Word: lasch
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...raised questions about the prosecution's case, which boiled down to pitting the accuser's harrowing tale of being pinned to the ground and violated against Smith's equally vehement denials. Many prosecutors would have dropped the case as unwinnable. Why then did State Attorney David Bludworth and Moira Lasch, his chief felony attorney, decide to press ahead...
...Lasch's suspicions were further aroused when the Kennedys gave police investigators what seemed to be a runaround. William Barry, a former FBI agent who was staying at the compound, incorrectly told detectives that Senator Edward Kennedy had left for Washington when in fact he was having lunch at the Palm Beach estate. For two weeks the family rebuffed police attempts to survey the grounds where the alleged assault took place. That was sufficient time for the wind and sea to obliterate any evidence that might have corroborated the woman's story. A grand jury may decide this week whether...
...doubts Bludworth and Lasch might have harbored about Smith's guilt seem to have been swept away last summer when three women came forward to claim that they too had been sexually attacked by Smith. Each described how an initially charming Smith had turned violent once they were alone with him -- eerily mirroring the account of the woman in the Palm Beach case...
Presenting the women's stories to a jury was another matter. Florida bars testimony about a rape defendant's sexual history unless it shows a striking and detailed similarity to the crime he is charged with. Moreover, none of the women had filed charges against Smith. One of Lasch's most controversial moves was to release the three women's stories, perhaps mistakenly hoping that prospective jurors would remember them even if they were not introduced into evidence. Bludworth says Florida's "sunshine law," which requires that public records be made available on request, left Lasch with no choice...
...unbelievably boring," says Evelyn Kusserow, a reporter for Germany's Stern magazine, as she sits in front of a TV in the offices of the Palm Beach Review watching public prosecutor Moira Lasch's performance. Minutes later, a camera crew from the German weekly Der Spiegel wanders in, ostensibly to film a roomful of American journalists watching the televised trial. Little do they know that one of the people they are filming is a fellow countrywoman. Thus the Germans from Der Spiegel have flown thousands of miles to cover the coverage of the trial, and end up with footage...