Mavrick Murder Trial, Day 5 Recap (Part 1)

CALLIE FRYE:

Do you remember the audio recording from yesterday? It was two hours long, but we stopped early. Today we finished it. It was mainly about the detective’s interview with Mavrick Fisher in San Diego.

Detective Kreutzer asked Mavrick if he went to the hospital for the cut on his hand. Mavrick said no. The detective said they would do an autopsy on Grant’s body and asked Mavrick to explain what they might find. Mavrick replied that they would find a broken skull. The detective asked if it was on the right or left side. Mavrick said on the left side. The detective asked which part of the head. Mavrick said he would show. The detective thanked him.

The detective asked about the tent and what it looked like inside and the sleeping configurations he had with Grant. He also asked about where the blood was.

Mavrick said blood was all over the place and that there was a puddle of blood. He said he stuffed Grant in a sleeping bag but there was still a puddle of blood in the tent. The detective asked if he texted people after it happened. Mavrick said he texted many people. The detective asked who he texted. Mavrick said he had to look at his Facebook. The detective asked what his Facebook account names are and how many he has. Mavrick said he had two: Mavrick Martin and Zaden Blujay. The detective took note of it. The detective asked about his phone and whether he had it with him and its whereabouts. Mavrick said the phone was seized in Mexico. The detective said “oh.” The detective asked about the direction of Grant’s attack, whether his arm went up or down. Mavrick said he was not sure because it was so dark. The detective said “oh.” He asked about the knife and what it looks like, whether it was silver or not. Mavrick confirmed the details. Mavrick later said Grant is so different from him and about how their lifestyles were not the same at all. The detective asked whether there was anything he missed. Mavrick said it’s his place to ask the questions. The detective asked if Mavrick took photos. But Mavrick said he doesn't have the phone because he went kayaking and he capsized and lost his phone, that it got wet. He borrowed a phone from Michel Fucci until his phone became dry. The detective asked who he sent a picture of his hand with a cut on it to. Mavrick said “Rilee Strainis'' on Facebook Messengers. The detective said okay.

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Dr. Bennet Omalu took the witness stand and was sworn in. He said he had 22 years of experience in forensic pathology and is responsible for doing forensic autopsies to find the cause of death. His specialization is neuropathology to analyze brains to see how people died. He said he testified in court over 600 times, had five board medicine certifications, is a licensed practitioner in four different states. He said he did an autopsy on Grant’s body on August 28th and that the detective gave him superficial information prior to the autopsy. The DA Susan Krones asked what Dr. Omalu's conclusion was after the autopsy. Dr. Omalu said he concluded that Mr. Grant Whitaker, a 25-year-old white man, passed away from blunt force trauma on the head from a homicide. He was asked to explain more about how he came to that conclusion. Dr. Omalu said the left side of his head, under his orbital bone, his left cheek bone, and nose bones were completely shattered. There was brittle damage and pieces of bone everywhere on that side. The left ear was also destroyed. It is because multiple impacts caused the ear to dissolve.

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Dr. Omalu said there were signs that the head was struck with a large, heavy object with a smooth surface, possibly a hammer or a baseball bat, a surface object of some kind. The detective did not give Dr. Omalu many details. Dr. Omalu said his analysis shows that there were repeated impacts that were very powerful. He said the skull is one of the strongest bones in the body and that it would take tremendous impact to break it. He said it was a violent impact to cause that kind of damage in his skull. Dr. Omalu was asked how many times he was struck. He said three or four, and possibly five or six, but definitely not 20 or 30 strikes. He said he couldn’t be conclusive on the exact amount of impacts. Dr. Omalu said the force of the impacts was similar to a car accident if the other car was traveling at 50 mph. The results were similar. Dr. Omalu said when a person is impacted in that way, the person would be rendered completely unconscious and unable to fight back. Dr. Omalu said he checked Grant's arms because it is human nature to have a primitive reaction to reach out and defend ourselves by using our hands. We also use our hands as our weapons. That is a natural impulse that we can’t control. Dr. Omalu said after his careful analysis, evidence shows Grant had no defensive wounds, not even one, and that meant Grant did not engage in a fight or anything. He said there was zero evidence of this. The court was very quiet.

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Dr. Omalu explained that although Grant’s body had decomposed, they were fortunate because it was wrapped in a sleeping bag and Grant’s head was wrapped with some kind of fabric that could be a blanket or a sheet. Dr. Omalu said the body went through a type of mummification (like in Egypt) and that evidence was easy to spot and analyze. He said there were maggots present, but they had a harder time to get through the sleeping bag and sheets, so the fabrics helped to preserve Grant’s body and made it easier for him to look at it.

Dr. Omalu was asked why he doubted that Grant was standing up. Dr. Omalu said Grant was pretty tall at 6’1, which would have required someone much taller than Grant to strike him, from a higher elevation. Dr. Omalu said if someone was lying down, the amount of force and gravity associated with a strike would make sense. Dr. Omalu said the evidence was consistent with Grant lying close to the floor.

The defense attorney asked Dr. Omalu about whether Grant could possibly be standing up. He challenged Dr. Omalu about Grant possibly crouching. Dr. Omalu said the evidence doesn’t support that Grant was standing up before he was struck.

The defense asked about if Grant was crouching down, what would it look like? Dr. Omalu said the wounds would be on the top of his skull, not on the side. Dr. Omalu said he was not speaking from personal opinion but from his educated, medical opinion and explained that he did autopsies on over 12,000 bodies. He said he is sure that Grant was lying down when it happened and because of the absence of defensive wounds. The defense attorney continued to challenge Dr. Omalu about whether Grant was kneeling or crouched down. Dr. Omalu said there was no evidence to show that Grant was crouching down and that he was lying down, that it was what happened.

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The defense attorney asked Dr. Omalu about DNA tests. Dr. Omalu said the situation didn’t call for a DNA test and that it was unnecessary. Dr. Omalu also explained that the body was not affected when it was transported because it was protected by a sleeping bag.

Dr. Omalu was challenged on why he did certain tests on Grant but not other tests. Dr. Omalu said it was based on commonsense, that he was following procedures based on his experience. He gave an example: if someone had a near infection, they wouldn’t need a colonoscopy.

The defense attorney asked Dr. Omalu if he talked with the detectives before he did the autopsy. Dr. Omalu said no, that the information he got was very superficial such as where it happened.