The Out-Lawyer's Blog

At the risk of radical simplification, let me condense several hours.  The psychiatrist, Beverly Parr, who was familiar with Hans’ mental state from an early age, has opined that he exhibited some of the characteristics of Asperger’s syndrome/disorder/condition.  This – surprise – is often associated with brilliant, socially difficult people.

But – on cross examination by the DA – the jury learned that Hans remained capable of planning and carrying out a murder.  No surprise there either.

This was roughly a day’s worth of testimony, and I doubt very much is the jury gives a whit. They have not learned anything germain about Hans from this mental health professional that they were already to glean from the relevant lay testimony.

Dr. Parr was followed this afternoon by Hans’ mother, Mrs. Palmer, who has previously testified for the DA about – among other things -  “that darned post’. 

As I write this, Bill Dubois is trying to establish a pattern in which Nina demonstrated less than fervent interest in being with her children, for example by wanting to take three months away in Russia instead of the two she had initially scheduled, threatening not to come back without large sums of money being deposited in her account, even threatening to move to Sweden with the children at some point.

This is not so much the portrait of a mother seeking to escape motherhood, but the picture of a strong willed young mother who was perfectly willing to pull someone’s chain to get a result. 

It doesn’t sound like Nina was on perfect terms with Mom or Dad and - of course -Nina was trapped in a hostile relationship with Hans.  

Frankly, like almost everything the defense has so far produced, this evidence cuts two ways.  If Nina liked to pull people’s chains, and if she chose September 3, 2006 at about 3 PM to jerk Hans’ chain, then she may well have accidentally pulled a fatal trigger. This brilliant, socially maladroit, somewhat paranoid and very frustrated husband of hers might have lashed out…

In additional Palmer testimony, the jury is being treated to Hans and Nina’s wedding videos, to the fact that Hans was a messy guy, and that she had urged him to clean up after himself. In particular, Mrs. Palmer had urged Hans to clean up the cherry blossoms that tended to accumulate in the driveway…

I’m closing out for now with Mom still on the stand.  I’ll pick up at this point tomorrow.

As I indicated in a prior post, I’m hoping that DA Paul Hora manages to find an opening to revisit that blood smudged entryway post in the Exeter house.  I’ve already proposed questions that should be asked….

Stay tuned.