Week 1 - Friday Trial Recap
Passing Notes, Passing Gas, and Passing around the Whisky.
I was awakened early Thursday morning with a kick to the ribs by Maury Stinklestein, the editor of The Daily Brooklyn Bugler. I was confounded as to how he found me, since I spent the night sleeping in an alley near the court.
He said he was informed of my location by a bailiff who had noticed some bum lying in a nearby doorway and who was clutching a sketchpad.
Maury told me that since I was still employed to create sketches for the Trump trial I had to “get my shit together and hustle my ass upstairs to the court!”
Given my disheveled and odiferous state, the bailiff was none too pleased to see me, but thankfully my press pass gave me access.
As you may have heard, on Thursday and Friday of last week during the Trump Hush Money Financial Crimes trial, testimony continued from David Pecker. He went into detail on the various “Catch and Kill” schemes that he, Donald Trump and Michael Cohen concocted to hide damaging stories about Trump’s various debaucheries.
During those two days, major news outlets reported that when he wasn’t napping during testimony, Trump was whispering and passing notes to his lawyers.
However, what wasn’t reported was how he did this “note passing.”
Thankfully, I captured all the shenanigans.
Trump began his antics by annoying the hell out of his lawyer, Susan Necheles. He made a paper fortune teller and repeatedly asked her to select her “secret courtroom crush.”
You could hear him telling her, “Choose red, come on, choose red.”
Donald then got bored with Pecker’s testimony and started a game of paper football with his lawyer, Emil Bove.
After his tiring game of “football” and a short nap, Trump awoke and began sharing notes with his lawyers in the most annoying way possible.
His lawyer Todd Blanche chastised Donald to “Cool the antics!” Unfortunately this didn’t sit well with Trump’s fragile ego.
Whenever Blanche stood up from the table, Trump began to loudly rip sheets of paper.
Judge Merchan became quite displeased and called into question Blanche’s credibility to contain his client.
It was at this point when trial took a break for lunch.
I called Maury to ask if he was going to give me a stipend for food during this gig. He claimed he could only afford $2 a day for lunches, and suggested I make use of “New York City’s many fine sidewalk dining establishments.” In other words, “Grab something from a dirty hot dog cart.”
After munching on a weeks-old dirt water dog that had the taste and texture of a garden hose, I returned back up stairs to the courtroom.
Pecker’s testimony continued after lunch.
Apparently during the lunch break, Trump caught up on the reports from his immunity case before The Supreme Court.
This motivated him to create, and wear, a paper crown in celebration of his future coronation from the Supreme Justices.
However Trump’s festive mood was short lived when Pecker got asked about former Trump Tower doorman Dino Sajudin. The doorman was apparently paid off to silence his sightings of the numerous illegitimate kids Trump had sired.
During that afternoon, while none of Trump’s family was present, there was a group in attendance that seemed too oddly familiar.
Trump was contemptuously looking back at them throughout the rest of the day.
After David Pecker ended his testimony, Rhona Graff, who was Trump’s longtime executive assistant, was called to the stand. Nothing of any real importance was said by her. But she did remember how Stormy Daniels visited Trump’s office numerous times to “try out” as a contestant on The Apprentice.
After Graff left the stand, Trump handed a note to one of his lawyers. Supposedly it was to fire Graff later that day.
Next up on the witness stand was Garry Farro. He worked at First Republic Bank and handled the money accounts which Michael Cohen used to pay off Stormy Daniels.
As prosecution attempted to get Farro’s testimony, Trump’s lawyers were loudly opening and closing document binders.
Prosecution accused them of trying to obscure the jury’s ability to hear Mr. Farro. The lawyers said they were merely “sorting” paperwork for their rebuttal.
Meanwhile Trump napped in the corner during all this racket, which left everyone in the court dumbfounded.
Although when he did wake up after Farro’s testimony, Trump passed out more “notes” until he ran out of paper.
Once the courtroom was thoroughly littered with Trump’s notes, Judge Merchan adjourned court until the following Monday.
At the end of that day, I was exhausted and decided to head back to Brooklyn, back to the SRO motel room that The Bugler acquired for me. Despite the fact that I had to share a room and bed with a guy named Stinky Pete, I was far too tired and hungry to care.
I made it a point to remember to pick up a fifth of Wild Irish Rose whisky on my way back to the room. This was to quell any guff Stinky Pete might give me over sharing the bed.
In case you missed my previous mention, the run down motel was located right on the bank of the heavily polluted Gowanus Canal in Brooklyn. After exiting the nearby subway and walking toward the place, I noticed the Gowanus Canal was particularly fetid that evening.
I saw Stinky Pete was hanging out on the front stairs of the motel. The malodorous air didn’t seem to bother Pete as he sat there grumbling and yelling at the rats, who scurried near the garbage cans on the sidewalk.
“You bring my special medicine, boy?” He snarled at me.
“Sure thing, Pete.” I replied as I dug out the fifth from my bag and handed it to him. His face lit up with excitement as his hands wrapped around the bottle.
“It’s a Friday night and time for a party!” Pete howled before he tore it open and threw back a large gulp of the rot gut. “Come an’ join me on the stoop!” he beckoned to me.
Being dead knackered from the week’s events, I barely had the energy to walk up the stairs up to our room. I decided to plop myself down on the steps next to him for a bit. As Pete guzzled down the liquor, I asked him what his story was. How did he come to be here on skid row, next to a foul canal?
Pete took a swig, let out a long exhale, and then started to unravel his life’s tale.
“Boy…it’s a sorted story. I was once the king of Madison Ave! The darling of the ad world! My locutions once spun the gold that sold! I worked for decades with some of the best advertising firms in New York. I made millions! My ads sold freezers to Eskimos! Cadillacs to Mennonites! Liquor to Mormons! Medicine to Christian Scientists, and cigarettes to children!”
Pete spittled the whisky down his chin as he recited his grandiose past.
“But alas, what is gold today is shit tomorrow is the ad world! I was destroyed by one single ad for the most difficult and persnickety of clients!”
Pete threw back more of the whisky. It was obvious he was trying to drown his pain. I asked who this client was but he refused to say. Instead he just drank and drank until he passed out on the steps.
I left him there on the steps as I walked up to the room. I relished a full night’s sleep, no matter how dirty and flea-ridden it may be, alone in a bed.
I dozed off wondering how many fifths of whisky it’ll take to pry loose Stinky Pete’s tale of woe.
Stay tuned more to come.
Your articles and illustrations beat the NYT any day of the week. Thank you!
Best recap ever!