Fairfax County Double Murder

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:CW found plane tickets to Brazil. There is an extradition treaty with US but it can be a years long process.

Curious what he was going to do for work there but the COL was low so sale of the house would last a long time.

Wait was this shared during the trial? I don’t remember it. That is a huge flag if true.

It came out in hearings following her arrest. It’s in news accounts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:CW found plane tickets to Brazil. There is an extradition treaty with US but it can be a years long process.

Curious what he was going to do for work there but the COL was low so sale of the house would last a long time.

Open a mathnasium and pompously teach kids how to count

Quite possibly.

[Anonymous]

Will we be able to watch the sentence hearing too?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:CW found plane tickets to Brazil. There is an extradition treaty with US but it can be a years long process.

Curious what he was going to do for work there but the COL was low so sale of the house would last a long time.

Wait was this shared during the trial? I don’t remember it. That is a huge flag if true.

No, it wasn't in the trial. It was in the news reports when the arrest happened.

Didn’t the prosecutor say something in closing about a learn to speak Portuguese book and they were planning to go to Brazil in closing? I’m not sure the exact level of detail she used. Or maybe that was on cross, I definitely remember some documents and the book coming up, maybe not tickets. I think Juliana’s visa would have expired at the end of the month she was arrested in. So it seems to make sense.

Yes, that is the timing that led to her arrest. She had not been able to get a student visa and he had not married her so she had to go back. It appeared that concrete steps were being taken for all 3 of them to go.

[Anonymous]

https://www.youtube.com/live/-5gxXco2CRY?si=G0XXKWgseBKECpCt


This one

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:https://www.youtube.com/live/-5gxXco2CRY?si=G0XXKWgseBKECpCt


This one

amazing thank you!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sorry if this has been asked, but what are the odds the jury gets to a verdict tomorrow? Is there a way to tell?

No, no way to tell. If quicker more likely to be guilty. I don’t think NG is likely but could be a hung jury I suppose.

Has anyone ever been to one? How does it work backstage? I mean, I’m certain he’s guilty and idk how there can still be a question about that, but I’m sure they need to check boxes or something?

I was on a murder trial once and it was so obvious the guy did it- in fact he was pleading guilty, but to self defense, not to first degree murder. It was clear as day it was first degree murder (this was maryland so terminology I guess is different there). It still took like 2.5 days because a few retired people wanted to discuss it ad nauseum, and one or two younger guys wanted to play devils advocate and blame it on the guys girlfriend (the one guy murdered the other because the girlfriend was sleeping with them both). They were very anti-woman, probably MAGA types (but this was 25 years ago). I kept being like, you guys, she isn't on trial, yeah she sucks, but having a girlfriend who cheats on you isn't "self defense" when you kill the other dude??? But the one guy kept being like "she pushed him to the edge!" and i was like "but he didnt murder HER he murdered the other guy???" believe me there are some prejudiced people out there. And then some bored people without jobs who just want to rehash things over and over.

[Anonymous]

Back to why this takes so long: I’ve served on two juries (and gotten close on two others—thanks, DC!) and both were from much less serious crimes. One was drug possession with intent to distribute and one was gun possession. Deliberation took several hours each time. People tend to take it seriously, and everyone wants to make sure they fully understand the charges and the evidence. It’s a pretty cool process, even though it can be incredibly frustrating, too. Anyway, I don’t find it surprising that a case like this would take many hours of deliberation to reach a unanimous verdict.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:CW found plane tickets to Brazil. There is an extradition treaty with US but it can be a years long process.

Curious what he was going to do for work there but the COL was low so sale of the house would last a long time.

Wait was this shared during the trial? I don’t remember it. That is a huge flag if true.

It came out in hearings following her arrest. It’s in news accounts.

Juries are not allowed to take that sort of thing into account when they deliberate. They are supposed to think to themselves- if it wasn't admitted in trial, then there is a reason for that, which could very easily be that the thing on the news was actually not even true. And, also, during voir dire they typically have to truthfully say they'd either never heard of the case before, or had heard so little of it that they do not have any opinions one way or another and are open to hearing all of the evidence. because of course some cases (OJ, etc) everyone has heard of it before the trial starts. for this case, i bet they could find people who hadnt heard of it, or who vaguely remembered a local news story about the woman being killed back in 2023 but didn't realize it was being pinned on the husband and au pair.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Will we be able to watch the sentence hearing too?

It may or may not be covered by Court TV.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:CW found plane tickets to Brazil. There is an extradition treaty with US but it can be a years long process.

Curious what he was going to do for work there but the COL was low so sale of the house would last a long time.

Wait was this shared during the trial? I don’t remember it. That is a huge flag if true.

It came out in hearings following her arrest. It’s in news accounts.

Juries are not allowed to take that sort of thing into account when they deliberate. They are supposed to think to themselves- if it wasn't admitted in trial, then there is a reason for that, which could very easily be that the thing on the news was actually not even true. And, also, during voir dire they typically have to truthfully say they'd either never heard of the case before, or had heard so little of it that they do not have any opinions one way or another and are open to hearing all of the evidence. because of course some cases (OJ, etc) everyone has heard of it before the trial starts. for this case, i bet they could find people who hadnt heard of it, or who vaguely remembered a local news story about the woman being killed back in 2023 but didn't realize it was being pinned on the husband and au pair.

Some of the details WERE referred to in the closing and photos of things like the how to learn Portuguese may be in evidence, have not looked.

[Anonymous]

Agree with the above posters about letting the jury process play out! I hope they are taking it seriously. Even if it's an immediate Guilty vote by all 12 (unlikely IMO, probably at least a few undecideds even if they ultimately go guilty), they will still probably want to talk through all the evidence to make sure each of the elements are met beyond a reasonable doubt.

And if you do get some of the jurors who want to really discuss things, the last thing that helps is trying to rush the process along. That just gets people more stubborn.

Having multiple paths to finding proof beyond a reasonable doubt is helpful because there will be some pieces of evidence that just don't, for whatever reason, resonate with some jurors. But if they can look to other things that will help. Not everyone has to be convinced because of the same evidence.

What's really hard to see here is a unanimous NG verdict. If I were on that jury I think I would holdout for guilty against even an 11-1 NG pressure vote. I think you're more likely to get a hung jury than all NG. And on a second trial Brendan, because he testified, is SUPER locked in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Agree with the above posters about letting the jury process play out! I hope they are taking it seriously. Even if it's an immediate Guilty vote by all 12 (unlikely IMO, probably at least a few undecideds even if they ultimately go guilty), they will still probably want to talk through all the evidence to make sure each of the elements are met beyond a reasonable doubt.

And if you do get some of the jurors who want to really discuss things, the last thing that helps is trying to rush the process along. That just gets people more stubborn.

Having multiple paths to finding proof beyond a reasonable doubt is helpful because there will be some pieces of evidence that just don't, for whatever reason, resonate with some jurors. But if they can look to other things that will help. Not everyone has to be convinced because of the same evidence.

What's really hard to see here is a unanimous NG verdict. If I were on that jury I think I would holdout for guilty against even an 11-1 NG pressure vote. I think you're more likely to get a hung jury than all NG. And on a second trial Brendan, because he testified, is SUPER locked in.

Agree. Even on this thread, someone said that the blood splatter evidence meant nothing to them and the evidence that the text messages on fetlife seemed like they were written by Juliana instead of Christine based on syntax etc. And that poster was frustrated that they didn't bring in a linguistics expert to testify that the writer was likely not a person whose first language was English. Even though to most of the rest of us, yes that was important info, but was so easy to explain away by someone faking that writing style, etc, whereas the blood splatter evidence was pretty hard to refute. But to that poster, the blood splatter stuff just didn't resonate. On the jury, there could easily be one or two jurors like that- some of the most damning evidence just doesn't resonate and they need to look at other angles, and that will take discussion.

Also, in my experience on a jury, these people are not true crime junkies or people who are super intelligent or people who even really care. Some of these people aren't smart, or they're very prejudiced against this or that, or they want to argue and enjoy being oppositional and enjoy being that one lone holdout to a verdict. But to get all 12 to say not guilty I think in this case is impossible. I bet eventually, there will be a clear majority that says guilty, and if there are a couple of hold outs who just think Christine was a cheater and Joe was a deviant and they deserved it and think BB may have done it but "seems like a good guy" and will refuse to say guilty- those people will get worn down when the judge continues to send them back to deliberate longer if they attempt to say they are a hung jury. And they'll stop caring and they'll vote guilty. Some people really just don't care much and they want the trial to be over so they can go back to work and are happy to just vote what everyone else is voting. I've been on 3 juries and it's amazing the people who you find on them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Agree with the above posters about letting the jury process play out! I hope they are taking it seriously. Even if it's an immediate Guilty vote by all 12 (unlikely IMO, probably at least a few undecideds even if they ultimately go guilty), they will still probably want to talk through all the evidence to make sure each of the elements are met beyond a reasonable doubt.

And if you do get some of the jurors who want to really discuss things, the last thing that helps is trying to rush the process along. That just gets people more stubborn.

Having multiple paths to finding proof beyond a reasonable doubt is helpful because there will be some pieces of evidence that just don't, for whatever reason, resonate with some jurors. But if they can look to other things that will help. Not everyone has to be convinced because of the same evidence.

What's really hard to see here is a unanimous NG verdict. If I were on that jury I think I would holdout for guilty against even an 11-1 NG pressure vote. I think you're more likely to get a hung jury than all NG. And on a second trial Brendan, because he testified, is SUPER locked in.

Yes. he is locked in and now they have time to go investigate his story and provide evidence.

I was wondering though what happens to JM's deal and would she be able to leave the country. That is a big worry because she would have no incentive or reason to come back voluntarily. If the retried him immediately maybe, but I often see these retrials taking months to schedule.

[Anonymous]

Rough rule of thumb is the prosecution needs to start to worry if the jury deliberates more than one hour for every day of trial. Trial was appx 10 days.