I could NOT love this EMT/Firefighter witness more.

[nolabear]

She is not letting the defense back her down. She flat out told him “I do t believe that” when he claimed the ambulance had been called before she got there.

And when he makes a mistake she makes sure he gets it right. I want her on my side in a fight.

[Ocelot II]

1. Firefighters have to be tough. I could never do that job,

being a wimp and all, but she's tough enough and she doesn't back down.

[IcyPeas]

2. like the dispatcher from the other day....

she knows how to handle stress on the job and on the stand. great witness.

she's giving the defense lawyer a lesson!

[dem4decades]

3. I could not like this defense attorney any less.

[JohnQFunk]

5. I do - because he's helping the prosecution! 🔚

[dem4decades]

27. I hope you're correct.

[True Dough]

4. Supremely confident and a clear thinker

She's making the defense attorney work. Nice to seem him swinging and missing.

[demmiblue]

6. She was pretty shaky at first, but she has definitely found her voice!

Nerves/anxiety are difficult to overcome.

She is killing it now! Just two years into her profession.

[sop]

7. This defense attorney has tried everything he can think of to create the impression poor officer

Chauvin was in fear for his life from a horde of angry black people. He's failing miserably.

[nolabear]

8. Absolutely miserably. He's fishing for admission of fear.

That the crowd was making the cops scared. I don’t know the point but he’s making Chauvin look like either a coward or a monster—or both.

[Irish_Dem]

10. The pictures I saw of the "crowd" consisted of about 5 people.

Young people just standing there.

[sop]

20. That angry nine-year-old girl with "Love" printed on her t-shirt must have been really frightening.

Someone should point out to the defense attorney the "angry crowd" was upset because three cops were slowly killing an unconscious, handcuffed man on the street.

[wnylib]

30. So how in hell is that a defense?

"Your honor, I was in so much fear from the angry crowd that I just HAD to kill the Black man. I knew that would calm them down."

How does that defense work???

[sop]

32. It doesn't and it's total bullshit, but that's the standard cop defense:

We were in fear for our lives, so we had to choke/club/shoot the suspect to death.

[kwijybo]

44. But he WAS in fear! That third grader might have thrown her crayons at him, after all

[LiberalLovinLug]

50. Just conjecture, but IMO it was more that he wanted to show power and defiance to the onlookers

He was thinking how disrespectful all the other nwords were being to him, telling him what to do! Thinking they could order him, a superior human and authority figure, to "get off of him!". It was a "I'll show you how much I listen to the little people, I'll bear down even harder!...that'll show them who's boss"

[Watchfoxheadexplodes]

9. Her testimony just went out the window

[Evergreen Emerald]

11. what do you mean?

[joshcryer]

13. No it didn't.

The defense attorney was extremely combative with extremely bizarre hypotheticals that she didn't understand the prosecution would come back and ask her about and reduce them to complete shambles, so she was trying to answer the obvious about those stupid ass hypotheticals.

[Ocelot II]

14. No, it didn't. The judge reminded the witness that

she shouldn't argue with the lawyers. There's nothing unusual about this in a trial; lay witnesses don't understand court rules and sometimes they have to reminded about them. This is not a big deal.

[joshcryer]

22. Yeah, all she needs to be told is that she should just answer the questions.

Even if they're as absurd as they were. She didn't know she'd be asked these stupid, bizarre, ridiculous hypotheticals such as people yelling at firefighters telling them how to do their job, lol.

[Historic NY]

51. I remember being on the stand and the old judge...

ordered me not to answer the defense questions. That he was badgering the witness. When he starts with hypotheticals, he asked me one or more about what his client was thinking about several times, my answer was how the fuck would I know what he was thinking, I'm not a mind reader. I thought the judge was going to lose his teeth. Looking at the jury they didn't seemed shocked, they appeared relieved.

[ramen]

45. On what grounds? nt

[Watchfoxheadexplodes]

12. She was doing okay until the end

Part of her training would have been giving testimony in court, she lost composure at the end.

[joshcryer]

17. That's absurd this could be the first time she's ever been in court.

She obviously kept overtalking unintentionally as part of a personality quirk. She didn't even bother to read her original transcript because she knew it was inaccurate.

[Watchfoxheadexplodes]

21. Inaccurate?

Lawyers know the answer before the question is asked, the first refusal of looking at the transcript had a touch of arrogance.

[joshcryer]

24. The transcript was filled with her innaccurate memories.

Such as describing that Floyd's face was facing the Speedway. What she doesn't understand is that the prosecution will come back and fix any gotchas the defense pulls out of their ass. This is a very open and shut case.

[secondwind]

34. The Speedway thingie is just a blip.

She self-corrected herself.

[joshcryer]

36. I know but the transcript is likely full of those memory inaccuracies.

And she refuses to refer to it for that reason (and she is entitled to that). He likely wants to sit there and go over it piece by piece and try to destroy her credibility.

[sop]

31. This defense attorney is trying to use conflcting and shaky witness recollections to cast doubt

on what exactly? That the multiple videos made from every angle as the incident unfolded don't exist? That's preposterous. This tactic might work if video evidence didn't exist, but the jury can see exactly what happened.

[ShazzieB]

42. He's doing that because he literally doesn't have anything else to try and make a case out of.

It's pathetic, really. He's trying to make sense out of nonsense, and it's not working AT ALL.

[Ms. Toad]

47. Tree point of putting her on the stand

Is that she is an EMT, and is trained to recognize distress - unlike the teenage (and younger) witnesses.

Her testimony was intended to add a strong, medically informed recollection of the events of the day.

By using her recollections of that day, made at the time her recollections should have been freshest, defense counsel implies that her testimony yesterday is likely even less accurate - and not to be believed.

[stopdiggin]

52. defense attorney's JOB is to cast as much doubt

as possible (without alienating the jury). No more than what we should expect. Was this the best witness to ever sit in the box? Maybe not. But not nearly as 'damaging' as made out to be either.

(and yeah -- some witnesses/personalities just tend to be a bit more feisty when pushed. nothing really new there either. but not helpful either.)

[Ocelot II]

19. If you've never testified in court you don't understand how stressful it is,

or how, after you've been badgered for awhile - as this witness was - you might lose your composure, too. People who aren't used to these procedures sometimes to have to reminded not to argue with the lawyers even if they'd been thoroughly prepared for the trial, as I'm quite certain she was.

[Watchfoxheadexplodes]

23. I've testified many times

I understand the stress.

[Ocelot II]

25. Chances are that she hasn't, though.

[USALiberal]

37. Cool story! Nt

[qazplm135]

28. I would be surprised if a firefighter gets court-room training

but even so, I've seen attorneys lose their composure in an emotional case. It happens. Juries understand so long as it isn't something horrible or the entire interview and it was neither.

[Mr.Bill]

15. You know why she's so strong and solid?

She's telling the truth.

[CentralMass]

18. +1

[BobTheSubgenius]

26. That does help one's confidence A LOT!

[Oldem]

40. And she knows what she's talking about and know it. What are the odds

of having a mixed martial arts pro and an EMT standing there watching this murder? It's the perfect storm of witnesses against Chauvin. But the defense will pull some razzle-dazzle, or try to. Their fatuous argument that the police felt threatened has already backfired; it was the witnesses who felt threatened.

This was a lynching, pure and simple. We now have to see if all twelve jurors understand that fact.

But let's look on the bright side. If Chauvin is convicted and does hard time, maybe the tide will turn against murder-by-policeman.

[spanone]

16. every witness today did the RIGHT THING

[brettdale]

29. Just plain amazing

What a dream witness, she was tough, she showed compassion, she was honest, you
couldn't ask for a better witness!!!

[lillypaddle]

33. She is GREAT

Loved her saying to the defense attorney, "If you've ever seen someone being killed, it's upsetting," or something to that effect.

[Ms. Toad]

48. I can pretty much guarantee the prosecution didn't love that.

You work hard with your witnesses to make sure they know to answer opposing counsel's questions, answering what they ask, and only what they ask. Too risky to go odd on a tangent, and open doors, not to mention that getting on the bad side of the judge (even through a witness misbehaving) is not a good thing.

[Cyrano]

35. Okay, here's the ugly part

All it's going to take is one or two white supremacists, or total morons, on the jury to let the murdering prick walk.

If it happens, we know there will be riots of outrage. And I fear how many more will be murdered during those riots.

If justice can't take place in view of that video, then justice is nothing more than just some bullshit, made up word.

[nolabear]

39. One hopes voir dire isn't totally ineffective.

The reporters who were in the room commented that the jury seemed very engaged. I hope they're taking it all seriously. They'd be fools not to.

[stopdiggin]

53. jurys DO take these things seriously

with few exceptions, they recognize this is one of the most important/critical functions they've every played in their lives.
----- -----

[rgbecker]

38. I'd like a lawyer type to weigh in, but here is my read:

The statements taken by law enforcement back in May, are not in the court record nor available to the Jury. The Defense wants them in for the Jury to see because they are full of mistakes or they might have statements that are favorable to the defendant.
"
The defense lawyers are trying to get the witness to acknowledge the statements as true, but can only ask if she remembers making the statement. She's caught answering yes or no. But does the Jury hear yes meaning the statements are true or that the witness simply remembers making the statements. Its just one more fucked up part of our so called Justice system.

If I were in the the witness, I'd deny remembering making the statements, by saying, "No, I don't remember". If, as this lawyer did, they pressed me to read the statements to refresh my memory, I would simply read them and then deny remembering making those statements.

The don't remember line was proven to be Perjury proof by Ron Reagan in Iran/Contra days of yore.

[nolabear]

41. I agree with that. I think that's why she got irritated at the end.

The attorney was challenging what she'd said at the time and she was frustrated and argued with his assumptions. Hopefully she'll gather herself and do exactly that, say "I don't know," though all those questions beforehand about her perceptions and calm under pressure might give the defense attorney a path.

She's still clearly competent and knows what she saw though, and what should have been done.

[sop]

43. The defense might be trying out a version of "Falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus," a Latin phrase

meaning "false in one thing, false in everything." It's an old (mostly discredited today) legal principle that holds if a witness testifies falsely about one matter, they are not credible to testify about any matter.

Chauvin's attorney may believe pointing out a few inconsequential statements made earlier to police, at odds with testimony given later at trial, will create doubt in some jurors' minds about the truthfulness of a witness. In this case the prior inconsistent statements are not material, and the prosecution has a lot of incriminating video evidence.

[MOMFUDSKI]

46. Totally agree

and, like I have said to my husband on many occasions, I hate to see these quiet, polite women unable to speak their minds. Hubby and his milquetoast sister had to go at it with step-mom and her attorney over her stealing $350,000 from their dead father's account. Sister broke down and cried at one point! Then they gave in because sister was at wit's end and couldn't handle the whole scenario. I told hubby I would have not even sat down in the room as standing is a psych advantage and crying would not even cross my mind. Put me in that negotiation. EMT is my kind of woman for sure. I believe she is scheduled for more this morning. You go girl.

[dlk]

49. I hope there isn't hell to pay for Hansen speaking out

It took tremendous courage to share her story.