THE COURT: Next witness, Miss Lamp?
MS. LAMP: Your Honor, the People call Brigitte Gozowsky to the stand.
THE COURT: Step up please. Raise your right hand. Do you solemnly swear or affirm the testimony you will give in this matter will be the truth, so help you God?
MS. GOZOWSKY: I do.
THE COURT: Come on around here. Watch your step coming up. The chair is on rollers, so be careful. The microphone isn’t going to make you any louder, so you need to make sure you speak up loudly and distinctly for us. State your full name.
THE WITNESS: Brigitte Gozowsky. B-r-i-g-i-t-t-e.
THE COURT: B-r-i….
THE WITNESS: G-i-t-t-e.
THE COURT: And spell your last name.
THE WITNESS: G-o-z-o-w-s-k-y.
THE COURT: Okay, thank you very much. Miss Lamp?
BRIGITTE
GOZOWSKY
Called at 8:03 p.m. by the People, sworn by the court, testified:
DIRECT EXAMINATION
BY MS. LAMP:
Q. Brigitte, do you know Matt Mercier and James Henderson?
A. Yes, ma’am.
Q. And how do you know the two of them?
A. I used to help them out on their farm down the street from my house.
Q.
Would that be the Turn Three Ranch located at
A. Yes, ma’am.
Q. And approximately when did you start helping them out at their farm?
A. Probably in 2001.
Q. Okay. And approximately how long did you work there?
A. Mmm.. Four or five years.
Q. Okay. When I say work, did you get paid for working there?
A. No.
Q. Was there some other arrangement?
A. It was an exchange to ride horses.
Q. Okay. And is Matt Mercier here in the courtroom today?
A. Yes.
Q. Could you point to and identify him and what he’s wearing for the record please?
A. A blue pin stripe suit.
THE COURT: Seated at the table?
THE WITNESS: Yes.
THE COURT: The record will reflect she identified the defendant Mr. Mercier.
BY MS. LAMP:
Q. And is James Henderson, Jr. here in the courtroom today?
A. Yes.
Q. Can you point to and identify him and what he’s wearing please?
A. Gray shirt and pants.
THE COURT: Seated on the bench with the colorful tie?
THE WITNESS: Yes.
THE COURT: Okay. The record will reflect she’s identified Mr. Henderson. Miss Lamp?
BY MS. LAMP:
Q. And Brigitte, did you, Brigitte, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to mispronounce your name. Did you have occasion to drive by that farm on a regular basis between January, 2007, January first, 2007-ish, and through March twentieth of 2007?
A. Every day to go to school.
Q. Okay. And approximately what time would you drive by?
A. Seven in the morning and I’d drive by again at three thirty and five thirty on other days.
Q. Okay. So sometimes at three thirty and sometimes at five thirty?
A. Depending on the day.
Q. Okay. And depending on your class load or whatever?
A. Yes.
Q. Okay. And did you have occasion to observe what was going on there at the farm as you were driving by it on a daily basis?
A. I didn’t really observe too much, but I noticed, you know, I looked around and saw stuff, yes.
Q. What did you see?
A. I saw Matt and then I saw Jim there and that was just about it. Saw the horses.
Q. Approximately when did you see them there?
A. Probably earlier in the mornings and sometimes afternoons.
Q. Did you see James Henderson there on multiple occasions between January and March, in March of 2007?
A. Yes. I saw him there a couple of times.
Q. And when you say you saw him there. Did you see, did you personally see him and say, hey, that’s James Henderson? Could you tell?
A. Yeah, I could tell it was him.
Q. Okay. So it wasn’t just that you were looking at the vehicle, you could see him there on the farm.
A. Yes.
Q. Okay. And approximately how many times had you seen Matt Mercier there between January and mid March of 2007?
A. Quite a few times. I saw him more than I saw Jim down there.
MS. LAMP: Okay. No further questions. Thank you.
THE COURT: So did you actually see him too then?
THE WITNESS: Yes.
THE COURT: You didn’t see a car or something like that, you saw the person?
THE WITNESS: Yes.
THE COURT: All right. Mr. Dungan will have some questions for you, Miss Guzowsky. Mr. Dungan?
CROSS-EXAMINATION(At 8:06 p.m.)
BY MR. DUNGAN:
Q. You saw Jim twice during that time period?
A. Maybe a couple more times than that, but I definitely saw him walking.
Q. Walking where?
A. Like when, there’s a driveway right there where you pull up to the gate and then I’d see him in the background or like not too far off from the gate.
Q. Okay. So any time that you would see him it would be right in the area of the gate.
A. Yes.
Q. All right. Do you see that chart that’s up there?
A. Yes, sir.
Q.
Not the greatest looking chart in the world.
A. Mm-Hmm.
Q. That’s the street that you’d go down.
A. Yes, sir.
Q. That’s the driveway right there?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. With a gate?
A. Mm-Hmm.
Q. Where would you see Jim at?
A. Either—-
Q. You can get up and point if you need to.
A. Either in the driveway or right inside of the gate.
Q. Okay. You never saw him back on the farm?
A. No.
Q.
Never saw him with horses? And as
I understand it, just driving by on
A. I suppose so. But my mother’s a slow driver too, so..
Q. Well, I don’t care how fast she’s going, I mean if there’s trees and stuff in the way and the property slopes up, where you’re not going to see no matter, I don’t care if you’re walking on your hands and knees down there. Right?
A. Well, yeah, there’s trees and everything so you’re only going to see a certain amount of everything.
Q. You’ve testified against Matt before, haven’t you?
A. Yes.
Q. In a civil lawsuit?
A. Yes.
Q. Where Matt sued your family?
A. Yes. And we counter sued back.
Q. And you guys lost.
A. No.
Q. It was over a stud fee, wasn’t it?
A. Yeah, but there was an equal agreement in that in which he did not meet his part of that agreement either.
Q. So it went to court.
A. Yes.
Q. And you guys lost.
A. Mm-Hmm.
MR. DUNGAN: Okay. Thank you. I don’t have any other questions, Your Honor.
THE COURT: Is that a yes?
THE WITNESS: Yes.
THE COURT: So you had a trial is what you’re saying?
THE WITNESS: Yes.
THE COURT: Okay. Miss Lamp, anything further?
MS. LAMP: No, Your Honor. And I’d ask that Brigitte Gozowsky and her mother Denise Gozowsky be excused.
THE COURT: Miss Gozowsky, you mentioned that you helped on the farm for four or five years starting in 2001. Is that correct?
THE WITNESS: Yes, sir.
THE COURT: And you helped on the farm. Is there particular chores that you had?
THE WITNESS: Anything that Matt really needed help with, I would do. If he needed help, you know, feeding the horses, I’d help him with that. If he needed help putting the fencing up, I’d help him with that. I basically just hung out and I did all this just because I wanted to ride horses.
THE COURT: And did there come a time when that relationship ended?
THE WITNESS: Yes.
THE COURT: What year was that?
THE WITNESS: Two thousand and five.
THE COURT: Okay. Was that because of the lawsuit or for some other reason?
THE WITNESS: That was because of prior actions that had happened before the lawsuit.
THE COURT: Unrelated to the lawsuit?
THE WITNESS: No. Related to it.
THE COURT: Okay. And during the period of time that you were there up through 2005, did you see Mr. Henderson at the farm?
THE WITNESS: Yes.
THE COURT: How often would you see Mr. Henderson there on the farm, let’s say on a weekly basis?
THE WITNESS: Maybe once or twice.
THE COURT: What would you see him do?
THE WITNESS: I don’t know, usually every time I saw him he was walking or maybe he was out fixing a tractor in the field.
THE COURT: Doing some work?
THE WITNESS: Yes.
THE COURT: How old are you?
THE WITNESS: Eighteen.
THE COURT: Were you a plaintiff in this law suit or defendant in the law suit, or was it your parents?
THE WITNESS: It was my mother.
THE COURT: You weren’t a party to that law suit. I mean, you weren’t sued, were you?
THE WITNESS: No.
THE COURT: You were just a witness, is that correct?
THE WITNESS: Yes.
THE COURT: Are you here testifying today because your family lost the law suit?
THE WITNESS: No.
THE COURT: All right. Anything further, Miss Lamp?
MS. LAMP: Just a couple questions.
REDIRECT EXAMINATION (At 8:11 a.m.)
BY MS. LAMP:
Q. Brigitte, over the time that you had to observe James Henderson at the farm, how did he treat the animals generally when you observed him?
A. When I was down there helping out on a daily basis?
Q. Yes.
A. It depended on the day. Some days he was a little out of line and he did things that I didn’t agree upon and other days he was fine, he treated the animals well, but on the days that he didn’t, you know, I wouldn’t have wanted to be one of the horses.
Q. Did he and Matt Mercier seem to get along well based on your observations there at the farm?
A. Not quite.
Q. And why would you say that?
A. They argued a lot. It was mostly Jim bickering with Matt.
Q. Was there occasion where your mom asked you to stop working there or didn’t want you to work there anymore?
A. Yes.
Q. And did you stop working there?
A. Yeah, I quit going down there for a while.
Q. And why was that?
A. It was because Jim had poured gasoline on Matt’s lap.
Q. And what was the context of that occurring, if you recall?
A. It was some kind of argument that Jim had started. He was fuming about something and Matt was in the field trying to fix the tractor so he could mow the alfalfa and I don’t know, it just carried on and one thing led to the next. I don’t quite remember what the argument was about, but I remember the incident.
Q. And you told your mother about it.
A. Yes, ma’am.
MS. LAMP: No further questions, thank you.
THE COURT: Mr. Dungan, any further questions?
MR. DUNGAN: No.
THE COURT: Okay, Miss Gozowsky, you may step down. Watch your step there. May she be excused?
MS. LAMP: We would request that both she and her mother Denise be.
THE COURT: That’s fine. Any objections, Mr. Dungan?
MR. DUNGAN: No, sir.
(At 8:14 a.m. witness excused