| Federal Trial of Slip and
Fall Fraud Raises Issues of Bloods Gang, Nine
Eleven and Low Hanging Fruit
By Matthew
Russell Lee, Patreon,
Periscope
SDNY COURTHOUSE,
May 7 – The U.S. government
put three men on trial on May
7 for staged slip and fall
accidents and fraudulent
lawsuits. But from its first
day the trial raised issues
about Bloods gang culture, the
prosecutors' propensity to use
conflicted criminals as
witness to go after low
hanging fruit, and the
potential of having witnessed
the 9/11/01 attacks to sway a
jury.
In open
arguments before U.S. District
Court for the Southern
District of New York Judge
Sidney H. Stein, the lawyer
for incarcerated defendant
Bryan Duncan, Ikeisha T.
Al-Shabazz, argued that U.S.
Attorney Geoffrey S. Berman's
office is going after the "low
hanging fruit."
Berman's
Assistant U.S. Attorney
Alexandra Rothman objected to
the phrase, or perhaps only
the word "hanging." Judge
Stein sustained the objection,
saying "I don't even know what
that means," and told Ms.
Al-Shabazz to move
on.
Likewise when
Mitchell Dinnerstein, lawyer
for defendant Robert Locust,
asked of one of the lawyers
involved in the slip and fall
lawsuit, "Where's George?"
Judge Stein stopped him and
told the jury, "What law
enforcement does is not of
concern to this case."
Later Judge Stein
told Dinnerstein, with the
jury out on a ten minute
break, "You are not in the
good graces of the court. I'm
surprised at you." He told the
group of seven lawyers that it
had been a "very sloppy
opening" and then asked why
the witnesses mentioned in
motions filed with him were
not named.
One of the
witnesses whose WhatsApp
messages with Duncan will be
admitted into evidence has a
pattern, Ms. Al-Shabazz
argued, of replacing all c's
with k's. She filed with Judge
Stein a copy of a New York
City Police Department
"General Gang Rules" for the
Bloods, which lists as Rule 26
"Always cross out your C's" -
because Crips begins with C.
Judge Stein said he will allow
it.
Another witness
with mental issues relates
those back to what he saw on
September 11, 2001. The
defense says this will sway
the jury to the witness' side.
On these and other questions,
Judge Stein said the scope of
cross examination will be
decided as the trial goes
forward.
Judge Stein told
the jury not to read press
coverage about the case, while
predicting there would be no
press coverage of it. But why
then are there three separate
Assistant U.S. Attorneys on
the case, two marshals
shepherding Duncan in and out
of the courtroom even during
breaks, and rulings to keep
out information about the
lawyers and funding companies
behind this slip and fall
fraud scheme? Inner City Press
will continue to cover this
trial. More on Patreon, here.
The
case is U.S.
v. Bryan
Duncan, et al.,
18-cr-00289
(Stein).
***
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