Jurist Notebook-Day Two

Thursday, September 9, 2004

The jury wasn’t called into the courtroom until almost 11:00 am. The Sheriff was late in transporting the defendant from jail.

The defense attorney, Mr. Bloom offered his opening statement. To my surprise, Mr. Bloom completely conceeded all the assault charges. On a hastily drawn up chart, he laid out the charges and color-coded each charge as followed:

Red: “No Doubt”
Green: “No Way”
Blue: “Not Certain”

He flatly circled "assault" in red; “no doubt.” The charges of threatening harm or death and kidnaping were in green; “no way”. Coersion and threat of bodily harm with a knife were circled in blue; “not certain”.

He also brought up the idea that the defendant, Zameer Azam, may have been under the influence of drugs in these intstances of rage. This might be the beginning of an insanity plea that was mentioned yesterday. He also referred to an Amber Alert that was called on August 30, 2003 when they had merely attended a family barbeque. Azam is accused of forcing Bascom to change her story to the police on this trip.

Our job now seems to be whether the prosecution can prove the allegations of threats, kidnapping and whether the restraining orders were indeed broken.

The victim, Jennifer Bascom, was our first witness. She was tall and petite wore a short-skirted business suit, stylized messy hair and dark eye shadow. She was very attractive. To me, she had the ominous look of Nicole Simpson. Maybe it was the breast implants.

When she walked into the courtroom, I noticed that the defendant gave her a look; a once-over, up and down. In her testimony, she said she loves Mr. Azam and I noticed that during a sidebar with the lawyers and judge that Ms. Bascom shot a long, loving gaze towards Mr. Azam. Would she take him back again? I’m sure of it.

Her testimony basically mirrored what the prosecutor stated the day before. She described the beatings and her habit of continually keeping him in her life.

There is no doubt as to what happened in regards to the assault. I would believe her even if there were no photos or witnesses. Otherwise, I felt she was leaving facts out or conveniently having no recollections of horrific events.

On Aug. 26, 2003, she told Azam not to come over one evening because she was tired. He still came over and apparently knocked on the door for some time. When she finally opened the door he was in a rage because he believed somebody else was in the house. After the initial beatings, he came at her again saying, “who’s bottle of Curve (a men’s cologne) is on top of the refrigerator?”

It doesn’t seem to have any bearing as to whether she deserved to be beaten if, say, she had another guy in her house. The beatings could never be justified.

Bascom says she had no idea what he’s talking about. Was it was made up? I’m wondering whether the defense will offer any lurid accusations towards Ms. Bascom. She might be a high-priced call girl.

An important point was made in cross-examination by defense attorney, Brian Bloom. On the night of November 1st (the final assault), an Officer Marconi filed a report signed by Ms. Bascom that has no mention of a knife being used to threaten her that evening. Ms. Bascom claimed that she verbally mentioned the fact after the officer had read it back to her and she signed it. Might the knife and the subsequent threat of “I could easily kill you right now” be bogus?

Next: The prosecution will wrap up examining Ms. Bascom and possibly be cross-examined by the defense.