At the end of day eight of State Senator Hiram Monserrate’s assault trial, defense attorney Joseph Tacopina told reporters they would make a decision later that night whether to call Monserrate to testify.
“We said we would make that decision at a certain point, and we are at that point now,” Tacopina said on Wednesday, October 7, adding that they would come to the decision as a team – including Monserrate.
However, Tacopina said the defense feels no burden to do anything.
“How anyone can make a case about what happened in that apartment definitively on this record is beyond me,” he said.
On Wednesday, the defense questioned Jasmina Abril de Rojas, the cousin of alleged victim and Monserrate girlfriend Karla Giraldo. Rojas walked Giraldo back to Monserrate’s apartment the night the alleged incident took place. During the morning session, a defense attorney asked Rojas questions about Giraldo’s drinking that night.
One day earlier, Justice William Erlbaum dismissed two of the six counts against Monserrate as the defense called its second witness in the case. Erlbaum threw out counts three and five – assault in the second degree and assault in the third degree, but left the top charges for intent. After the prosecution rested its case on Tuesday, Tacopina’s co-counsel Chad Seigel argued that all six charges against his client for assault should be dismissed because the prosecution failed to prove any element of its case beyond a reasonable doubt.
However, Erlbaum denied the motion to dismiss the charges specifically related to the alleged intentional assault that took place within Monserrate’s apartment and allowed the assault charge for recklessness that took place when Monserrate pulled girlfriend Karla Giraldo away from her neighbor’s door and dragged her out of the building to remain.
During the afternoon session on Tuesday, the defense called its first witness –Jackson Heights attorney Jesus Peña –a member of the New York State bar for 22 years who practices criminal law. Peña hosted the Christmas party that Giraldo attended earlier that evening. He said he greeted her when she arrived around 9 p.m. and did not recall her being drunk at that time.
While at the party of more than 150 people, Peña testified he saw Giraldo dancing with different guys and talking to the disc jockey.
“She was gesticulating a lot and dancing in an out of control situations,” said Peña a native of Cuba, who added that if his guests drink too much or act recklessly he will approach them and ask them to tone it down or leave for fear of lawsuits. “I put it [to her] either ‘Stop drinking or leave the party because I’m not going to be responsible.’”
Last week, Giraldo’s dramatic courtroom exit made headlines when she fled the witness stand after Kessler showed her the surveillance video of the night Monserrate allegedly assaulted her. In addition, a 19-year NYPD veteran who photographed Monserrate’s apartment that night took pictures of bloody towels, a torn white sleeveless T-shirt recovered from a garbage can, a bloody white bed sheet, a bloody green shirt recovered from the sink in the bathroom and a broken glass on the bed.
The prosecution has argued that an enraged Monserrate struck Giraldo in the face with a piece of glass while the defense claims it was a freak accident.
Rojas could be the defense’s last witness in the assault trial and closing statements could come as soon as early next week.
