The court room was packed with many of Chris’ loyal friends, family and supporters and those that could not be there in person sent warm wishes of support and love.  And of course everyone in the room felt sorrow for the victim’s families.

Chris’ words to the court were poised, genuine and honest. He expressed his heart felt thoughts to the victim’s families while still maintaining his innocence.

This week there was a horrible portrayal of the case printed in Newsday – and of course ALL of the facts that clearly contradict the government’s case were left out. The writer shared a one-sided account of the case he was TOLD to tell rather than actually doing any obvious research himself.  Not to mention one of the three “cold case rookies” had already charged and convicted another man (who is still serving time) for the murder of Louis Dorval many years ago. It seems he needs to go back to the basics and explain how he was able to charge two men for the same murder – which happened at different times and under different circumstances.

There will be updates posted once the appeal process is underway.  Thanks for your support.

Chris’s legal team has been working tirelessly reviewing the case and the governments position. After some serious consideration and review, it looks like they found solid ground for dismissal of count one.

The statute used to charge Chris is titled “Destruction of Motor Vehicle”. It was originally created many, many years ago regarding the destruction of commercial vehicles – trains, airplanes and buses – as a result of terrorist activity. The statute states that there must be clear intention to to damage a vehicle or the operator of a vehicle. In the case of count one, the alleged crime should have been considered nothing more than a sidewalk robbery. Based on testimony, there was no malicious attempt to disable or hurt the driver. The crime might be punishable as a robbery – but of course there is no shortage of compassion for Mr. Baumgardt or his family. But it is not fair or constitutional for the government to make arrests and file charges under a law that does not match the events. Mr. Baumgardt was not inside the vehicle during the accidental shooting and further, testimony from witnesses showed that the description of the “man” that was supposedly Chris, matched the description of Scott Mulligan. In addition, an eye witness on the scene who has known Chris for many years said that the voice he heard was NOT Chris’.

In addition, Scott Mulligan was arrested and charged under the same statute. It is clear that prosecutors also arrested him under a fake/made up charge just to further develop a case against Chris. So all of their discussions and cooperation tactics upon arrest of Mulligan were done falsely. I bet now, Scott wishes he hadn’t taken a plea so fast. Wait till he hears that he might have been sitting in jail this whole time for no reason. I guess desperation does have it’s disadvantages!

During the trial, the government kept Mulligan in the dark about that statutes conditions – knowing that he might have second guessed his plea and or cooperation agreement. That would have created a hardship in their case against Chris. Without Scott (although his testimony was filled with perjury) the government would have had a very hard time convicting Chris.

The second motion filed was to recuse Judge Seybert, who according to Chris’ lawyers and bystanders aided in government misconduct by knowing about the statute and how it wasn’t applicable. Further, she allowed the government to move on an arrest of Mulligan and obtain evidence under a statute that does not even apply to the charges. She also told Mr. Mulligan that he faced a mandatory life sentence unless he cooperated. It was noticed and said throughout the trial that Judge Seybert showed bias and favorability to the government for the duration of the case – and this motion is the final straw.

We expect for Seybert to deny both motions (as she typically does) and Chris’ lawyers will go straight to the United State Court of Appeals.

We are getting lots of questions about the case and why the government has left out many VERY important facts that lead to Chris’ innocence. If you read some of the posts from last week, some of your questions may be answered.

Thanks Again!

I miss you bro. My prayers are with you today. Love for Life stay strong. I would give anything for my baby to meet her Uncle one day soon. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxox

G ]]> http://www.supportchristarantino.com/?feed=rss2&p=337 0 http://www.supportchristarantino.com/?p=329 http://www.supportchristarantino.com/?p=329#comments Thu, 10 May 2012 23:18:04 +0000 Admin http://www.supportchristarantino.com/?p=329 Continue reading →]]> This is a revised and updated post with some additional facts! Please read it!

Wednesday –  both the govt and the defense rested their case. The jury is now deliberating.

In closing arguments the govt argued that Chris hired Bressman to kill Garguilo.  However, there is no evidence of that at all.  They are relying heavily on a 3 minute phone call that Bressman made to Chris days before the murder. They of course ignore the fact that those same phone records also show several other calls that Bressman made to his friends during the same time period. His call to Chris was NOT unusual or out of the ordinary. Bressman’s calls were NOT indicative of planning a murder and there are NO facts to support that. It would be fair to say however that he was “drunk dialing” after a 12 hour crack binge!

It is also clear that the govt’s motive  - which tries to position that Chris killed Garguilo to prevent Garguilo from turning over a tape to the FBI – makes ZERO sense. The timeline shows that Garguilo was leaving threatening messages on Scott Mulligan’s answering machine 10 months before the murder. Why on earth would Chris or anyone wait that long just to hire a crackhead to kill Garguilo ONE YEAR LATER? It makes NO sense at all.

The defense showed that Garguilo was killed in a drug related incident. The govt’s own witnesses testified that Vinny and Bressman were friends and drug addicts and that Bressman had sold Vinny drugs in the past – and that he was trying to sell Vinny drugs just the week before the incident.  Phone records show a direct relationship between Bressman, Vinny, and Vinny’s then roommate.

As far as Scott Mulligan and his testimony – all I can say is that nothing he said had any direct connection to Chris murdering Vinny. It is that simple.

Evidence showed that Bressman and Amador were both junkies at the time of the murder. Whether Vinny owed them money, or they just wanted to rob him of drugs they thought he may have had on him, or they were just on a delusional crack binge, we may never know for sure.

What we do know is that an eye-witness to the shooting testified that he saw an Hispanic male with a tattoo of colorful wings on his arm shoot Vinny in the head – this matches Amador’s description exactly! The eyewitnesses statement has not changed in all these years – despite the govt’s despicable attempt at trying to make him look like a liar. It’s funny that the gov’t tried to argue that this eyewitness lied because he wanted two free nights in a hotel room -ludicrous!  So this eyewitness had to guess that Amador had a colorful winged tattoo – Amador took off his shirt and there it was – wow this eyewitness must be psychic!!!

The government also noted that Amador’s fingerprints were found on a beer can located inside of a nearby phone booth. This is consistent with the defense theory because Amador’s roommate said that Amador and Bressman left the apartment hours before the actual shooting. That gave them plenty of time to go to the location and scope it out before leaving to come back later when they expected Vinny to show up. Amador must have left the beer can there when they were casing the scene earlier.

Lastly – Amador was arrested with a 22 caliber gun in September 2003 and that was the the same caliber gun used to kill Garguilo.

What does all of this this mean?  That AMADOR shot and killed Vinny in the head – not Bressman – and that Amador’s story was a TOTAL FABRICATION designed to help him avoid a life sentence.  That seems to be a recurring theme in this case – the gov’t gives ridiculous deals to criminals without verifying major parts of their testimony, as long as they incriminate Chris.  Enough is enough.

Let’s hope the jury sees that the dots just don’t add up. They will return on Monday to continue their deliberation. Thanks for your support!

Alex ]]> http://www.supportchristarantino.com/?feed=rss2&p=320 0