Conviction: The Untold Story of Putting Jodi Arias Behind Bars (36 page)

“Yes.”

“And it was crooked when you showed it to us, wasn’t it?”

“It’s bent, yes.”

Instructing her to hold her finger up for the jury once again, I asked her why, if Travis had injured her finger on January 22, 2008, it did not appear bent in the photo of her and her sister taken almost four months later, on May 15, 2008, less than one month before the murder.

“My finger
is
bent there,” Arias insisted, even though the photograph showed otherwise.

“. . . Hold up your finger again,” I directed, “sideways so we can all see it.”

“When my fingers are straightened, this one stays bent,” she said, raising her left hand and showing her ring finger bent at a ninety-degree angle.

“. . . Well, you talked to Ryan Burns about it, didn’t you?” I asked. “And you told him that that finger, the left ring finger, had been damaged, right, injured, didn’t you?”

“I don’t know if it was the left,” Arias submitted.

“You don’t remember telling him it was the left ring finger, ma’am? . . . Again, do you have a memory problem?”

“Occasionally,” she replied, latching on to the parachute I was apparently providing.

“And so some of the things you told us, for example, then, about things in the past, you may have also had memory problems, right? . . . And so whatever you told us in the past is somewhat suspect, then, because your memory is lacking?”

“I only told things that I remember clearly that are crystallized in my mind.”

I reminded Arias of the bandage she was wearing on her finger when she arrived in Utah on June 5 and she and Ryan Burns joined friends at a restaurant. “And it was your left finger, wasn’t it?”

“No.”

“It was your right finger then . . . is that what you are saying?”

“It was two fingers,” Arias maintained. “. . . Two right fingers.”

“Do you remember your conversation with Detective Flores about this issue involving the finger? . . . And that you told him that on June 4, 2008, you had been over at Mr. Alexander’s home . . . and that some girl had come in. . . . And during whatever happened on June 4, you told Detective Flores that it was your left finger that had been damaged, do you remember that?” I asked, requesting to move into evidence the portion of the video containing Arias’ conversation with Flores on July 16, 2008, so that the jurors could view her contradictory statements for themselves.

After playing the video, I directed Arias’ attention to the comments she made to the detective that day, indicating that
the supposed female intruder had cut her “right there,” as she pointed to a specific location on her left ring finger.

“Look at it there,” I said, directing her attention to the monitor. “The finger had the same aspect or the same angle to it that your finger does now, doesn’t it?”

“Yes,” Arias conceded.

“Ma’am, the injury to your finger happened on June 4, 2008, not January 22, 2008, didn’t it?”

“That’s not correct,” she pronounced in a dictatorial fashion even after having viewed herself admitting to Detective Flores that the finger had been injured on June 4, 2008.

To further discount her claim and show she was being untruthful, I pointed to two entries in Arias’ journal, dated January 20 and January 24, 2008, which I asked her to review. “And nowhere do you mention either in this January 24 of ’08 or January 20 of ’08 document, you don’t mention anything about this physical encounter with Mr. Alexander that you told us happened on January 22 of 2008, do you?”

“No, I would never.”

“I’m not asking if you would ever. Do you mention it there?”

“I said no,” Arias sniped.

“. . . You do say in Exhibit 456 [the entry dated January 24, 2008], ‘I haven’t written because there is nothing noteworthy to report,’ right? . . . So to you, getting this injury to the left ring finger, that’s no big deal, right?”

“That’s not what I’m saying.”

“. . . Well, you didn’t call the police? . . . You didn’t get medical care for it, right?”

“Not professional medical care.”

“Ma’am, did you go to the doctor to get it looked at? . . . Did you go to the hospital to get it looked at?”

“No.”

“. . . And with regard to your conversation that you had with Detective Flores on July 16, 2008, you didn’t tell him
anything about that, did you? . . . In fact, you told him a different story, didn’t you? . . . You told him something about these two people and how you got that injury to your finger, right?”

“Yes.”

“So, you’re saying that what you told the detective was a lie?”

“Yes,” she conceded, knowing that she had nothing to lose because she had already admitted that she had been untruthful with Flores about who killed Travis.

“So, in your view, when do you decide to tell the truth, when you’re in this court and no place else? . . .”

“No.”

Touching on Arias’ claim that she walked in on Travis masturbating on January 21, 2008, I reminded her of the testimony she gave on direct examination claiming to have been “concerned” about Travis spending the night at a friend’s home, knowing that the friend had a child. “You made it sound like there was such a big problem . . . and yet you didn’t go to that person and tell them, ‘Hey, he’s got this issue,’ did you?”

“No.”

“You didn’t go to the police and tell them anything?” I posed, pointing out that she also did not report Travis to Child Protective Services, instead choosing to keep this allegation to herself for two years after his death.

“I think it’s almost three years ago at this point,” Arias said, changing the reference point, seemingly oblivious to how her response might be construed by jurors.

As the first day of my cross-examination wore on, I continued to chip away at the credibility of her claim that Travis was a pedophile. To further discount her allegation, I wanted to pin her down by soliciting more precise details of her movements on January 21, 2008, the day she claimed to have caught Travis masturbating to the photo of the little boy, something
that she would make excruciatingly difficult with her vague responses.

“What time do you claim that you saw this masturbatory activity?” I asked.

“I don’t know the exact time, but it was afternoon, well before it was dark. It was still light out.”

“Okay, can you be more specific?”

“It was afternoon.”

“All right. Was it two o’clock? If it was so noteworthy, why can’t you remember the time?”

“It’s kind of traumatic.”

“. . . Weren’t your senses heightened at that time that you saw this? . . . Were you angry?”

“I was sick to my stomach. . . . I mean, it’s something I’m never going to forget, but I wish I could.”

“You are never going to forget it . . . but you have forgotten the time?”

“I know it was afternoon.”

“. . . You worked at Mimi’s Café. . . . You had been working that day. . . . Your shift was over. . . . What time did your shift start?”

“It varied.”

“That day, what time did your shift start?”

“In the morning.”

“What time?”

“Some time in the morning. I don’t know the exact time.”

“You don’t know the exact time, yet you knew you had to be there that day at a certain time. . . . What time does Mimi’s open?”

“I’ve never opened Mimi’s, so I’m not sure, but they open early.”

“. . . Was it an eight-hour shift, then?”

“No, they aren’t eight-hour shifts.”

“. . . How many hours was your shift?”

“It depends on the flow of business.”

“I understand that it may depend on that. How many hours did you work on January 21, 2008, on this day that this horrible thing you claim happened?”

“I would only be able to tell you a range. . . . I know the range, but not the exact hours.”

“Ma’am . . . you had a lot of memory for a lot of events involving sexual instances with Mr. Alexander, yet you seem to be having problems with your memory here today. . . . And you also alluded to a little bit that you have problems with your memory. . . . Your problems with the memory, is this of recent vintage?”

“Define recent,” Arias countered sharply.

“. . . Since you started testifying?”

“No, it goes back further than that. . . . I don’t even know if I’d call it a problem. . . . I just . . . I don’t remember every single thing that’s ever happened to me in my whole life.”

“Ma’am, your memory issues—”

“I wouldn’t call them issues,” Arias corrected me again.

“Well, you don’t want to call them problems. . . . You don’t want to call them issues, right?”

“I didn’t say I didn’t want to . . .”

“All right, we’ll call them issues, then. . . . With regard to these memory issues that you claim to have, when did you start having them?”

“It depends on the type of memory issues.”

“If it benefits you, you have a memory issue,” I asked, to which Nurmi objected. “Or by virtue . . .” to which Nurmi also objected.

“Well,” I began, about to formulate my next question when Arias blurted out a response.

“When it hurts, sometimes,” she admitted over Nurmi’s objection.

“. . . You say that you have memory problems but it depends on the circumstances, right?”

“That’s right.”

“And give me the factors, I don’t want to know about the specific circumstances, what factors influence you having a memory problem?”

“Usually when men like you are screaming at me or grilling me, or someone like Travis is doing the same,” she retorted, her body tensing angrily.

And with that flash of anger, everyone in the courtroom, including the jury, could now imagine Jodi Ann Arias wearing the pants with a vertical stripe running down the leg standing just outside the shower moments before she took out her knife and stabbed Travis Alexander in the chest.

J
odi Arias’ responses to questions posed by the media had been beautifully worded and elegantly delivered, falling from her lips like water flowing down a clear stream. She had been just as persuasive in her presentation to family, friends, and police, even if her tale had changed several times. Although she had been just as impressive in her performance on direct examination, she was now missing her cues as she tripped over her lines during the first day of cross-examination. There would be no critical acclaim as she defended her most recent story, because reality had started to set in with almost every answer that she gave—Arias had a problem with the truth.

In formulating my cross-examination, I had been careful to emphasize only major areas rather than quibble with her about trivial matters, which would have been a waste of time. The sexual relationship with Travis had been a mutual experience, so I necessarily had to question her assertion that Travis always forced her into having sex because she could not say no. She had been implicit in her testimony that she was no longer being untruthful, because she had sworn to tell the truth, causing me to expose how she manipulated her words.

“Ma’am, you have a problem with the truth, telling the truth, don’t you?” I began.

“Not typically,” Arias replied.

“Well, when it’s to your benefit you will lie, right?” I asked, drawing an objection from Nurmi, which was sustained by
Judge Stephens, forcing me to take a different approach to illustrate the point.

“Ma’am, do you remember having a conversation with Detective Flores of the Mesa Police Department back on July 15, 2008?” I continued, drawing the courtroom’s attention to the video monitors. I played an excerpt from the videotaped interview in which Arias tells Flores that she would “help” police with their investigation in any way she can.

Turning to Arias, I asked, “That’s not true, is it?”

“I don’t know,” she responded. “I guess it depends on what ‘help’ means,” she answered.

“Yes or no?” I pressed. “Were you there to help him?”

“I don’t know,” she resisted.

“Were you there to tell the truth?”

“No,” she said, finally admitting what she could not deny.

“And in fact you were there for a different purpose. You were there so that he wouldn’t get the truth, right?”

“No, I was there against my will,” Arias argued, insinuating that being arrested for Travis’ murder had been an unlawful violation of her personal freedom.

“. . . So, if being arrested had already occurred, why not tell the truth?” I persisted.

“I was ashamed,” Arias uttered, looking down at her lap in a move obviously intended to garner sympathy.

“And the reason you were ashamed of killing Mr. Alexander was because that was going to have some repercussions for you?”

“Part of the reason, yes,” she answered.

“. . . And the other reason was that you were feeling scared, right?”

“That’s part of the reason, too.”

“So, if you feel scared, you believe then it’s okay to lie?”

“No, that’s not true,” she said, suggesting there was an altruistic motive to her deception.

“Well, that’s what you did, though, right?”

“Yes,” Arias replied, adding that her concern for her family was part of the reason she had lied to Flores that day.

“And so you were thinking more of yourself when you made this statement to this detective, right?” I asked, unwilling to accept her answer.

“I’m not sure about that.”

“Well, other than you, who would be sure about your statement?” I inquired, not expecting the response she offered.

“God,” she said.

“Well, God’s not here. We can’t subpoena him, right?” I answered her back, signaling her suggestion was outrageous and not the end of the inquiry.

“I don’t think so,” she replied, refusing to admit the obvious.

“Do you remember that you lied about the murder of Travis Alexander?” I asked. “. . . Because the detective had already told you about the fingerprints, hadn’t he? . . . And he also told you about the hair that was there. . . . You guys talked about DNA analysis, didn’t you? And he showed you the photograph with the foot in it. Do you remember that?”

I asked this series of questions to demonstrate how adept she was at creating innocuous explanations for the evidence linking her to the crime scene.

“Yes,” she replied to all of my questions.

“. . . And you don’t deny that that is your foot in the photograph, do you?”

“I don’t deny it.”

“And that’s when you changed your story . . . to conform with the forensic evidence that he was telling you about, right?”

“That’s right.”

“And that was because you wanted to make up a story to conform with what he was telling you, right?”

“Yeah, as much as possible.”

“. . . Well, ma’am, your goal was not to go to prison, then? And in fact it was something you were trying to avoid, right?”

“I don’t know. I was trying to kill myself, I think,” she answered, attempting to portray herself in a fragile state.

“One of the things you told us about was that when you were in the Maricopa County Jail that you tried to kill yourself, right?” I followed up.

“No, Siskiyou Jail,” she corrected me.

“Siskiyou Jail,” I amended. “You do remember that when you tried to do that, you took Advil . . . and that . . . you took some razors . . . and you cut yourself, right?”

“It was a nick,” she corrected me again.

“. . . And you nicked yourself and it hurt . . . and I think that the word you used was stung, right?”

“Yes.”

“To use your standard, ma’am, of how you stopped because it stung, can you imagine how much it must have hurt Mr. Alexander when you stuck that knife right into his chest, that really must have hurt?” I asked as a way to remind the jury that this was a murder prosecution, not a cathartic exercise for Arias.

Nurmi interjected with an objection—“Relevance, argumentative”—which the judge sustained.

Moving the inquiry back to the subject of Arias’ continuing lack of truthfulness, I asked, “The detective isn’t the only person you lied to, right?”

“That’s right.”

“. . . You lied to a lot of people, right?”

“Everyone,” she replied coolly, appearing to have finally found a comfort zone.

“. . . And in fact one of the people you lied to was Ryan Burns . . . this individual that you had a romantic interest in? . . . In fact, in order to see if the spark was there, you went all the way to Utah, right?”

“That was my goal . . . but not for the reason that you stated.”

“. . . So you’re saying that he was an afterthought?”

“Yeah, he was.”

“So he was just an alibi, then?”

“Well, no, not an alibi . . .”

“Mr. Burns was an afterthought, though, right?”

“. . . He was an afterthought after June 4.”

“Okay. So before that he was a priority, though?”

“He was the reason for the trip.”

“. . . And the reason for the trip to go and see him was to see whether or not there was a romantic interest, right?”

“That’s why I planned the trip,” she replied, something she was eager to point out, knowing that her answer countered the allegation that she took the trip as part of her plan to kill Travis.

“. . . And when you got there, one of the things that you said was that, ‘Well, I needed to keep up a façade.’ . . . So you lied about getting lost, right?”

“Yes,” Arias affirmed, although she was quick to add that she had actually gotten lost during the trip.

“. . . Oh, so it’s true, then, that this trip that you went to see Mr. Alexander, it was because you got lost?” I asked, trying to clarify that it was no accident that she had detoured to Arizona to visit Travis.

“That’s not why,” Arias said, beginning to appear rattled.

“. . . Ma’am, when was the first time you realized you were lost?”

“When I couldn’t power on my phone, it was dark,” she recounted, claiming that she pulled off the road somewhere in Arizona and made a series of phone calls, the first being to her ex-boyfriend Matt McCartney to tell him that she was lost.

“. . . So, you’re out there and you try to call Mr. McCartney. And so you say that you are lost. But one of the things that you say you do is that you get out of the car . . . and you clean up . . . because you knew what you had done, right?”

“I don’t remember thinking that.”

“Well, you knew you had killed Mr. Alexander at that point, right?”

“It’s hard to describe,” she answered, refusing to admit what was a fait accompli.

“So in your mind back then when you’re on the side of the road, you don’t know if you killed him, right? That’s what you’re saying?”

“I don’t really know if it was in my mind like—it was kind of not there . . . in my head.”

“. . . You were there enough to pick up the phone and call Matthew McCartney. . . . You were there enough to call Ryan Burns, right?” I asked, casting doubt on her story that she was disoriented.

“Yes.”

“And you were there enough to make a call to Travis Alexander, weren’t you?” I asked, referring to the voice message she left on Travis’ phone in an attempt to cover up that she had killed him.

“Yes.”

“How about the time when you got out and you started to wash your hands?” I asked, mentioning the blood that she claimed to have washed off with some bottled water she had in the car when she stopped somewhere in the desert.

“. . . I just knew something awful had happened because I had blood on my hands and feet.”

Arias claimed that when she arrived in Utah on the morning of June 5, she was in a “strong state of denial” at having killed Travis. But when pressed, she conceded that she “believed [she] knew he was dead.”

“. . . And when you went to see Mr. Burns, you were the same person that you had been before, you were happy, smiling, right?” I asked, knowing that her friends in Utah had described her demeanor as being normal, with her smiling.

“I was not,” she claimed. “But I was trying to portray that.”

“. . . And during the afternoon when you are with Mr. Burns, you begin to kiss him, right?”

“Yes,” she replied.

“. . . Knowing that Mr. Alexander was dead, right?”

“I guess so. . . . It’s hard to explain,” Arias said, appearing to want to parse out the killing.

“Ma’am, what is hard to explain about a person breathing or not breathing? . . . Why is that a difficult concept for you?”

“Because I never killed anyone before,” she sniped, suggesting that perhaps she should be shown latitude because it was her first time.

Returning to the topic of the sexual encounter she had with Ryan Burns, I asked Arias to tell the jurors when the intimate kissing had taken place.

“I think it started first in the afternoon and then in the evening, or I guess it would be early morning, on the fifth or the sixth . . .”

“He also placed his hands between your legs, right, at some point?”

“Not that I recall,” Arias said with an air of indignation.

“. . . You were here when he testified . . . so it could be that he did place his hands between your legs, right?”

“No,” she snapped edgily. “Could be that he was full of crap,” she answered in a flash of anger.

“So you’re saying that Mr. Burns is full of crap?”

“When he said he got near my vaginal area, absolutely.”

Arias’ testimony on direct examination had portrayed her sexual relationship with Travis as more obligatory than pleasurable, implying that he had been the sexual aggressor and she the passive partner, a victim of sorts who had only gone along to avoid displeasing or offending him. I wanted to show the jury that she had been a willing participant, who had enjoyed their sexual interludes and had even encouraged and initiated some of them.

“One of the things that you kept saying on direct examination was that he [Travis], you know, ‘I felt that I liked him
[Travis] and I didn’t want to hurt his feelings.’ . . . Do you remember saying that you didn’t want to hurt his feelings?”

“I felt that way, like it would have been a blow to his ego,” Arias said, referencing her and Travis’ first sexual encounter at the Hugheses’ house in Murietta.

“. . . You cared about his ego even though you had only known him for approximately two weeks?”

“Yes.”

“So does that mean you were more invested in him than you are telling us? In other words, you really had strong feelings for him?”

“They weren’t strong, but there was an attraction there.”

“So, you were attracted to him then, and you wanted this sort of activity to continue?”

“. . . Well, I didn’t stop it,” she said, in keeping with her earlier script.

“Well, when you say you didn’t stop it, it just sounds again like you’re saying it was all him, not you, right?”

“It takes two to tango,” Arias admitted.

“That’s right. And it was a mutual activity. . . . So that means, for example, that when you and he were involved the very first time that it was mutual, right?”

“Yes, it was.”

“And when you were involved any time after that, it was also mutual, right?”

“I believe it was . . . when I told him to stop, he did,” she answered, removing the insinuation that the sexual activity was forced upon her by Travis.

As my queries grew more pointed, so did Arias’ responses. This reached an apex with questions about text messages she had found in Travis’ cell phone when she sneaked a peek while he was napping, conduct similar to her returning to the Yreka library and snooping into Bobby Juarez’s e-mail account.

“The messages, what did they say? . . . What was the subject matter?” I asked, not knowing what Arias had in store for me.

“Things referencing specific sexual body parts interacting with other sexual body parts . . . and plans in the making of meeting up at hotel rooms or his house . . .”

“And you were very offended by that, right?”

“Yeah. Offended would be accurate,” she offered, conceding for the first time that I had chosen the right word.

“Right. And you were so offended that you still decided to go on vacation with him, right?”