Pellicano rests defense in wiretap case
The private eye chooses not to take the witness stand himself and calls only one witness, an FBI computer forensics expert.
Hollywood private eye Anthony Pellicano rested his case this morning, after calling just a single witness to combat prosecution accusations that he conducted a years-long wire-tapping and racketeering spree to gain an illegal edge for his clients.
Pellicano, 63, who is acting as his own attorney, did not take the stand, but told Judge Dale S. Fischer he reserved the right to call himself as a witness after his four co-defendants complete their presentations.
Fischer earlier had offered to help the detective avoid a Woody Allen-style farce of asking and answering his own questions.
In the film "Bananas," Allen, on trial for subversion after serving as the inadvertent leader of a banana republic, ran back and forth between the courtroom well and the witness stand as he cross-examined himself.
Pellicano's wife, Kat, and his two daughters, Josi, 17, and Tori, 18, were in the courtroom for the private eye's presentation. "I think he did excellent," said Kat Pellicano, when the proceedings broke at mid-morning.
Pellicano's sole witness was FBI computer forensics expert Donald Schmidt. Most of Pellicano's questions revolved around how Schmidt was able to tell if the audio files on the computer seized from the detective's Sunset Boulevard offices were actually wiretaps.
Wearing his customary dark green, jail-issue jacket and dark cotton slacks, Pellicano debuted his defense presentation, coached at points by a patient Fischer.
When one line of questioning prompted a string of objections from Assistant U.S. Attorney Daniel Saunders, the judge told Pellicano, "What's relevant is what he looked for and what he found. That's the only way you can continue with this line of questioning."
After Pellicano rested his case, defense attorney Chad Hummel called his client, former Los Angeles police Sgt. Mark Arneson, to the stand. Arneson is accused of accessing confidential police databases for information on Pellicano's targets.
In a clear, confident voice, Arneson spent more than an hour casting his relationship with Pellicano as an innocent, even virtuous one.
Arneson, who was on a $2,500 monthly retainer from Pellicano, said that the detective paid him for personal bodyguard services, surveillance work and "residential security assessment," not for running names through police records. And he, in turn, used Pellicano as a resource in his police work, Arneson testified.
