trial thread: 3/29/2012

New thread for a new day. Please remember the rules


:tos:




When posting an opinion please remember to use IMO or JMO.

:moo:



the crown will present its case in chapters:

Chapter 1: The day of the kidnapping. The surveillance video showing Rafferty driving up the street outside Tori's school and McClintic walking Tori up the street. Witnesses from and around Oliver Stephens public school will talk about seeing Tori.
An identification officer will use photographs and maps to show the route from Woodstock to Guelph.
Tori's mother, Tara McDonald, will testify about the frantic hours the family spent looking for Tori.

Chapter 2: Terri-Lynne McClintic. "She was an essential part of all that happened," Gowdey said. "I expect her credibility will be a major issue in this case."

Chapter 3: Guelph -- video surveillance and bank records detailing the events there.

Chapter 4: the Mount Forest death scene, which the jury will visit. "It will be difficult to go to the very place where this happened, I know that, but understanding the crime scene is crucial to understanding the crime," Gowdey said. Photographs, some of them graphic, will be used to explain "exactly how the killing happened."
"Unfortunately it is only through them that you can fully understand (the) evidence," Gowdey said.

Chapter 5: Police interaction with Rafferty.

Chapter 6: The searches of Rafferty and McClintic's residences and the evidence found.

Chapter 7: The Honda Civic. What was found inside.

Chapter 8: Rafferty's connection to the Mount Forest area.

Chapter 9: Comments Rafferty made to friends after April 8. "He had some interesting things to say to other people about Terri-Lynne McClintic and about the kidnapping itself," Gowdey said.

Chapter 10: The May 15 weekend and Rafferty's actions.

Chapter 11: The BlackBerry. The BlackBerry allowed police to track his movements April 8 and after.

Chapter 12: A recap of the surveillance video.
http://www.lfpress.com/news/london/r.../19463111.html

Salem's warning from last week:
Okay everybody - LISTEN UP! We are not bashing, accusing or blaming Tori's family here. It won't be allowed.
Children walk home from school every day without incident. Parents are not perfect, it's just not possible. Tori's parents DID NOT do this to her. TLM and an accomplice DID. That is where the blame goes.
We had a lot of family bashing in the early parts of this investigation after Tori went missing and a lot of baseless accusations - NONE OF WHICH PROVED TO BE TRUE. Victim and family bashing will not be allowed during this trial.
Thank you,
Salem
---------------------------------
and reposting SoSueMe's warning:
As some of you may have noticed, the members following this case are dropping in numbers. It's disheartening to us because we need and welcome discussion of both sides of every issue on Websleuths.
Zero tolerance means ZERO tolerance. Please discuss this case with respect to your fellow members. Subtle and veiled harassment and/or talking in code about other members will not be tolerated.
A word of caution on the Alerts in this forum. If you alert a post, make sure it is a clear violation of our Terms of Service. A difference of opinion is not a violation of TOS.
Please note that everything discussed in court and printed/tweeted is now within the realm of discussion. WS has never and does not now have a policy of "innocent until proven guilty." That is for the court room. Here, we discuss, speculate, theorize and judge according to the opinions we develop from following the case.
Keeping that in mind, abuse of our alert system is a good way to find yourself in timeout or worse. Abuse of the alert systems includes, but is not limited to:
Alerting repeatedly on the same poster;
Demanding a specific outcome;
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Once you have alerted a post, move on and don't question the decisions of our Administrators, Moderators or Owners.
Following this trial is very important to our members and we're going to see that they have their day in court. The "zero tolerance" policy in this forum will continue and it will be enforced.
Thank you and please carry on.
Sue aka SoSueMe
Websleuths Co-Owner

I am not sure that there is court today? But this thread is for today either way... Everyone post responsibly please.

Nope no court today, trial resumes tomorrow

Good Morning!

<modsnip>

Is there anyone out there that thinks MR is not guilty??

JMO

I wish we knew what the court schedule would be for next week. I'm off work and wanted to take a drive down. I'd like to go on Thursday or Friday. Is there a way to know in advance?

Confusedashell said:

<modsnip>
Is there anyone out there that thinks MR is not guilty??

JMO

Click to expand...

Is there a way to take a poll? Even anonymously so we can get a sense of how many on the forum think he is guilty vs. how many think he is not?

If we can have a poll, can we also include an option such as guilty of a lesser charge or lesser charges?

I think the court should take advantage of being ahead of schedule and keep it that way instead of taking days off. Now next week it will only be a three day week because of good friday

~n/t~ said:

I wish we knew what the court schedule would be for next week. I'm off work and wanted to take a drive down. I'd like to go on Thursday or Friday. Is there a way to know in advance?

Click to expand...

Well don't go Friday, it's Good Friday = no court

If you wanted to take a drive down I would plan for Thursday maybe, I am sure we will hear tomorrow the schedule for next week though.

I went once, first day of TLM's testimony.

Jezbel said:

Well don't go Friday, it's Good Friday = no court

If you wanted to take a drive down I would plan for Thursday maybe, I am sure we will hear tomorrow the schedule for next week though.

I went once, first day of TLM's testimony.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the reminder. I forgot it was good Friday!! Duh!

I'd have to leave Wednesday night...sleepover and attend Thursday, if court will be in session.

~n/t~ said:

Thanks for the reminder. I forgot it was good Friday!! Duh!

I'd have to leave Wednesday night...sleepover and attend Thursday, if court will be in session.

Click to expand...

They will probably be going out to Mt Forest some point son too, but I think they should advise of next week's schedule tomorrow, then you can plan your trip. If you plan on going to the main courtroom, get there fairly early but if you don't mind sitting in the overflow room, it doesn't matter as you can go in and out of there anytime.

Confusedashell said:

I think the court should take advantage of being ahead of schedule and keep it that way instead of taking days off. Now next week it will only be a three day week because of good friday

Click to expand...

I believe the reason for no court today (Thursday) is that the judge has a previous commitment. Also, the proceedings are going faster than anticipated and scheduled. Expert witnesses have been booked according to the schedule, who cannot bring their appearances forward because of their own schedules.

Jezbel said:

Well don't go Friday, it's Good Friday = no court

If you wanted to take a drive down I would plan for Thursday maybe, I am sure we will hear tomorrow the schedule for next week though.

I went once, first day of TLM's testimony.

Click to expand...

Did you sit in the overflow room or in the main room? I can't remember if you posted here on that day, MR's demeanor, TLMs demeanor

Whenever I see that quote referred to from MTR's facebook (Good things are coming my way) I think of dear dear Dr. Phil's quote, "So how are things working out for you now my friend?"

Confusedashell said:

<modsnip>

Is there anyone out there that thinks MR is not guilty??

JMO

Click to expand...

I am not sure it matters a whole lot what I think, but based on the evidence presented thus far, and the theory that was intimated during TLM's cross examination, I believe I can conclude MR is guilty of some crimes..............such as hiding evidence, failing to report a crime........but do not have the same confidence in the main charges..........................yet.

Ardy said:

I am not sure it matters a whole lot what I think, but based on the evidence presented thus far, and the theory that was intimated during TLM's cross examination, I believe I can conclude MR is guilty of some crimes..............such as hiding evidence, failing to report a crime........but do not have the same confidence in the main charges..........................yet.

Click to expand...

Yes I feel pretty much the same as you Ardy. I lean more towards the full story of the crown but still lots up in the air ...so far.:twocents:

And although I am not totally convinced yet of all the suggestions from the crown about MTR...I would not like to have tea with him as he is up to his arse in drug dealings and has horrible friends not to mention zero respect for the well being of a child.

Oldsoul2 said:

Did you sit in the overflow room or in the main room? I can't remember if you posted here on that day, MR's demeanor, TLMs demeanor

Click to expand...

I was in the overflow room, court that day was busier than it had been so far, even the overflow room got full, at one point people sitting on the floor. I think everyone wanted to be there for the first day of TLM’s testimony.

I can’t say much about her demeanour because you really can’t see her, there is one camera that gives an overhead of the courtroom, so you can’t really see faces, listening to her though, well, she sounded high at points, she spoke very slowly, long pauses in between, even when the crown first started questioning her and it was about her childhood and where she grew up, at some points she had to ask the crown to repeat the question. She cried and whimpered a lot, it was really hard to hear her at times, she did sound believable on the stand though. The other camera sits right in front of the prisoner box so you can see MTR close up, the majority of the time he was looking directly at her, through most of her testimony, with what could be a scowl on his face. He shook his head a lot when TLM was answering questions about the events of that day and also he took a lot of notes. At one point it looked as though he mouthed the word ‘bulls**t” but I cannot be sure. He did look weary at point, taking off his glasses and rubbing his eyes.

Honestly though, he looked angry and cold hearted sitting there, I did not see any type of empathetic, remorseful, sorry, sad etc emotion from him. Maybe he was concentrating intently on what TLM was saying then taking notes to show his lawyer, maybe that would explain it. The whole overflow room basically gasped when TLM admitted that she was the one, some got up and had to leave, some were crying, even while TLM was talking about the assault the public there was having a hard time listening, I thought maybe MTR would show some sadness but I didn’t see it.

This is all JMO from being that day, I plan to go again at some point.

Delaware said:

Is there a way to take a poll? Even anonymously so we can get a sense of how many on the forum think he is guilty vs. how many think he is not?

If we can have a poll, can we also include an option such as guilty of a lesser charge or lesser charges?

Click to expand...

due to the limited publication ban we cannot do that at this time. However, if the jury is sequestered during deliberations that may be a good time to do one while we are on verdict watch

Thanks Jezebel..........that was a very well written and insightful post.

I think cameras should be allowed in our courtrooms, because the sound of voices, the demeanor of witnesses, the nuances of questioning,.........much of the atmosphere the jury is witnessing is lost when the trial is reported by a jumble of tweets.........or the end of day reporting.

As we have noted here............reporters listening to the same testimony are printing differing facts in their stories.

Thanks for attending.........on behalf of everyone who wants justice for Tori.

snoofer said:

Whenever I see that quote referred to from MTR's facebook (Good things are coming my way) I think of dear dear Dr. Phil's quote, "So how are things working out for you now my friend?"

Click to expand...

Tiny correction ... he actually spelled the word "comming". Could be a typo or his spelling is lousy ?? I've toyed with the idea that it could possibly have been a reference to the internet.

I've also thought it was possibly related to the fact that he would be obtaining drugs that day ... but it seems that obtaining drugs was a frequent occurrence in his life, so i doubt it was worthy of a special mention on that particular day. IIRC, that statement was made shortly after he had been driving around a school in the morning.

Anyone else recall if MTR's normal communications contained spelling errors?