So, you've been wondering, whatever happened to Sara Caplan, the former Phil Spector defence attorney who said she saw forensics expert Henry Lee remove a piece of potential evidence from the legendary producer's Beverly Hills home, but who then refused to formally testify about said claims putting herself in contempt of court? As you'll remember, Caplan claimed she couldn't formally testify about the claims because of attorney/client confidentiality rules. But Judge Larry Paul Fidler disagreed, not least because by making the claims in the courtroom in the first place (albeit sans jury) Caplan gave up any confidentiality rights, if there were any to start with, which Fidler doesn't think there were. The last we knew Fidler had held Caplan in contempt of court and was threatening to jail her unless she agreed to testify. Caplan was appealing Fidler's ruling on the matter.
Well, things have now moved forward, and not in Caplan's favour. The California Supreme Court yesterday refused to hear her appeal against the contempt order, which means the lawyer now really is facing jail if she continues to refuse to testify. Some reports say she may be jailed as soon as today. She is due to meet Fidler at 10am today, East Coast time, where a decision will be made. It's all a big distraction, of course, from the real issue the court is considering, whether or not Spector shot dead actress Lana Clarkson at his home in 2003, or whether she committed suicide. And the prosecution have been seemingly pursuing the case against Caplan mainly to discredit Lee, who's expected to back up other forensic experts who claim the forensic evidence of the case suggests Spector did not shoot Clarkson. But now it seems that Lee might not even testify - he being increasingly concerned that his association with this case is tarnishing his reputation, even though he strongly denies ever taking any evidence away from the crime scene.
Whatever - back to the real case in hand, and the defence continued with its efforts to show that Clarkson was very depressed in the months leading up to her death at Spector's home, making her, Spector's people want the jury to believe, prone to turning a gun on herself. Yesterday they called Jennifer Hayes-Riedl, a friend of Clarkson, who told the court about what had happened when the aspiring actress had taken on a hostess job at the House Of Blues club where she later met Spector.
"She was pulling out chairs for people she had beaten out in auditions", Hayes-Riedl said of the hostess job her friend had been forced to take to make ends meet. It was a job that "humiliated" Clarkson driving her "out of her mind and depressed". So much so, that when Clarkson had come over to Hayes-Riedl's house to borrow some clothes for the new job she had "cried her eyes out". To add insult to injury, Clarkson had broken up with a man who she had hoped would be "the one". Hayes-Riedl concluded by saying her friend had been drinking excessively, and that she had been taking the painkiller Vicodin while drinking tequila or champagne.
All of which kind of fits in with the defence's claims about Clarkson's state of mind at the time of her death. Under cross-examination from the prosecution, Hayes-Riedl admitted that Clarkson was a hopeful and ambitious person, determined to succeed, all characteristics that might suggest that, despite the depression, the actress would not be the suicidal type. But, the witness added: "It was game-face hope. That's different than long-term hope. She was very, very, very, very depressed".
The case continues.