Air Train station. We also heard from another eyewitness, James Kollore, a friend of Bell’s and Guzman’s, whose account differed from the earlier testimony of Marseillas Payne, the other eyewitness to testify thus far.

First Isnora, since his testimony most goes to the heart of this case. Overall, Isnora seemed to be a very frightened, nervous, fragile man who, in my opinion, should never have received this kind of undercover assignment. He stressed repeatedly how dangerous it was to be an undercover, how if your cover is blown you could really be in trouble. Just looking at him in court, it’s hard for me to believe he’s ever gone into a strip club and soliticited prostitutes, he looks so meek.

Isnora’s Grand Jury testimony was read by the supervisor of Queens County court stenographers, Michael Cascone. Isnora, 28, unmarried, and nicknamed Jess or Jessie, joined the NYPD in July of 2001. His first assignment was as a uniformed patrol officer in Brooklyn, where he served for three years until moving into the Brooklyn narcotics division to work as an undercover. A year later, in October 2006, a month before the shooting, he was transferred to the Queens narcotics unit to work in the same capacity. But when he arrived for his assignment there, he was told he would instead be temporarily entering the Vice Unit’s Social Club Task Force, geared toward investigating clubs in which there have been community complaints of weapons possession, violence, prostitution and drugs. It seems to me, he ended up with a pretty different job than he was expecting…

Three days before the shooting, Isnora successfully solicited a prostitute and bought cocaine at Kalua Cabaret, which resulted in two arrests. His assignment on November 24th was, along with Detective Sanchez, to try to do the same. He and Sanchez parked their unmarked car a few streets away from the club, arriving around 1:00 a.m. Sanchez went into the club first to see if the two women who’d been arrested on the 21st were there; if they were, they’d very well recognize Isnora and tell everyone he was a cop. As soon as Sanchez called telling Isnora the women weren’t there, Isnora went inside and sat with him near the front of the bar. On his way in he was frisked “lightly” by the bouncer.

Throughout his testimony, Isnora kept apologyzing to the District Attorney, saying he was nervous.

Soon a woman approached Isnora and asked him to buy her a glass of champagne, which he did. He engaged in small talk with her and asked her what she was doing after work. Another woman walked up and asked for a drink, and he did the same, asking her what she was doing after she left. Both women hinted they “don’t do that kind of thing.” While Sanchez went into the back to explore the club, leaving Isnora alone up front, a woman dancing at the pole asked him why he was alone, making Isnora nervous. If you’re a new face admidst regular, people assume you’re a cop, he said. So, he called the team leader, Lt. Napoli, to have him send Cooper in. He felt safer with two team members around. Cooper arrived and sat next to Isnora.

Soon Isnora saw one of the dancers grab the arm of a man wearing a White Sox cap and a white shirt, telling him another man, “that mother fucker over there,” was harassing her, and pointed at him. “Him over there?” Isnora heard White Sox guy reply. If he keeps it up, White Sox said, let him know and he’d “take care of it.” When he said this, he took the woman’s hand and placed it on his right hip waistband area. Isnora saw a bulge right where the woman placed her hand. He told Cooper he thought the man had a gun. The White Sox guy then went into the back. Cooper went outside and called Napoli, telling him what Isnora had just said. As soon as Sanchez returned, Isnora told him about the White Sox man and Sanchez went into the back of the club to look for him.

It was soon closing time, so Isnora excited the club and walked to the corner of the street. He thought Sanchez was behind him, but when he turned around, couldn’t see him. At the corner, he called his field team. Napoli told him to go back to the club and ghost (ie: watch over) Sanchez, as he waited for White Sox man. Isnora asked a fellow officer to meet him at Liverpool and 94th Avenue so he could retrieve his police shield and gun before returning to the club. “It was just me and the ghost now on the street; the field team’s several blocks away. You never know if people think you’re someone they’ve had a problem with before,” Isnora explained.

Isnora returned to the front of the club and looked for Sanchez. About two minutes later, Coicou drove up in his SUV, exited it and stood in front of its passenger-side door, as if he was waiting for someone. Sanchez emerged from the club and phoned Napoli. Napoli told him and Isnora to wait for White Sox man to leave. A group of 7-8 men, including Guzman and Sean Bell, exited the club and hovered in front of its entrance.

Isnora suddenly heard a “loud commotion.” He saw that a woman in that group was arguing with two of the men, saying she wasn’t “going back with” them. “I’m not doing you guys,” she yelled.

Coicou then had some words with Guzman. Coicou kept “fidgeting” in his jacket pockets with his hands. Coicou looked nervous. Isnora couldn’t hear what they were saying, but suddenly Guzman called out to his group, “Get my gun, get my gun.” Guzman said the words loudly and emphatically. Sean Bell walked up to Coicou and said “let’s fuck him up.” The group then began walking down the street at a fast pace, “like they were going to come back.”

Sanchez phoned Napoli and told him what was happening. Sanchez gave Isnora his phone and told him to follow the men and tell Napoli where they were going and what they were doing. Isnora did as he was told, following the men but not closely. He didn’t want them to think he was associated with Coicou.

As he rounded the corner of Liverpool and 94th, Isnora took out his police shield and clipped it to the right area his collar. He held his hand over it until he passed a small group of men who stood at the corner looking back down at the club. As soon as he passed them, he removed his hand from his collar and pulled out his service weapon.

He saw Guzman and Bell getting into an Altima. He thought perhaps the men were getting into the car so that they could do a “drive-by” of Coicou. Isnora told Napoli the men were getting into a car on Liverpool Street. They were the only men around at that point, so they should be noticeable to Napoli, Isnora said. Napolic told Isnora he and the team were on their way, were “moving in.” Isnora couldn’t remember who exactly was the arresting officer for that evening, but thought it was Cooper, who was riding in Napoli’s car. (Normally, the arresting officer, as the name implies, does the “arresting,” not the undercover).

As soon as Isnora saw Napoli’s Camry begin to drive down the street, he looked at Napoli and motioned toward the Altima, nodding toward the car as if to say “that’s the one.” But the Camry continued driving down the street failing to stop, perhaps not seeing Isnora.

Isnora looked back at the Altima. He now saw Guzman, in the front passenger seat, looking right at him. He said, “Police, don’t move,” and pointed his gun at Guzman. Seeing only Guzman, Isnora again said, “Police, don’t move.” He was standing about one foot away from the car at that point. Suddenly, the car lurched forward, as if the driver had “floored” the ignition. The Altima hit Isnora in the leg. Isnora fell onto its hood, then walked backward and regained balance. The Altima went on and hit head-on the unmarked police “prisoner” minivan (driven by Detective Oliver, who, under Napoli’s orders, was following Napoli’s Camry.) The Altima then quickly backed up, right into Isnora’s path. Isnora jumped out of the way. The Altima ‘s rear crashed into a gated area afront a building. The Altima sped forward again, trying now to go around the minivan. But it didn’t make it, and the passenger side of the Altima smashed into the passenger side of the minivan, where it stalled.

Isnora could see only Guzman in the car. He had “tunnel vision”; couldn’t take his focus off Guzman because he was the one who’d told somone, “go get my gun.” Locking eyes again with Guzman, Isnora said again, “police, don’t move.” He said the same words several times, he claimed. He also thought he saw Guzman eye his collar, bearing the police shield.

Isnora thought he saw Guzman reaching into his waistband, to withdraw a gun. “It all happened so quick,” he said. “I yelled ‘gun’ when I saw his arm going to his waistband. I thought if I waited he would fire at me. It was the last thing I ever wanted to do. In my mind, I knew he had a gun, so I fired. It was the last thing I wanted to do.”

Isnora never knew when his fellow officers got out of their cars. He could only focus on Guzman. Everything besides Guzman was “blurry.” He was about 6-7 feet from the car. He knew he was the first to fire, and when he did so, he heard glass shatter. The passenger-side window blew out. He fired all 11 rounds within a couple of seconds. After his magazine fell out of his gun, he didn’t reload. He was trained to “shoot center mass” — the center of the torso — because that was where most vital organs were, in order to stop a threat. All of his shots were directed at that area on Guzman. He was so “scared” and “nervous,” he never paused to assess the threat.

After a grand juror asked him why he continued to fire if he didn’t know whether there were shots coming from the Altima, Isnora said “I can’t answer, I can’t explain, it was all continuous. Once I fired, I just didn’t stop.” Another juror asked why he didn’t take cover. Isnora answered that he was in the middle of the street, a wide-open space; there was no cover to take.

After firing had ceased, Isnora saw Benefield emerge from the back passenger seat of the Altima and run down the street. Detective Headley (who was driving the Camry, which was now stopped down the street, after hearing the shots), ran after him, not wanting Headley to be left on his own. After he saw Headley grab Benefield, “taking him down,” Isnora called 911 for an ambulance and backup units.

After giving his narrative of the events, the prosecutor questioned him. During this kind of “cross examination,” Isnora said after the Altima lurched forward, crashed into the gate and sped back forward again into the minivan, Isnora yelled, “police, don’t move,” along with “police, show your hands.” He said both “don’t move” and “show your hands” several times. The prosecutor asked him if he felt those commands were contradictory. Isnora said he didn’t know; it all happened so quickly.

Isnora said he’d been robbed before working as an undercover. He’d been in fights. But he’d never before fired his weapon. He’d never before even thought about firing his weapon. Isnora said he prayed for everyone, “for the individuals that this happened to and for what happened that night. I wish the vehicle would have stopped. I felt I had no choice.”

During lunch I overheard several spectators saying if only Sean had driven the other way, had not tried to pass the minivan, but instead made a left; it was a two-way street.

Okay, on to Detective Cooper.

Cooper, 39 and married with three kids and with the NYPD since 1989, told the Grand Jury he went into Kalua, and joined Sanchez and Isnora at the front of the bar. He remembered a dancer with a tattoo “Crime” on her shoulder talking with a man wearing a White Sox hat and a white jacket. Isnora told Cooper he’d seen that man point to his waistband and say something like, “I got this,” in response to something the woman said.
Around 3:00 a.m., Cooper phoned the team and told them there was “nothing else going on,” and he was leaving. He left the club and the Camry picked him up a few streets away. When Cooper got in, Napoli was on the phone with Isnora, who was telling him about a fight outside between a man in front of an SUV and a group of men. Cooper put on his bullet-proof vest and picked up his weapon and police shield, but stayed in the car, which drove into a nearby Long Island Railroad parking lot and waited for word from Sanchez about White Sox guy. As soon as Isnora called again saying someone in the group had threatened the SUV guy by saying he was going to go get his gun, Napoli radioed the minivan, saying “let’s move in on this.”

Napoli told Headley, who was driving, and Cooper, that Isnora’d just told him the threatening group was getting into a car on Liverpool Street. Cooper didn’t remember there being any specifics as to how many men were in this group. When the Camry began driving down Liverpool Street, Cooper saw the men getting into the car, but Headley passed on by. “I guess he wasn’t sure if that was the car,” Cooper said. Cooper, who was sitting in the rear passenger side seat (farthest from the Altima), didn’t see Isnora at that time, and didn’t hear any shouting.

Suddenly, Cooper heard the revving up of a vehicle, followed by a crash. The Camry stopped, and Headley began to get out. Cooper opened the rear passenger-side door and began to get out too, but right when he did so a barrage of gunfire began. Realizing he had no cover, Cooper crouched behind the car door, one foot in the car, one foot out, peeked out from behind it, and with his right hand only, fired in the direction from which he thought the gunfire was coming — the blown-out rear window of the Altima. He admitted he did not use his left hand to steady his weapon, making his aim unbalanced and unstable.

Seeing Benefield run by, Cooper yelled out for him to stop and chased after him. Cooper thought the gunfire had stopped by then, but wasn’t sure. He didn’t see anything in Benefield’s hands, so didn’t shoot. Once he caught up with Benefield, he saw that Headley and a uniformed officer had placed him under arrest.

Cooper said he believed he’d fired 1-3 rounds in total. But when he’d spoken with the Queens DA, Cooper’d told them he was certain he’d fired only one round. He now knew he was incorrect about that, and fired about three rounds. When told there were four rounds missing from his supposedly (according to NYPD dictates) loaded firearm, Cooper said he could have fired four. He fired all shots at the rear windshield of the Altima.

Finally, James Kollore also testified. 32 years old and nicknamed “Quick,” Kollore showed up in court dressed professionally in a suit. Overall he impressed as polite and honest (he admitted he was “probably” selling crack while on the lam for another crime), while somewhat lacking in observational capacity during the shooting (he needed glasses but wasn’t wearing any, and he was standing on the opposite side of the street from the Altima).
Anyway, Kollore had two prior felonies from long ago — 1991 and 1993, the first for possession of crack cocaine, the second for possession of a firearm. He was sentenced to a short prison term, which he didn’t serve until 1995 because he’d gone “on the lam” by which he meant he simply didn’t show up to court and no one came looking for him. He was only found when arrested for loitering and gambling, and the police found he had an open warrant. He also had a few misdemeanor convictions from 2002, 2003, and 2004 for trespass, possession of burglar’s tools, and possession of a loaded firearm.

Kollore had only met Sean Bell in 2002, but had known his friends, Benefield and Guzman, for about 15 years. They all lived in the same neighborhood.

Kollore arrived at the club to celebrate Bell’s bachelor party around 11-12 midnight. He’d come in Bell’s car, which was stopped briefly by a uniformed officer. The group proceeded to the rear of the club, where they sat near the stage.

After the club closed, Kollore left with the rest of the group, who congregated outside in front. He noticed Coicou standing in front of his SUV from which loud music was blasting. Kollore began walking toward Bell’s car when he turned around and saw Bell “having words” with Coicou, who had his hands in his pockets. The conversation turned loud with “shouting back and forth,” “angry facial expressions,” and at one point Bell and Coicou were “face to face.” Kollore thought Coicou may have a gun in his pockets, as indicated by his body language. Kollore walked over the Bell, put his arm around his back and told him to “come on.” He didn’t remember saying to Coicou, “I’m going to take that gun from you” but admitted he may have said that.
Kollore and Bell began walking down the street toward Liverpool, followed by Guzman and the others. As they rounded the corner onto Liverpool, the SUV drove by slowly. After passing them, it sped on.

Kollore walked to his friend’s car, parked across the street from the Altima, while Bell and Guzman got into the Altima. Kollore saw the Camry drive by.

When the Altima pulled out, it smashed into a van coming around the corner just then. At that point, Kollore said, the minivan’s passenger-side door opened and a white man with dark hair emerged (who was presumably Officer Carey, not charged here), holding a gun. Kollore heard gunfire and saw a flash from Carey’s muzzle. Bell’s car backed up and collided with some kind of railing surrounding a building behind it. Bell then pulled back out and tried to drive around the minivan, but didn’t make it, and crashed into it again. Then there was more gunfire. Carey fired several times, kneeling down on one knee.

When a bullet pierced a car he was standing next to, Kollore took off, running down the street. Eventually, he met up with two others in the group, and they tried to call Benefield. But Benefield didn’t answer his phone. When they got back to 95th and Liverpool they saw why: Benefield was lying face down, handcuffed.

After being told by a paramedic that the three shooting victims had been taken to various hospitals, they proceeded first to Jamaica, to visit Bell, and after they were told to go home, proceeded on to Mary Immaculate to visit Benefield and Guzman.

The gunfire lasted about a minute. Kollore heard no police commands and saw no shields.

On cross examination, Anthony Ricco asked Kollore why he hadn’t called 911, instead calling Benefield. Kollore just stared at him, as if it was the craziest question in the world, as if it never entered his mind to call the police. Just another clash of cultures. If I’d just witnessed a shooting, the first thing I’d do is call 911. Of course. And when the officers arrived, I’m sure they’d all have nothing but pity for the hysterical white girl, never ever suspecting me of being involved. If I was in Kollore’s shoes, I’d likely think a lot differently.

Kollore said he’d possessed a gun in 1993 for protection. He never carried it on the street with him while selling drugs.

A good deal of cross examination was taken up with questioning about Kollore’s belonging to a rap group, along with Guzman and Larenzo Kinred (but not Bell or Benefield) in 2001. The group produced a CD containing songs about the hustling life. Titles included “We Be Thuggin'”, “Let Off A Shot”, and “Gangsta.” I didn’t really see this testimony as probative of anything (are those former Oscar-winners for best song, pimps because of their number, “Life is Hard For A Pimp” — or whatever it was called?), but maybe the judge might have thought something of it, since he let it all in. On the way out of the courtroom, several prosecution-side spectators were very angry that ADA Testagrossa hadn’t protested more to its admission. One woman said, “he did, but the judge overruled it. What’s the point of continuing to object?”

“That’s right!” someone sitting on the prosecution side of the spectator’s area shouted out on Wednesday after key witness Fabio Coicou (a/k/a, the all-important “SUV guy”) said the above quoted words. Coicou was responding to defense attorney Anthony Ricco’s question about his prior convictions. But Ricco was allowed to ask the question not in order to turn the tables and put a prosecution witness on trial, but to call into question his credibility. I.e.: if someone has previously been convicted of a crime, that shows a certain willingness to put his interest above society’s, and possibly to lie under oath. Anyway, legally legitimate as Ricco’s question was, it also made sense to me that Coicou (and other prosecution witnesses who’ve testified and been questioned about their priors), felt the tables were being turned, fingers were being pointed back at them instead of those who pulled their triggers. And that obviously made sense to the person in the spectator seats as well.

Regarding Coicou, though, his testimony and personality were very unreadable, very all over the place and in the end, inscrutable. I couldn’t figure out if he was trying to be a smartass and rile up the spectators, of if he genuinely was worried he was going to get into trouble (he was, after all, the person who got into a contentious argument with Sean Bell, making the detectives fear there was going to be a shoot-out between the two parties) and was giving off this false bravado as a defense mechanism.

Anyway, here is his testimony. I’ll break it down into direct and cross. Direct first.

Coicou is 30 years old, originally from Haiti, and moved to Brooklyn with his family at age 10. He later moved to Far Rockaway, Queens, where he lived in November of 2006 and where he still lives with his ex-wife and their two young children. Coicou is a certified emergency medical technician and has worked as a funeral director. He had no prior felony convictions, but did have two prior misdemeanors — one for a petit larceny he committed in Nassau County in 1998; the other, a 2006 conviction for criminal trespass in Georgia.

Coicou had been to Kalua Cabaret before November 24th; he’d been there the previous Sunday. LaToya Oliver, his girlfriend, was working in the club as a dancer. On that Sunday, he’d driven her to the club, and as she danced, he parked around the corner and slept, then returned after the club closed to pick her up and take her home. He didn’t go inside the club with her since the club’s owners frowned on the presence of dancers’ boyfriends because it may lead to jealousy. His vehicle was a black 1998 Ford Expedition with customized just about everything (tail, skirt, rims, windshield visor, grill, headlights, scoop, hood, shades, etc. etc.).

On November 24, 2006, driving his 1998 Ford Expedition, he took LaToya to Kalua, and, as he did before, dropped her off, then drove around the corner to nap. Around 1:00 – 2:00 a.m. (before the club had closed), he went in. Before doing so he was thoroughly checked for weapons.

The club was packed and there were a lot of men drinking and looking at the female dancers, particularly in the back of the club. He later learned the group in back included Sean Bell, Joseph Guzman, and Trent Benefield, but hadn’t known any of them at the time.

Around 3:40 a.m., Coicou left, retrieved his SUV, parked in front of the club, waited for LaToya. There were many people now standing outside; it looked like “the whole club was in front of the place.” Coicou stepped out of his SUV and stood at its rear passenger door. Sean Bell, followed by Benefield, walked back into the club.

When Bell walked back out, Coicou claimed he said, under his breath, that alcohol was taking control of the situation. As Bell and Benefield passed by Coicou, Benefield said to Coicou that he was not letting alcohol take control of the situation. Bell got “chest to chest” with Coicou and also said he was not letting alcohol take control. Coicou backed up, then said to Bell, “I have money inside the club; I have bread in there,” referring to LaToya. He said he called her “money” because she is “taking care of me”. Bell gave him “a look like he understood,” then began talking a group of about 7-8 friends.

Bell again approached Coicou and asked him where he was from. Coicou responded, “A.” Bell asked what “A” was and Coicou said, “Atlanta Georgia.” Talking to the whole group, Coicou said he was now staying in Far Rockaway and this SUV was his vehicle in case they see him again. He held both hands in his vest pockets and said, “I’m not here to fight.” Guzman said “I’m from Far Rockaway too, from O.V.”, which Coicou took to mean Ocean Village, a part of Far Rockaway. Coicou said “Oh.”

Bell and Guzman and their group then began walking away.

And that was the end of that.

Coicou noticed two guys standing behind the Bell group, who were clearly not with them. One guy, a bald man (whom he later learned was Detective Sanchez), was “playing with his phone.” The two men didn’t go anywhere, but stood there making cell phone calls. Coicou had seen Sanchez in the club before.

The Bell group “scattered.” A few members of the group stood at the end of the block, looking back toward the club; others had gone around the corner. Wondering why the group had dispersed so quickly, Coicou got into his car and thought, “let me get out of here.” He drove down to the end of the block, and, before rounding the corner, saw Guzman, about to cross the street. Guzman directed him to go ahead, so Coicou drove on and circled the block, before returning to the club and parking again in front of it. While waiting there, Coicou saw someone, whom he thought was a woman, run up the block and jump into some bushes in a nearby backyard. He never saw her again. Soon LaToya emerged from the club and got into the car. She told him someone had just been shot. When they got home and watched the news, Coicou realized the people who’d been shot were the ones he’d spoken with in front of the club.

Coicou insisted he never heard any threats, never heard anyone say they were going to get a gun or a “gat”. The police had come to speak with LaToya but she refused to talk to them, feeling too much pressure. She soon returned to Atlanta because of the pressure.

Okay, now Coicou’s testimony on cross.

As mentioned at the top of the post, Anthony Ricco, defense counsel for Detective Isnora, began to ask about Coicou’s prior convictions, when Coicou quickly shot back, “yes, but I’m not on trial here.” Ricco decided not to ask the judge to direct Coicou to answer with a simple ‘yes or no’ and instead moved on to his Grand Jury testimony. Before reading Grand Jury testimony into the record, Ricco asked Coicou, “you swore to tell the truth, both to the Grand Jury and today, correct?” — a typical introductory question to the elicitation of Grand Jury testimony which is likely going to differ in some way from what the witness has just claimed at trial. Instead of saying “yes,” Coicou said, “and your point is?” which drew laughter from the spectators, but not from Justice Cooperman. Moments later when Ricco began another question, and Coicou opened his mouth, Cooperman said in an annoyed tone, “Just listen to the question.”

Such a clash of cultures. I have no idea what a jury would think if there was one — obviously it would depend who was on that jury — but an older white judge is going to have absolutely no patience with witnesses who smart off, who seem to disrespect the system. I don’t know if any judge would, actually. But then, maybe Coicou just didn’t get the system. Maybe it just doesn’t seem to serve him.

I overheard people on the defense / police side say thank god a judge is hearing the case; you don’t ever take a jury unless you’re guilty. I’ve never heard any attorney advise their client to forego their right to a jury trial. But then, I only know public defenders, who represent the poor, largely black, population. Who represent the Guzmans and the Coicous. I’ve handled plenty of criminal appeals; I obviously only got an appeal if there’s been a conviction (otherwise there’s nothing to appeal). So, juries do convict when the evidence is there. But juries also — usually — look very carefully at all of the evidence, deliberate at length, consider the charges separately, and take their role seriously. If the attorneys are good and the system is fair, there will be a good cross-representation of society on the jury. Something tells me a good many jurors would also understand where witnesses like Coicou are coming from – the fear and distrust of the system, of attorneys and police, the eagerness to mouth off when you feel like you’re the one in trouble and are being treated unfairly. But while they’d understand anger, I still think they’d be critical of inconsistencies and contradictions.

When Ricco continued on, asking him about his criminal background, Coicou again said “I’m not on trial here,” to which the woman in the spectator area said, “That’s right,” followed by mumbles and unrest on both sides of the courtroom. Interestingly, neither the judge nor any of the courtroom officers quieted down the room.

Coicou had a gun in Atlanta, but obtained a permit for it, possessing it legally. He has no permit in NY for a gun, and hence, doesn’t carry one. He didn’t have a gun that night. He held his hands in his pockets, he maintained, to demonstrate peace, so the group would leave him alone. “Uh-HUH,” declared a female spectator. More unrest. Still no demands to “quiet down.”

Ricco asked him if he knew what a “gat” was; Coicou said, “no, what is it?” and told Ricco to get a dictionary.

If you listen to Coicou’s Grand Jury testimony, it seems like he was a lot more scared of the Bell group that night than he wanted to admit at trial, which makes no sense since he’s not friends with them. Ricco read some of that Grand Jury testimony: “I said to them I’m not here to fight. I had my hands in my pockets because I was trying to tell them to calm down. People don’t like to be told to stay calm.” He “thought they looked impatient, rowdy” and that they were “making a scene.” There was “a lot of drinking involved, and if you talk to a drunk person the wrong way … I was trying to hint we are grown men, there’s no reason to act this way.” He was trying not to have a “situation” with them, he was trying to hint to them that the bald guy might be a police officer. He was concerned that if something went wrong, a bunch of people would jump on him, outnumber him, “just like in the situation here, with a bunch of lawyers.”

Coicou also claimed he never saw anyone peeking around the corner, but his Grand Jury testimony belies that. “I got into my car because of the people peeking at the corner. I got concerned. If I didn’t move, someone might come around the corner.” He felt the group’s splitting into two parts — those who went around the corner and left his sight and those who stood “peeking” back at him — could have been “a diversion.” He “was concerned because he didn’t know where they went.” He thought they “were going to get whatever to do whatever.” So, he drove around the block, past the “people who were still peeking.”

Coicou also met with the Assistant District Attorneys on January 17, 2007, shortly after the shooting and before he testified before the Grand Jury. He gave them a statement then, which also contradicted his trial testimony. He claimed at trial that he didn’t recall ever telling the ADAs then that he worried the men were coming back for him, that some of them were peeking around the corner, that he was worried they were “going to go get whatever to do whatever,” or that anyone said, “we’ll get my gat.” However, the ADA’s notes reflected that Coicou did indeed tell them all of those things at the meeting, including, most importantly, the “we’ll go get my gat,” to which the DA stipulated.

Ricco tried to discuss further Coicou’s thoughts that the group splitting up might be a “diversion.” Coicou said that when he drove around the block, he saw nothing was up, so there was obviously no diversion; he “didn’t see anyone doing the diversion.” I guess the way he said this sounded funny because there was some laughter in the courtroom, and Ricco said, “Mr. Coicou, isn’t it true you sometimes use big words you don’t know the meaning of?” Coicou retorted, “I guess so. I’m just trying to be like you.” More laughter. Ricco looked dumbfounded.

Coicou clearly had a thing for Ricco; he would not stop taunting that attorney. Once Mr. Cullerton (Detective Oliver’s attorney) began questioning, Mr. Coicou gave him very little crap. Perhaps he was just tired by that point. But Mr. Ricco is black, Mr. Cullerton white. And when Mr. Martin, (Detective Cooper’s attorney) who is black as well, did his cross, Coicou’s snappishness returned. Martin asked him if, with all this talk of his girlfriend being his “bread” and his “money”, he was in fact her pimp. Coicou asked for a definition of pimp, then asked Mr. Martin if he was one. More laughter in the courtroom. At this point, one guard hushed people.

On redirect, Coicou stated he had absolutely no interest in either side of this trial. He didn’t know anyone involved, didn’t know Bell and his family or friends. And, his brother is a police officer.

Additionally, Dr. Daniel O’Connor, the orthopedic surgeon who operated on Trent Benefield and Joseph Guzman, testified. Benefield had two gunshot wounds to his right buttock — one where the bullet entered, one where it exited. He likewise had two bullet wounds — entry and exit — to his right calf. He sustained one bullet wound to his left calf, and that bullet struck and lodged in his tibia bone, fracturing it. O’Connor repaired the fracture by placing a metal rod into Benefield’s leg. X-rays of Benefield’s leg with the metal rod and screws holding it together were shown in court. Heads shook in disgust on the prosecution side of the spectator area. O’Connor said it would have been difficult for Benefield to have run on the leg following the shooting, but with a rush of adrenalin, he could have hopped on his right leg and dragged the left along.

Guzman sustained multiple wounds, O’Connor said, but his fractured left tibia was the injury O’Connor operated on. O’Connor performed the same surgery on Guzman as he had on Benefield, inserting a metal rod into the left leg to repair the fracture and stabilize the bone.

The beginning of Detective Cooper’s Grand Jury testimony was also read into the record, but since it concluded the following day, I think I’m going to save that for Day 16. I’m tired…

Early in the day, I wrote in my notes, “courtroom is asleep.” Everyone had dozed off listening to the first witness of the day, NYPD criminalist Michelle Miranda, talk about ballistic damage to Sean Bell’s car. If it was the first time we’d all heard about all the bullet holes, we’d have been wide awake, but this is about the fifth witness to testify to the same thing. People were literally snoring.

But not long after I wrote that, things heated up when Miranda, declared an expert in gunshot residue, began removing clothing worn that morning by Trent Benefield, Joseph Guzman and Sean Bell from giant brown bags marked “biohazard,” and pointing out holes which she tested for gunshot and lead residue. The ballistics evidence is always a bit confusing, because the number of bullet holes in the clothing doesn’t necessarily mean that all of those bullets pierced the wearer’s skin or caused a wound; they could have passed through the clothing, making two different holes the result of one bullet, etc.

Anyway, that said, Miranda found a total of six holes containing elements of lead (making them likely bullet holes) in Benefield’s jeans, most on the back of the pants, one in the front, and one at the waist. Eerily, you could see the bullet holes in the courtroom, even from the back. Guzman’s outer vest bore six bullet holes, most of them on the right side; his pants four, all of them on the back of the pants, both legs; and his long-sleeved undershirt one in the shoulder area. Examining Sean Bell’s jacket, Miranda found a total of 14 holes, six of which tested positive for lead residue. Those six, deemed likely bullet holes, were on the right, back side of the jacket, the hood, and in the right shoulder and arm. While Miranda showed the judge the bullet holes, Nicole, Sean’s fiance, got up and left the courtroom, the door slamming loudly behind her as she went. Soon, the other people in her row left, along with Mr. Bell’s mother and father. Justice Cooperman halted proceedings for a minute or two until the situation calmed down a bit.

Miranda continued, saying that all bullet holes found in all of the clothing tested negative for gunshot residue, meaning that the shooter was not standing “near” or “in close proximity to” the three men in the car during the shooting, though Miranda didn’t define what those terms meant.

The upset in the courtroom at the showing of Bell’s bullet-torn jacket seemed to set the tone for the rest of the day. Mr. Ricco, Detective Isnora’s attorney, got short with Miranda over the word “twisted” regarding a portion of the Altima’s bumper in which a bullet hole was found, and later Paul Martin, counsel for Detective Cooper became visibly angry during his cross examination of the day’s second witness.

Anyway, Miranda also testified that she found additional ballistics evidence in the Altima’s flat tire, trunk, and dashboard, and that, judging by the way in which two bullet holes ended up in the Altima’s engine, the hood would have had to have been raised during the shooting, and a bullet would have had to have gone through the hood to have made a hole in the engine.

No gunshot residue was found inside the Altima; so, there’s no evidence any gun was ever fired from within Bell’s car. Finally, Miranda swabbed two bloodstains from the Altima’s hood and trunk for DNA testing, as well as several bloodstains in the rear seat of the Altima.

Next on was Assistant District Attorney Michelle Cort, a member of the District Attorney’s Integrity Bureau, which examines misconduct by police and DAs. It seemed pretty clear to me that ADA Cort was very unhappy, angry actually, with the police department and was not going to cut them one bit of slack in this case. She gave testimony recounting a meeting she and other ADAs assigned to the case had had with Detective Cooper and his lawyer, Mr. Martin, in January 2007.

According to Cort, Cooper told her at that meeting that, following a field team TAC meeting on the night of 11/24/06, he and the team, in three separate cars, proceeded to Kalua Cabaret, arriving there around 1:00 a.m. Cooper rode in the Camry with Lieutenant Napoli and Detective Headley. There was no police bubble light in the Camry. Cooper told Cort he was unfamiliar with Queens, having only recently been assigned the club initiative in that borough and having only been at Kalua on 11/21 for the team’s one previous prostitution and drug bust there.

Inside Kalua he saw Detective Isnora and Detective Sanchez talking near the front of the bar. Soon a woman with a tattoo reading “Crime” on her shoulder began speaking with Isnora. Cooper also saw that woman sitting next to a man about 6 feet tall and wearing a White Sox hat and lots of jewlery. Isnora told Cooper he saw the tattoo woman reach toward the White Sox man’s waistband and the man say, “I got it covered,” pointing to the waistband. Isnora told Cooper he thought that meant the man had a gun. Cooper didn’t hear that conversation but did see the tattooed woman speaking with the White Sox man.

Around 3:30 a.m., Cooper went to leave the club. When he went outside he didn’t see Sanchez or Isnora. He called Lieutenant Napoli and asked him to come pick him up, which Napoli did. Cooper got into the back passenger-side seat. Napoli told him Isnora had just phoned him about seeing an argument outside between a man standing near an SUV and some other men who were on their way toward Liverpool Street. Napoli radioed to Detective Oliver in the police minivan to “move in closer,” and Napoli also drove toward Liverpool. As they drove down Liverpool Street, Cooper saw three men get into an Altima very quickly. As their car drove past the Altima, Cooper saw one man getting into the rear of that car.

Suddenly, Cooper heard a crash, followed by gunshots. Detective Headley, who was driving, stopped and exited the car. Realizing he had no cover, Cooper slowly opened the passenger-side door, and stepped outside of the car with his right foot, keeping his left foot in the Camry. With his right arm extended out and around the Camry’s door and leaning on the door, crouching behind it, Cooper peeked around to see the Altima’s back window blown out. He fired one shot in the direction from which he heard the shots coming — the Altima, which he had his gun trained on. Cooper, according to Cort, had said that he fired for cover. Cooper never saw Isnora. Napoli remained inside the car, ducking down.

Cooper then saw Benefield running down the street, past the Camry. Headley began to chase him, and Cooper joined in the chase. Because he saw nothing in Benefield’s hands, Cooper never shot at him.

During the meeting, Cort claimed Cooper said he was “certain” he only fired one shot that morning. ADA Charles Testagrossa asked Cooper if his weapon was fully loaded at the time he began his day, and, if so, how many bullets were missing from it. Cooper responded that he should have three more bullets in the weapon than he had, but said he had found the remaining loose rounds at his house in a drawer after the incident.

On cross examination, Cort said Cooper told Testagrossa he normally removed his magazine and bullets from his gun at home each night; some of them had simply remained there, mistakenly. Cort said Cooper was never asked, and never said, whether he felt he was being fired on before he shot. Counsel was incredulous that such a fundamental question was never asked at the meeting.
Finally, the parties stipulated that DNA tests on the bags of marijuana and black gloves found on the street were insufficient for testing. So, we’ll never know whom those bags of pot belonged to.

I don’t have much time tonight, so this will be short, but today’s testimony was very odd. I feel like the prosecution is calling every single person who participated in the crime scene investigation in any way.

First on was Dr. Peter Pizzola, another CSU detective (and very educated; he has a PhD in Philosophy of Criminal Justice, which is why the Dr. preceding his name — he’s not an MD). Anyway, he was declared an expert in crime scene and ballistic reconstruction, but not accident reconstruction. So, still no expert testimony about who initially smashed into whom.

He didn’t want to speak with absolute certainty about anything but said that analyses of paint chips he ordered taken from the gray pedestrian gate of the building on Liverpool Street and the rear bumper of Bell’s Altima showed that Bell’s Altima could have come into contact with the gate. He also found clothing fibers compressed into the Altima’s front bumper. Comparative analysis of those fibers with material from Detective Isnora’s pants revealed that the car’s front bumper could have come into contact with Isnora. Since the fibers were compressed into the bumper, such contact was not casual — ie: it did not occur with Isnora simply standing next to the bumper; there had to be somewhat more forceful contact. Paint smears on the Altima’s front bumper could have come from the license plate of the police minivan. There was a tire smear on the side of the police minivan, but Pizzola could not say whether it was from the Altima.

Based upon his impact analysis, Pizzola said the collision happened as such: the police van and Altima impacted, the Altima backed into the sidewalk then into the gate on the building, then went forward again and again made contact with the minivan. The paint on the Altima from the minivan’s license plate was from the first, not second impact.

When Pizzola was first given the Altima for examination, it was already in the precinct’s garage. At that point part of the car’s bumper, foam from seats, and other large items were haphazardly packed into the car’s backseat. Saying he didn’t want to “second-guess anyone,” Pizzola admitted he thought the placement of such objects was not so swift. He noticed the car’s two rear tires were deflated and the front driver’s one flat; ballistics evidence was found inside of that front flat tire. Two bullet holes in the Altima’s hood were definitely made after the damage to the front of the car (so, the crash happened before the shooting). There was slight, typical factory tinting on the front windshield of the Altima, and there was perhaps a bit of tinting on the rear window, but the side windows were not tinted.

The shots fired into the rear of the Altima and into the Air Train station were produced by Detective Cooper’s gun. Cooper was shooting from the unmarked police Camry, parked down the street behind the Altima. The slope of the shot that fired into the Air Train was 11 degrees upward — a slope “slightly” above the target, also called “a grazing shot.”

Detective Edward Bingham (not sure if I’ve spelled his last name right) was the source of the aforementioned odd testimony. Another CSU detective, he examined the Dodge Stratus parked on Liverpool Street that sustained a bullet hole to its trunk; the bullet was found inside the trunk’s interior lining.

Bingham also documented the trajectory of the 24 bullet holes in the Altima through a 3D model called a “total station.” Using Pizzola’s trajectory rods, he made these 3D images, which were projected onto the courtroom screens. They showed a model car with long, long lines pointing toward it, each line representing one of the 24 rods marking the bullet holes. The minute he put up the 3D images, they looked odd and very out of proportion. The trajectory lines seemed ridiculously long, seemingly coming from either below the surface of the ground or way above, in the air. It turned out, as revealed on cross, that he hadn’t made a vertical scale, only a horizontal one. There hasn’t yet been any testimony about how far away each detective was from Bell’s car during the shooting, but Bingham admitted, according to one image, if the detective shot from 28 feet away, he would have had to be aiming from 14 feet in the air. “You don’t know any 14-foot tall people, correct,” defense counsel Ricco asked rhetorically. According to another image, if the detective had fired from 15 feet away, he would have had to be underground. Bingham admitted that when he made the “total station” he hadn’t taken into account the fact that the passenger side of the Altima was higher than the driver’s side when it was shot at (both because of the flat driver’s side tire and the dips in the street). He performed the test only in the precinct garage, rather than at the scene, making it difficult for him to get the proper dimensions since the garage was so small. On redirect, DA Testagrossa adduced from the detective that he hadn’t intended to show the placement of the shooters in the images. But there was a long side bar before the admission of the images, after Mr. Ricco objected to them on the grounds that the DA hadn’t given an “offer of proof” as to their relevance. After the lenghty side-bar, Ricco withdrew his objection, but I wondered what that relevance was after all…

The little things that amuse me

Originally uploaded by swan lake samba girl via mobile.

Today’s courtroom passes are green & have little clovers on the bottom.

Yesterday was a short day. The only testimony came from yet another Crime Scene Unit detective, Charles Reiss, who took 63 photos of Sean Bell’s Altima at the NYPD garage after it had been towed there for evidence preservation, and photos of two gates in front of a building on Liverpool Street that appeared to have been impacted by the Altima. Because this set of Altima photos was taken once it had been removed from the scene, we could see its entire front including the point of impact with the unmarked police minivan. The whole front bumper was off and the right front passenger-side wheel was turned awkwardly in, “dramatically” so, Reiss said. The front driver’s side tire was flat. The passenger windows were missing. In examining the glass recovered from those windows, Reiss said they didn’t seem to be tinted, which one can determine by the way the glass breaks.

There was some, but not as much, damage to the car’s rear: the point where the trunk meets the body of the car was askew, the trunk was ajar, there was a bullet hole in the trunk lid, the back bumper was damaged, and the rear deck inside the car was covered with glass.

Reiss took several hair and fiber samples and serological (body fluid) swabs from inside the car and sent them to the lab, and he, too, documented the car’s ballistic damage. He went through all the bullet holes and bullets recovered in the car, most of which went through the passenger side of the car. Reiss tried but was unable to collect any latent fingerprints from inside or on the car.

In examining the scene, Reiss saw glass splattered on the ground in front of two gates covering pedestrian and vehicular entrances to a building on Liverpool Street located diagonally behind the Altima, as well as a damaged lock to the pedestrian gate, chipped painting on the adjacent vehicular red gate, and chipped red paint on the Altima’s rear bumper. He concluded from all of this evidence that the Altima may have crashed into the gates. He therefore obtained paint samples from the rear of the Altima and both gates and sent them to the lab for analysis. When asked whether there was any doubt in his mind that the Altima had been involved in multiple collisions that morning, sustaining damage to front and back, Reiss said “no.”

Reiss’s testimony about the two collisions is important because it contradicts earlier eyewitness testimony by exotic dancer Marseilles Payne. Ms. Payne had said she saw the unmarked police minivan crash once into the Altima, followed immediately by shooting. She said the Altima never backed up into the building and came forward again crashing into the minivan, which is the defense contention.

And that concludes weeks three of the trial.

It’s kind of weird how the trial is a big deal on one hand, and on another, it’s not. There’s a fairly large media presence, though some days more than others. N.J. Burkett from News Channel 7 was back from Albany yesterday; he breezed in halfway through the testimony. There’s a total of four sketch artists — all of whom seem quite taken with Detective Oliver; from where I’m sitting I can usually see the progressing drawings of two to three of them and one day all three had nothing on their canvasses but his profile. He is rather charismatic and is located the closest to them, but still, I wanted to laugh when I saw three paintings of exactly the same thing. Earlier in the week when the judge briefly recessed the case to hear another item on his docket and the defendants had to leave the front area, one sketch artist actually followed Oliver around the room. He looked up at her and smiled kind of self-consiously. He looks at ease with all the attention — not like he is eating it up but not uncomfortable either. Detective Isnora on the other hand usually sits slightly hunched over and head slightly down. And Detective Cooper, charged with the least serious of the offenses, kind of sits off to the side, on the fringe. Still, I wanted to stand up and applaud when one of the artists actually began a drawing of Detective Cooper yesterday.

As for the families: the Bell family is always present, especially Sean’s mother, father, and Nicole, his fiance. There’s a large man who always sits next to the father, who I suspect is Sean’s brother. And Nicole’s row of friends are always there for support. Her lawyer is often present, and Sharpton shows up about once a week and for brief periods of time. On the defense side, the second and third rows are equally packed with police officers. I don’t know the detectives’ families, but I suspect some are there. There was a cherubic-faced but worried-looking woman who looked just like Detective Isnora but white-Hispanic, not black, talking to him the other day during brief recess.

And as for the spectators: the courtroom is often fairly full by late morning but the regulars are becoming fewer and fewer. We all sit in the same seats and are kind of getting to know each other, if mainly by sight. There’s an older man with a limp and a thicket of white curly hair who sits diagonally behind me and I honestly worried about him after not seeing him for two days in a row. Thursday I met a woman who always sits near me. She told me she’s a police officer and her son’s currently studying at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. “That could have been my son,” she said referring to Bell. “I know police procedure. I’m here because we need answers.”

I’ve been asked a few times why I’m there. I think I am just about the only white regular who’s not official press and not associated with the police so it is probably curious. The guards outside keep trying to send me to jury duty. They have police barricades set up outside the courthouse separating the main entrance from a side entrance which leads to a narrow hallway, thronged by police guards, reporters, and a large TV camera, then on to the main courtroom. Every morning I start to walk up the courthouse steps around the barricade and toward the side door but am stopped and directed around the other way, behind the jurors. I simply say “Sean Bell” and they say, “oh,” and let me continue on my way. Thursday when I was walking along to the proper door and heard a guard call out “miss, miss,” then another say, “naw, she’s here for Sean Bell,” I considered it a minor victory.

The above was said by my favorite attorney, defense counsel Anthony Ricco, when he asked the prosecution’s last witness of the day, on cross, whether she was relieved when the police arrived at her house to ensure she was okay and to search for an errant bullet that pierced her living room window during the shooting. The witness, Maria Rodrigues, nodded almost instinctually, then looked out into the crowd of spectators and realized the context. “Yeah, yeah,” she continued, under her breath. I personally feel better when the police arrive after I’ve called 911 (which has only happened twice in my life — once in college and once over something that happened not long ago here), but then I’ve always lived in largely white, middle-class areas where the police are almost always a positive presence…

Today’s spectators included a group of local high-school students from a school specializing in criminal justice, and their two very enthusiastic teachers. Sweet. And it turned out to be a good day for them to attend because Al Sharpton made a rare appearance (this is the only third time I’ve seen him here); he stayed for the morning testimony then gave a press conference at lunchtime outside and was gone by the afternoon.

Anyway, all of today’s testimony consisted of eyewitness accounts of people who lived on Liverpool Street, where the shooting occurred. Well, almost all. First on was Detective Christopher Florio from the crime scene unit who responded to North Shore Hospital to photograph the officers involved and their injuries. So, full length photos of the five plainclothes officers who fired weapons that night were shown, followed by a photo of the cut thumb of Detective Carey (not charged here), and another picture of Detective Isnora’s smallish shin abrasion sustained when Bell’s car hit him. We also saw photos Florio took of all five guns and ammo recovered. There was a small amount of dried blood near the front of Detective Isnora’s Glock. Update: I hadn’t thought much of this evidence (the small amount of blood on the gun) when it was presented in court because I thought it could have come from a number of places, but according to news reports here and here and here, apparently some, like Al Sharpton, calling the “bloody gun” a “smoking gun”, are surmising that it meant Detective Isnora was shooting from very close range, enabling him to see the men in Bell’s car were weaponless. I think we’ll have to wait for other evidence, though, including tests indicating whose blood was on that gun, to derive any meaning from it).

Next was Detective Thomas Forte, also from CSU, who examined ballistic damage to the Green Ford Explorer parked on the side of the street. Because the car was never examined by the original CSU detective, Detective Rivera, the car’s owner Bernardino Dossantos (who would testify next) brought it to the Task Force’s garage, leaving Forte to examine it two weeks after the shooting. Forte found on it two bullet impact marks (meaning the bullet hit the area but didn’t pierce it and make an actual hole): one on the front passenger quarterpanel and one on the rear passenger-side door. Both impact marks tested positive for lead (bullet) presence.

Dossantos, the owner of the Explorer who lived around the corner from Liverpool, testified next. From Portugal, he could probably have used an interpretor; he had some real trouble understanding complicated, nuanced questions, particularly those posed by the defense. Nevertheless, he was pretty funny. Speaking in his thick accent, he was one of those charmingly authentic, no nonsense people. He literally came from his job as a construction worker, covered in dust, sweat, and yellow safety vest, and he made it clear up front he was missing some valuable work time here. The attorneys were good humored and promised they would hurry.

Dossantos was sleeping at 4:15 a.m. on 11/25/06, when his wife heard shots and woke him. He then heard about 8-10 shots himself, coming from Liverpool. He dressed and walked out onto that street, where he saw Lieutenant Napoli’s Toyota Camry. Three men were behind it — two standing above a black man, Bennefield, who was lying on the ground, bleeding from the head. As emergency workers helped him into an ambulance, Bennefield said, “watch my legs, watch my legs.”

Dossantos’s wife told him there was some damage to his Explorer, which was parked in front of his house on the side of the street. He claimed he left the Explorer in that position the whole day, only moving it the following morning, which contradicts Rivera’s earlier testimony that he couldn’t examine the Explorer on the day of the shooting because it had been moved from within the crime scene tape before he could get to it. In any event, Dossantos brought the truck down to the NYPD Task Force’s garage two weeks after the shooting. “Of course I bring it, I want pay!” he said, all seriousness. Everyone laughed. He looked out at us like we were nuts, before assuring us the NYPD did indeed compensate him for the damage. When asked if he had walked around his house to examine it for any damage, he frowned and said, “No, no, not my house, I rent, I don’t care to look,” as if it was a crazy question.

In the afternoon, the court heard from Robert Hernandez, who lived in the house at the corner of Liverpool and 95th Avenue and whose aluminum-filled chain link fence sustained two bullet holes. At 4:14 a.m. on 11/25/06, he was in his living room trying to find the remote control to shut off his TV when he heard shouting followed by a gunshot. He couldn’t make out the contents of the shouts, but heard two male voices. He then heard a gunshot, a 3/4 of a second pause, then a barrage of gunfire. He looked out his living room window to see Napoli’s Camry with its headlights on and the front doors open and a light-skinned man wearing a blue sweater and jeans crouching behind one of the doors. The man suddenly turned and ran down the street.

Hernandez looked down the street and saw a man holding a silver gun leaning against a black Honda parked on the side of the street. He then saw two dark-skinned men standing next to his fence and above another man, Bennefield, who was lying on the ground complaining that his legs hurt.

One of the standing men said to Bennefield, “Why you runnin’?”

Bennefield said, “I didn’t do nothing.”

Standing man said, “If you didn’t do nothing then why you running?”

Hernandez then heard someone else say “The cops are coming,” before hearing sirens.

Hernandez ran upstairs to get a better view. From there he saw Bell’s Altima collided with the police minivan.

About five minutes later Hernandez saw several uniformed officers in the area, including one who was inspecting his backyard with a flashlight. Later that morning, Hernandez went downstairs to survey the damage. He saw a bullethole on both sides of his corner fence — the Liverpool side and the side bordering 95th Avenue, which intersected with Liverpool. He saw Dossantos’s Explorer across the street bearing a dent and a neighbor’s minivan parked down the street with a shattered window.

Hernandez’s wife, whom Hernandez directed to call 911, heard a car screeching away. Her 911 call was played in court. She sounded very meek and frightened, saying, “people are yelling, cars are screeching, there are many shots.”

Significantly, at the time he witnessed the events, Hernandez hadn’t known any of the men he saw — the man leaning on the Honda, the man crouching behind the Camry door, or the two men standing over Bennefied — were police officers. He thought the whole thing was a “gang situation.” “Most of the guys who go into Kalua Club are thugs,” he said.

Before the final witness for today, Justice Cooperman held a short recess so that he could briefly take care of another matter on his docket, which he sometimes does. I had to run to the bathroom, and, by the time I returned, they were already in the middle of the matter, but it sounded like Cooperman and the lawyers were trying to schedule a man’s sentencing date. After they agreed on a day, the man, black, was taken, in handcuffs, out of the room by officers. As he went he looked out at us, at the ridiculously large, packed courtroom. Something tells me his trial wasn’t quite so well attended. A woman sitting down the row from me stood up and waved out to him. He looked at her and for the split second they had, locked eyes. As soon as he was taken from the room, she sat briefly, looking forlorn, then quickly rose and, excusing herself, passed by me. I felt so horrible for her, as I always feel for the women — the wives and mothers of the defendants.

But more, this man, who had obviously been held for his sentencing date in Rikers, scruffy, hair unwashed, and in torn clothes, was such a contrast to the three defendant detectives in this case, all of them dressed in expensive-looking suits — particularly Detective Oliver — clean, polished, well cared for. I’ve often seen the detectives leaving the nice Italian restaurant down the street from the courthouse with their lawyers and /or a large group of men from the Police Detectives Endowment Association, all of whom are present for support in the courtroom as well. I realize there are reasons why some defendants are remanded to Rikers to await trial and sentencing and others are not — some are considered serious flight risks or a danger to the community or can’t make bail — but it’s still sad there’s such a sharp disparity of treatment.

Last was the aformentioned Maria Rodrigues, who lived in the house on Liverpool whose living room window was pierced by a bullet. At 4:15 on that morning she was sleeping in her bedroom, located at the back of the house, when she heard a noise. Her husband woke too and told her he thought they were gunshots. Soon she heard the sound of breaking glass, which she knew was coming from her living room. She called out to her teenage children to stay in bed, in their rooms. She thought she heard about 10-12 shots in all, and after they were finished, she heard someone yell out, “get down” or “stay down.”

Minutes later, she heard a knock at her door. A voice identified itself as that of a police officer, who’d come to make sure the family was all right. She opened the door, told the officers she was okay, and they searched for a bullet, not finding anything. She saw her window was broken. Later that day another detective came by, finding the bullet in a lampshade near the window.

Outside, she saw that her husband’s car, a blue Mitsubishi parked in front of the house, had a partially shattered windshield, and it looked as if a bullet had entered through the back driver’s side door, passed through the front seat’s headrest, and exited through the front window.

Yesterday’s testimony consisted of two Port Authority officers staffing the Air Train station struck by a bullet from the shooting, and the Crime Scene Unit detective who examined that scene and photographed clothing of Sean Bell and Joseph Guzman, and Detective Isnora’s injuries.

First on was Port Authority Officer John Cea who was on routine patrol on the elevated subway platform of the Air Train, which ran north of Liverpool Street, where the shooting occurred. With him was his partner, Officer Brian Donnelly, who testified after him, a “Red Coat” staffer helping to direct passengers, a Transportation Security Administrator standing near the informational screens, and three civilians.

Around 4:13 a.m. they heard gunfire outside the terminal consisting of a few slow “pop pops” then a rapid round of succession. Cea immediately ran for cover behind a steel wall but Donnelly approached the Southern window to see what was going on. Right then, a bullet went through that window, shattering the glass, some of which lodged in Donnelly’s forehead and face. Donnelly then ran and Cea yelled out at the civilian passengers to “get down.” A man abandoned his suitcase and ran and two women ducked down behind a central informational stand. The Red Coat ran as well, but the TSA officer just stood there, then slowly ducked. A train pulled up and let a couple of customers off. Cea and Donnelly shouted out at them, but couldn’t remember exactly what they said.

After the gunfire, which lasted about 20-30 seconds, ended, Cea and Donnelly got everyone out of the terminal and down to street level, walked down to the street below to see if the officers who’d arrived needed help, then went back to the Air Train station and looked for ballistics evidence. They found a bullet on the floor and a copper bullet smudge on the north side of the platform across from the broken window. Cea put an informational pamphlet over the bullet to preserve it as evidence.

Cea sustained sprains to his left shoulder and wrist, likely when he hit the ground for cover, and was treated at Mary Immaculate Hospital. Donnelly sustained a torn rotator cuff and a sprained lumbar for which he received rehabilitation and surgery and was out of work for a year and four days.

Three surveillance cameras captured the scene. After about an hour-long side-bar, during which the courtroom was cleared and we stood outside in the lobby (likely so the attorneys and judge could decide which bits of the tape would be received into evidence), they showed the tapes on the monitors in court. The second one, showing the south side of the platform, was the most graphic. “Damn!” someone yelled as Donnelly was sprayed by a burst of blown window glass.

In the afternoon, Detective Greg Anzalone from the Crime Scene Unit testified. He recovered the bullet in the hall of the platform that Cea had found, and took measurements of a bullet hole in the window and a copper impact marking on the opposite wall.

His testimony about where he found everything ended up providing the comic relief of the day, which I think we all needed after that insanely long recess. In days of yore they used to have a diagram or photo set up in the courtroom and the witness would walk up to it and mark an X, or a “B” for bullet and “M” for marking or whatever they wanted. With this new technology, everyone — meaning, the witness, judge, each prosecutor, each defense attorney and each defendant — has a computer-generated image on their own computer screen. The witness is supposed to take a stylus and “mark” the area on their little computer screen where they found whatever they found. The marking then shows up on everyone else’s screens and on the large monitors on the wall above the judge for spectators (and I guess for jurors if there were any) to see. So far everyone’s making a little dot so small I don’t see how anyone can see it; I’m sitting in the middle of the courtroom and I certainly can’t. I have to wait for the prosecutor, or whoever is asking the questions, to read into the record where the witness has made the miniscule dot and the judge to okay it, so I know where in the world it is. But I guess the problem is, if the witness points too hard, a big red arrow shines out, and then if it’s not exactly where they intended it and they try it again, or if they accidentally touch the screen again, another big arrow shows and the screen becomes filled with all these crazy arrows and it’s confusing what is where. And one arrow or mark can’t be erased without the whole screen being cleared so, at points, the whole thing has had to be redone before being printed and entered into evidence because of too many confusing markings. Also, I guess it’s hard to make any kind of image other than a dot with the stylus because no one is being told to write anything other than a dot.

Well, Anzalone apparently wasn’t told the rules or how the stylus worked. When told to draw a line and point to the area where he found the bullet hole, he applied so much force he ended up with about four lines, three arrows and a bit dot. Very interesting stick figure. “Oops,” he said. The prosecutor asked him which line he intended to draw, but when that became too confusing, had the screen cleared so he could start again. Same thing happened. People snickered. He looked embarrassed. Immediately after the screen was cleared again, a big bright red arrow showed up on the bottom left corner of the the screen, completely outside of the picture.

“I don’t know, it must be my ring,” he laughed nervously.

“What did you have for lunch today,” Justice Cooperman said with uncharacteristic levity — with an uncharacteristic voice, actually — albeit still completely deadpanned. Everyone laughed including Anzalone. A lot of people, by the way (listen to March 7 “update”) are annoyed the judge isn’t showing more emotion or in some way indicating his thoughts, but this is how judges are supposed to act, like they’re completely objective and simply taking everything in. Unfortunately many don’t but that’s another story…

Anyway, finally Anzalone was able to draw only one line, but then when asked what the measurements were, marked them onto the screen, evidencing just how badly the stylus writes. His numbers looked like that which a two-year-old might make. The judge let them stand. Then, when asked to mark the area where he found the bullet, then the copper marking, he made big loopy red circles, which also resembled something drawn by the average pre-schooler. I really appreciated it though because I could finally see clearly what he was marking. But poor guy — he had no idea what we were all giggling at.

Anyway, Anzalone also examined the two police vehicles involved in the shooting: the Toyota Camry which carried Lieut. Napoli, and the ‘prisoner’ minivan which impacted with Bell’s Altima. From the Camry he recovered two shell casings (discharged when a bullet is fired), one from under the front passenger seat, and one from the rear passenger-side floor. From the prisoner van he recovered two shell casings at the base of the windshield wipers and one in the upper right area of the engine. He had no idea how that shell casing ended up all the way under the engine. Also, in the Camry, he didn’t see a police bubble light, which Napoli had testified he was bent down trying to find when the shots began.

Anzalone was also sent to Mary Immaculate and Jamaica Hospitals to photograph clothing recovered from Joseph Guzman and Sean Bell. The photos were shown on the monitors in court. Bell’s clothing was mostly dark-colored, so the only blood that was visible was on the waistband of his boxer shorts. Anzalone testified that the clothing — a golf shirt, t-shirt, thermal underwear, jeans and leather jacket — all bore ballistics damage and were severly cut by EMS personnel administering emergency care. Mrs. Bell (the mother) briefly left the courtroom at this point.

Guzman’s white t-shirt, light grey overshirt, and jeans did contain visible blood; there were a few large splotches on the right side of both shirts and a few smaller speckles on the left, and there was blood around the waistline and on the left leg of his jeans. His clothing was also severly cut by emergency medical workers. There were about five markers on the middle of the jacket’s right side but it was confusing as to exactly how many potential bullet holes those markers indicated, since some were surrounding a single hole. Somehow, though his vest was made of ordinary fabric, one bullet was caught in the jacket’s right-side collarband and one in the right-side bottom seamline.

Anzalone also took a couple of pictures of Detective Isnora’s right leg, on which there was a red, horizontal abrasion, on his shin area. Isnora had his pants leg rolled up to show the abrasion, but was also pointing to something on the pants, which Anzalone surmised was a marking corresponding with the abrasion. He didn’t examine or photograph the pants, though, so wasn’t sure.