"Screw you Rusty"

I told you earlier that I was going to write about a couple of interesting trials to keep up the Casey Anthony momentum.  The first one involved the Government's attempt to rob an innocent family of ten gold coins worth about $75 million.  The second one was going to be the Roger Clemens trial.  But, as you know, the judge declared a mistrial on the second day of trial.  So instead of getting into the details at this point, I'll just tell you why everybody yells "Screw you Rusty!" to Clemens' lawyer Rusty Hardin when they see him.

Mr. Hardin represented the estate of J. Howard Marshall, the Texas billionaire who married Anna Nicole Smith.  There was a very long and contentious trial concerning his billion dollar estate.  At one point during Hardin's cross examination of Anna Nicole, she was crying and sobbing while describing her love for her deceased husband. 

"Mrs. Marshall, have you ever taken acting lessons?" Hardin asked. 

"Screw you, Rusty," she shot back.

Now it is not uncommon for people in public to see him in the street and yell "Screw you Rusty!"  And he loves it!  That's hilarious.

Mr. Hardin is known for asking the right questions at the right time.  There is another story on this website about an exchange in the Calvin Murphy trial.  He is the NBA Hall of Famer who was charged with sexually abusing five of his own daughters.  During the cross examination of one of the daughters,  Hardin was getting nowhere with his questions when he suddenly stopped and asked her, point blank, “Do you sometimes make things up?” Amazingly, the daughter answered, “Yes.”

Instead of stopping there, Hardin pressed on. “Is there any way for the jury to tell when you’re making something up?”

“No,” she said.

The jury took less than two hours to acquit Calvin Murphy.