Rebecca Grossman was an impaired motorist who dedicated homicide and manipulated her teen daughter into defending her on the witness stand. Or she was a scapegoat whose well-known lover bumped into two younger brothers in a Westlake Village crosswalk and obtained away with it.
As closing arguments unfolded Wednesday in a Van Nuys courtroom, jurors have been introduced with two very completely different variations of the Hidden Hills girl and the Sept. 29, 2020, incident that ended the lives of two boys.
“This was not a tragic accident,” mentioned Deputy Dist. Atty. Jamie Castro of the deaths of Mark and Jacob Iskander, ages 11 and eight. “This was homicide.”
However Grossman’s lead lawyer, Tony Buzbee, launched into his closing assertion with phrases he’d repeated all through the six-week trial: “The place is Scott Erickson?”
Prosecutors allege Grossman, 60, had cocktails with Erickson, a former Dodgers pitcher, after which raced with him — he in his black Mercedes SUV and he or she in her white Mercedes SUV — alongside Triunfo Canyon Highway till they reached a crosswalk, the place she fatally struck the Iskander brothers.
Grossman is charged with two counts of second-degree murder, two counts of vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence and one depend of hit-and-run driving leading to loss of life. If convicted of all costs, she faces 34 years to life in jail.
To safe a second-degree homicide conviction, prosecutors should prove that Grossman acted with implied malice and knew the act of driving at a excessive velocity in a residential space was harmful to human life.
Castro argued the prosecution had performed simply that. Grossman, Castro mentioned, confirmed acutely aware disregard for human life and knew her velocity could possibly be harmful on a suburban road with pedestrian site visitors as a result of she had been warned of the risks by police prior to now. Prosecutors even have alleged that Grossman traveled a 3rd of a mile after slamming into the kids earlier than security options in her automobile mechanically shut it down.
“She had a historical past of dashing. She’d texted about it,” Castro mentioned. “She acted with disregard for human life.”
However Buzbee continued to level the finger at Erickson, who was the primary to barrel by way of the crosswalk. Crash reconstruction consultants for the protection have testified that Erickson’s Mercedes hit the boys first, sending Mark over his automobile and onto the hood of Grossman’s automobile.
“In case you have doubt that the black automobile hit a type of youngsters, this case is over,” mentioned Buzbee, who reminded jurors that Erickson allegedly lied to authorities concerning the automobile he was driving. He mentioned it was a 2007 Mercedes SUV, however protection consultants testified based mostly on video a brief distance from the collision that it was a 2016 AMG Mercedes, a automobile that authorities by no means inspected.
Castro, nevertheless, informed jurors that — though Erickson was reckless — there was “not a shred of proof” that he struck Mark or his brother.
“He nearly hit them however didn’t hit them,” Castro mentioned.
It was round 7 p.m. on Sept. 29, 2020, when Nancy Iskander and her three sons approached the crosswalk. Carrying inline skates, Iskander started to cross Triunfo Canyon Highway at Saddle Mountain Drive. Her youngest son, Zachary, was subsequent to her on his scooter; Mark, on a skateboard, and Jacob, additionally sporting inline skates, have been additionally within the crosswalk.
“The mom did all the things proper,” Castro mentioned. “Rebecca Grossman did all the things mistaken.”
Iskander beforehand testified that she heard revving engines and seemed as much as see a black sport utility automobile dashing towards the intersection. She dove out of the way in which, pulling Zachary to security.
However she testified {that a} white Mercedes SUV was following intently behind the black automobile. When it went by way of the crosswalk, Iskander mentioned, she heard an impression, and her two oldest boys have been gone.
Jacob was discovered close to the curb about 50 ft from the crosswalk. He was taken to a hospital, the place he was pronounced useless just a few hours later. Mark’s physique was discovered 254 ft away.
Grossman is accused of reaching 81 mph earlier than flippantly braking and hitting the brothers at 73 mph, based mostly on the automobile’s information recorder and the gap Mark was discovered from the crosswalk. However Buzbee referred to as in consultants who testified that the information weren’t dependable and that Grossman was touring at 52 mph based mostly on a video captured seconds after the collision.
Even after the impression, Castro mentioned, Grossman “continued to drive so far as her automobile would let her.”
Though Grossman informed a Mercedes operator and 911 dispatcher that she didn’t know what occurred, solely that her airbag had deployed, Castro mentioned a textual content Grossman despatched to a pal in 2022 confirmed “she was not trustworthy.” In that textual content, introduced earlier within the trial, Grossman wrote she had turned her head for 2 or three seconds and was distracted by Nancy Iskander, who was falling on her inline skates.
“The defendant is both mendacity or clearly impaired,” Castro mentioned.
The prosecutor pushed again on the protection concept that Erickson struck the brothers first, saying the front-end harm to Grossman’s automobile was not “the results of a toddler touchdown on the hood.”
Castro reminded jurors that pathologist Matthew Miller, who carried out the post-mortem, testified that the boys’ accidents have been according to a single automobile hitting them.
Buzbee countered, nevertheless, that Miller in what he thought of the strongest indication of cheap doubt had additionally acknowledged the “chance” that the boys may have been hit by a couple of automobile.
Buzbee targeted on flaws within the investigation, presenting a visible on the TV monitor with an L.A. County sheriff’s badge and the phrases “newbie hour.” He mentioned investigators misplaced 5 of eight items of proof from the crash scene and didn’t converse to Erickson. He mentioned investigators ignored different automobiles on surveillance video and targeted on Grossman: “That they had a busted-up automobile, and the blinders have been on.”
“That is an accident,” Buzbee insisted, saying the health worker had termed it as such, and never a murder, “on the entrance of their report. … Their star forensic pathologist mentioned, ‘I can’t rule it out that Mark was hit by a couple of automobile.’”
Castro conceded there have been shortcomings within the investigation by the L.A. County Sheriff’s Division — with proof lacking and few pictures of the scene. However throughout the trial, a former California Freeway Patrol officer turned crash knowledgeable was capable of re-create the scene.
The deputy district lawyer additionally repudiated testimony from Grossman’s daughter, Alexis, who informed jurors on Friday that she noticed Erickson hiding behind a tree close to the place her mom was detained and that he later angrily burst into her household’s dwelling in Westlake Village. She mentioned he smelled of alcohol and threatened to “damage” her and her household if she informed anybody she noticed him.
“Alexis is a sufferer of her mom’s manipulation,” Castro mentioned, noting {that a} deputy on the scene testified he by no means noticed Erickson and that nobody there reported his presence.
Buzbee stood behind the 19-year-old’s testimony, asking jurors, “Why did [Erickson] lie? Why did he make threats?”
Castro pressured in her closing argument the testimony by eyewitnesses. She reminded jurors that one witness, Susan Manners, testified that she noticed Grossman’s automobile hit Mark. Yasamin Eftekhari and Jake Sands, who have been driving in a automobile behind Grossman’s Mercedes, testified that they noticed the white automobile hit Jacob. Eftekhari, Castro famous, testified the black automobile by no means hit the boys.
The protection performed up the inconsistencies in testimony — variations amongst witnesses on what lanes the impacts occurred in, and what number of impacts have been seen or heard. Buzbee used as a visible assist a picture of cherry-picking. “That is what you name doubt,” he mentioned.
The lawyer mentioned that prosecutors “need us to elucidate the inconsistencies.”
“However,” he mentioned, “the reality is Erickson hit these youngsters first, so none of this actually issues.”
Jury deliberations are set to start Thursday.
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