Join us as we cover the melee trial live streaming live from the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. We cover a detective testifying about the G shine Gang, the organization, and the structure of the organization.
00:24:09.680So it's saying Bofaro means on point, DL means I got you, and he proceeds to give other definitions.
00:24:17.680SL means you have greetings and responses, R, rise and shine, I shine, you shine, rise up, up and pop, and shine, shine right, shine bright, light shine, shine blue gold.
00:24:28.680So these are all things that were written in that original document that we hung over.
00:24:33.680And that original document in terms of the date on that, do you recall for the set date?
00:24:40.680September something, September 16th, 2018.
00:36:47.260What that basically means is when they're on sidebar, they're talking on the side.
00:36:53.260Like the two lawyers, the defense counsel and the prosecution are meeting with the judge, talking to the side where no one can hear their conversation.
00:37:01.260So and it's meant to be, you know, pretty much a lawyer only discussion because judges are lawyers to 99% of the time.
00:37:07.260So let's go ahead and see if we can fast forward this trial a bit.
00:37:39.260And I would imagine during the voir dire process, jury selection process, both attorneys, both sides really question these jurors about their preconceived notions about gangs or gang violence.
00:37:58.260And Ikeisha, you know that jury selection is so important here.
00:38:01.260And let's talk about the jury in terms of this testimony.
00:38:05.260Gang testimony, testimony regarding gangs tends to be riveting at times for a jury because it's just an intriguing set of facts to hear about.
00:38:17.260How do you think the prosecution could have improved, not to be Monday morning quarterbacking this, but improve the presentation that we see here?
00:38:27.260I think they should have allowed the jury to just know that he was in a gang.
00:38:33.260I think the fact that they're now trying to explain this some more hurts them because the average juror, which is why we have an expert, right?
00:38:40.260The average juror doesn't know this about gangs.
00:38:43.260They just think that gangs are violent.
00:38:47.260They don't know that they're instructing you to love each other and to read and to go to school and not to be homosexual and to make sure your hygiene is good.
00:38:56.260And so they don't know this about gangs.
00:38:59.260And so now you're introducing them to an element and an aspect that they aren't familiar with that undermines your case.
00:39:06.260And so I think that they have a problem.
00:39:16.260The Law and Crime Network, some of the people that they bring on are kind of suspect.
00:39:19.260And it makes me question a lot of times their professional experience.
00:39:22.260It's actually extremely important to outline the gangs activities, practices, behaviors, structure, hierarchy, vernacular, you know, codes.
00:39:34.260All of these things are important to establish that they're an organized criminal faction.
00:39:41.260I remember when I was an agent myself and I investigated gangs, I used to write reports extremely detailed about, for example, I did land kings for a bit.
00:39:49.260Incas, regional Incas, what enforcers, what they did, what their roles were, who was who, how they did meetings, what a violation was.
00:39:56.260All these things needed to be documented in reports.
00:41:41.260And I'll tell you right, really quickly, jurors are serious about murder cases more so than any other type of case.
00:41:47.260And they are not going to accept anything but the most ironclad type of evidence to send this young man to prison for the rest of his life to his death.
01:07:31.260So, I'm now walking around Broward County, Palm Beach County, Dick County anywhere, and get ambushed by someone that might be looking for me.
01:07:41.260We've done cell phone warrants on multiple people in Broward County involved in the investigation work at the threat.
01:07:48.260And outside of that investigation, there's photographs of deputies being sent around, people trying to figure out who I am and what I look like.
01:08:01.260I will say this, that it's a little strange to me that they had to bring him in as a subject matter expert to talk about gangs.
01:08:07.260I mean, you know, normally, whenever you have a subject matter expert, you bring them in to kind of like explain things, right?
01:08:16.260So, for example, they asked me to do this before, be a subject matter expert on like human smuggling investigation.
01:08:20.260So, like anytime there's a human smuggling case or whatever it may be, I would come in and I would testify and I would explain how it works, how, you know, organizations work with taking money, how people are moved, how much it costs, the whole, the entire process.
01:08:32.260I've explained how human smuggling works on this channel before.
01:08:35.260I don't want to beat you guys with boredom unless you guys want me to specifically cover it again.
01:08:39.260But you typically have subject matter experts in different disciplines, whether it's a computer forensic agent that comes in and testifies as to how they've got retrieved evidence from a device or, you know, someone who talks about human smuggling, someone who talks about human trafficking, someone who talks about drug trafficking, whatever it may be.
01:08:56.200So, I think it's a little weird that they would bring in a guy like this who's kind of pretty much under damn near land low, right?
01:09:04.720Well, not protective custody because obviously law enforcement officer, so he's not in custody.
01:09:08.180But he's under, you know, he's obviously moving differently.
01:09:11.580It's strange that they would bring him in as a subject matter expert to talk about this knowing that he's green lit.
01:09:16.840But, I mean, I guess he's probably the best at it.
01:09:19.280So, they said, hey, I want the best person in the county.
01:09:21.060But, I mean, they could have easily grabbed someone from another agency to talk about this, right?
01:09:26.780Whether it was, you know, maybe someone from the FBI, someone from Homeland.
01:09:30.620I mean, we had a gang unit when I was an agent, right?
01:09:32.760You could have easily brought someone from over there to talk about this stuff.
01:09:35.640So, it is a little weird that they're bringing this guy in in particular.
01:09:38.320But maybe it's because he has intimate knowledge of the G-Shine bloods.
01:09:42.000That might be why, which you could see when we were going through the text messages before that he did have some intimate knowledge of them.
01:09:48.460But it's, like, kind of a stretch to bring a guy like this that's pretty much wanted dead in Broward County to testify.
01:09:53.980So, person, I'd probably just write it off.
01:09:58.000But, you know, after five or six cell phones got downloaded and there was pictures of many deputies being sent around saying,
01:29:45.720The next response is bring Mariah, which you've already heard testimony that Felicia Holmes, her daughter, Mariah Hamilton, was in a dating relationship with this defendant.
01:29:59.000And that at this time and that there was conversations and that she has identified Mariah as Mariah Hamilton.
01:32:41.400In addition, the defendant also, in other conversations at or about the time of the homicide, sends a photo of his driver's license to someone to be able to authenticate.
01:33:21.360That shows that the defendant has previously been to the studio and knows that.
01:33:26.380Also talks, and this is a conversation with Adrienne Davis, in which he is using this phone, sending in pictures of his driver's license on this phone.
01:33:35.920In some of the other pictures and items that your Honor has in front of you, there's pictures of credit cards, front and back, with the defendant's name on them.
01:33:48.020There are multiple in things that show that this phone was being used by the defendant, Jamel Demons.
01:33:57.640There is no evidence before, Your Honor, that it was being used at the time of the crime than anyone else.
01:34:04.500In eviction, the defendant is sitting on camera in possession of a phone as he is leaving the studio on October 26th of 2018.
01:34:16.900At that point, there's phone in his hand, that phone then tracks, and you can follow on all of the call detail records and all of the mapping that was done put in yesterday to show that this phone goes from the studio and is consistent with the phone of Anthony Williams, which is the other phone that's on there on T-Mobile, and all the way up to the scene of the crime.
01:36:01.320Why would he ask for a gun after the murders?
01:36:03.720I'm speculating because he got rid of the murder weapon.
01:36:09.160Because as you guys know in this trial, one of the big things that the prosecution does not have is they don't have the murder weapon, guys, which is important because that would be able to establish, you know, the rounds, when the gun was shot, etc.
01:36:22.800Or the making caliber, they don't have any of that, okay?
01:36:25.540So, what I think is after the shooting happened, more than likely, Melly got rid of the weapon, either throwing it away or giving it away to a friend, which is why he needed a replacement gun right after the fact, okay?
01:37:09.440I've seen less smiles and certainly there are no antics going on.
01:37:14.260And as far as the jury is concerned, the jury does look at the defendant at every move and every motion that that defendant makes because they're trying to make a determination as to whether or not the defendant is guilty or innocent.
01:37:28.900And so, I think they are looking at him.
01:37:31.960It doesn't seem to me, because I'm looking at the faces of all these jurors.
01:37:39.060They actually seem to be paying more attention to the witness.
01:37:42.820And they think, you know, at least it seems as though they're thinking that whatever it is that's going on on the defense table is something that might be normal.
01:37:50.180It doesn't seem as though they're using it against him.
01:37:52.340So, at the end of the day, I don't think that the antics will be used against him.
01:37:57.740But right now, he is being very serious.
01:38:01.620And I think we should point out, in fairness to Mellie, a lot of what we saw during the first week of the trial with the praying and the blowing of kisses and all this stuff, a lot of that happened outside the presence of the jury.
01:38:35.520Next question comes from Miranda O'Gannier from YouTube.
01:38:40.980Linda Kennybotton, are they going to revisit the evidence of the shots in the car?
01:38:45.560Because multiple of those bullet holes would have gone through Bortland and Mellie if they was in the car.
01:38:52.140And that shows that they both got out.
01:38:54.900Well, that's interesting because I do not know, because I don't have the list, whether the defense has a reconstruction expert, a crime scene reconstruction expert, and whether or not they feel the need to use that or whether or not they feel that they poked enough holes in the cross-examination of the prosecution's expert to say that, indeed, it shows that, you know, only one of them maybe could have gotten out.
01:39:20.420But, you know, if I were the defense right now, and I'm a big one for putting on the defense case, I—
01:39:27.000So you guys can see here, look at the bullet holes on the right-hand side of the vehicle, right?
01:39:31.380However, we know that the victims were shot from the left side of the vehicle, okay?
01:39:37.820So Mellie was sitting in the back seat right here.
01:40:36.280One thing we should point out, too, that I think is really interesting, and we haven't heard this testimony yet, Linda, but Christine Bradley, the assistant state attorney, said in her opening that the evidence, the medical examiner, is going to testify that Juvie and Sack Chaser were dead when the bullets were fired into the vehicle.
01:41:21.860Yeah, guys, they're estimating that this trial is going to – for you new viewers that just came in, they're estimating that this trial is going to be done by the end of July, guys.
01:41:27.900That means that they're going to go for over a month in this trial.
01:41:31.440So for everyone saying, oh, yo, the prosecutor is sucking it up, bro.
01:42:01.280I know that sometimes the state will bring in evidence from a defendant's social media, from their music, from their lyrics.
01:42:12.140He has a song that is called Murder on My Mind.
01:42:16.280And so I don't know if the state is going to be bringing that in.
01:42:21.380Right now, it's their job to show that he, in fact, was the killer in this particular situation.
01:42:29.460And so if I were the prosecution, I would be focusing on the fact that he was in the vehicle at the time he was the person who made the shots that came from within the vehicle.
01:42:40.260Yeah, and I hate to bring this up again, but in the opening statement, Christine Bradley said something like about music being artistic expression.
01:42:51.640But she did talk about social media messages.
01:42:54.380So maybe the prosecutor did say that they weren't going to use the music against them.
01:42:58.960And normally they don't use music, guys.
01:43:01.260They only use music if it aligns with what they said.
01:43:04.460And a lot of times they use the music maybe like in Rico cases, like they use Casanova's lyrics against them.
01:43:08.680They use YSL's lyrics against them, which if you guys want to break it, you could look at my YSL video where I talk about this in more detail.
01:43:15.960But in this case where it's Murder, they're not going to use it as much because they got a lot of physical evidence, too.
01:43:21.800But when it comes to gang stuff, Rico cases, they are going to use the music.
01:43:25.620And they did it for Bobby Shmurda as well.
01:43:27.080Now, the reason for that is because they're illustrating that the music in itself is done to increase the status and hierarchy of the gang, which plays into the racketeering statutes a lot of the times.
01:43:40.060And maybe the prosecution is just saying we're not even going to touch it because bringing in rap music lyrics has been a kind of a controversial thing, bringing this stuff into trials across the country.
01:43:50.060And if you guys notice, it only works when you bring it into Rico slash gang cases because they can use the music as a tool or a piece of evidence to show that the music is being used in furtherance of the criminal and gang activity to intimidate rivals, talk about rivals, brag about rivals, increase their stature.
01:44:10.460So even though you have that First Amendment right to free speech, it absolutely could be used against you, especially within the context of gang investigations.
01:44:18.640All right. So if you want to be a rapper and you want to talk about your gang, I wouldn't do it.
01:46:15.020Both are asking about Cortland Henry, the co-conspirator who's charged separately in this case and will face trial at a later date in a separate trial.
01:46:24.460Asked, do you think Cortland will take the stand and snitch on Malley?
01:46:28.940Is Bortland a state witness in the case?
01:47:56.680Can someone explain the car stealing or car ceiling situation?
01:48:01.380Was it Malley in the, um, I think if, if the prosecution doesn't feel like they approved their case, they're going to put him on the stand a hundred percent.
01:48:10.280So, um, I think that's kind of the, the, their, um, their X factor, you know, their ACE, their ACE in the hole is they have him ready to testify.
01:48:19.240They're trying not to use him, obviously, because they don't want it to be attacked.
01:48:23.020Just like that woman had said, Oh, you got a deal.
01:48:25.120Oh, you're, um, you're only testifying so that you don't go to prison for life or whatever it may be.
01:48:31.220So I think the prosecution is trying to not use Portland if they can avoid it.
01:48:35.280But I think if push comes to shove and they don't think that they made the strongest case that they can make, and they're not sure where the jury stands, they will absolutely put him on the stand and have him testify against Malley.
01:48:44.600Rear drivers, Portland in the rear, because even though, right, they always say, Oh, well, you know, one crook's testimony isn't enough to put another crook in jail.
01:48:54.020However, if Portland gets on the stand and says, okay, I was driving and Malley shot them and, you know, I heard the gunshots, blah, blah, blah.
01:49:02.840Even though Portland is looked at as a liar, because remember, he's the one that made this whole fucking drive by shooting up bullshit in the first place.
01:49:09.500Even though he's a liar, the thing that's going to save him and make him credible is that his testimony against Malley will be substantiated and most importantly corroborated by the physical evidence.
01:49:21.120It's going to show the wound patterns match up. It's going to show they stopped at this rural area to shoot into the car.
01:49:27.000It's going to show that he left Malley and went to the Memorial Hospital to go ahead and drop the bodies off.
01:49:32.400And Malley was there, you know, FaceTiming his girl and his mom saying, Hey, come pick me up, blah, blah, blah.
01:49:37.500So even though he's not a credible witness because he's lied before and he's also on trial for murder as well, his testimony is going to be corroborated by the physical evidence, which that in itself is what authenticates his testimony and makes it valid.
01:49:50.760Because it's going to line up with the physical evidence that they have.
01:49:53.820So what I see or what I suspect is the prosecution is going to go as far as they can without Portland assess.
01:50:02.700Can we win without him? If the answer is, eh, I don't know.
01:50:06.500They're going to put his ass on the stand and tell him, all right, tell us what the fuck happened.
01:50:10.140And then they're going to cut him a deal.
01:50:11.400So that's what's probably more than likely going to happen if the prosecution isn't able to bring this thing full circle or some piece of evidence gets taken away that can't be used, et cetera.
01:50:23.560We've seen that there's been discovery issues during this case.
01:50:26.080So that's what I predict is going to happen.
01:50:43.760I'm giving you a better insight than these four bimbos on screen.
01:50:46.880If they're who was all located in the vehicle and where they were.
01:50:51.520So I guess I would say from the we will go back to what the camera shows.
01:50:56.640And, I mean, I think that's the clearest indicator of where these, where everyone was.
01:51:01.960You had where Melly was in the back of the vehicle.
01:51:05.700And the forensics team is stating that that is where the initial shots came from, from the back of the vehicle.
01:51:13.400And that's why they are putting this murder on Melly, because they are saying that the shot, initial shot, came from the back seat of the vehicle that was from where Melly was sitting at.
01:52:20.680But if they do it correctly, they can put forensics in.
01:52:24.440I mentioned this before, but they need to make sure they have the phone data.
01:52:28.940They need to make sure that they have any sort of cameras that might have been outside to view the cars.
01:52:35.460They need to get the information from the cars to see where the cars went.
01:52:39.820And so I think if they put all of that forensic data together and they do it well and they analyze it, they can pinpoint what exactly happened.
01:52:48.240You know, as far as the car, we do have the video of the individuals getting into the car.
01:52:53.880And what the prosecution is claiming is, yes, you're right.
01:52:56.800We have Mellie in the back, and he's in the back behind the driver.
01:53:01.680We have Christopher Thomas, who's in the back on the passenger side.
01:54:57.020To me, it looks like she's overworked, and I'm shocked that she doesn't have a second chair with her.
01:54:59.860That's actually really shocking to me.
01:55:01.680But that doesn't mean that the case isn't going to be strong.
01:55:05.240But when it's a circumstantial case, it means you have to sit there and wait and be patient and look for all the pieces of evidence to come out because all the evidence together tells a story.
01:55:12.500You can't go off of one piece here and one piece there.
01:55:16.180You've got to blend everything together.
01:55:18.020And it's amazing to me how so few people don't understand how the justice system works and or how evidence is presented in a case, what circumstantial evidence is, why you need to look at everything.
01:55:30.380Like this case, right, if you just look – even if you look at the little clips here and there, it's not going to do it justice.
01:55:36.040You honestly have to watch damn near the whole trial to really understand everything.
01:55:39.160Obviously, I'm giving it to you guys and summarizing it for y'all, but the case is much more complex than a lot of people want to admit.
01:55:47.140So you have to pay attention to know what the hell is going on.
01:55:49.360But the prosecution absolutely does have a strong case.
01:55:51.240I've broken this down in other videos.
01:55:54.660But the problem is that it's circumstantial.
01:55:57.080But circumstantial cases can be strong cases if you hear out all the pieces of evidence because then it allows you to come to a logical conclusion of, all right, this is the only way that this could have been done.
01:56:05.420And then when you look at, like, the nonsensical story that the defendants came up with, which is what?
01:56:10.780They got hit in a drive-by shooting in a different location, right, like on Interstate 75 or something like that versus it was really proven that they got – they were shot.
01:56:19.560The drive-by shooting was done in a more desolate area by Miramar, and the police went back there, were able to find shards of glass that matched the Jeep, right?
01:56:26.200Like, all these things of evidence, again, though on its own, it doesn't look strong when you put it all together to match up with the phone because the phone is what got them to the area.
01:56:34.520So go back and look for the shards of glass.
01:56:36.460When they tested the shards of glass, it proved that it matched the vehicle that they had in custody.
01:56:39.900See how it all builds upon itself, right?
01:56:43.880You got to have critical thinking skills.
01:56:45.200But a lot of the people, I'll be honest, are fucking retards if I'm going to be all the way 1,000.
01:56:49.540A lot of people are stupid and don't understand how circumstantial evidence works and how you need to pay attention and know every piece of evidence so that it all makes sense.
01:56:58.120So, you know, for all the people saying, oh, yeah, this is a weak case, blah, blah.
02:00:57.520Because what I'll probably do is anytime there's, like, big cases in there on trial live, I could watch it with you guys and give you more insight and everything else like that.
02:01:05.140Because, you know, I totally understand that watching trial can be dry and boring as fuck.
02:01:09.280Which is why so many people don't know what the fuck is going on.
02:01:11.160Because they can't sit there, you know, through all the monotony and all the boringness and be able to siphon, cipher through all the bullshit and be able to get, like, the pertinent information.
02:01:22.440But if y'all enjoy it, man, you want to watch Trials with your boy, Myron Gaines, so I can go ahead and explain shit to y'all, I'd be happy to do that.
02:01:29.400Okay, looks like it's all, it's resounding ones.