Wayne Bent trial transcripts emerging Online

TRANSCRIPTS

Two frequent contributors to the comments sections of this blog have teamed-up to post written transcripts of the Wayne Bent trial on the Internet.

Sam Redman and Jan Brennan are publishing the transcripts at Redman’s Strong City “mirror site“.

According to Redman’s mirror site, the names of the victims will be redacted from its published transcripts.

Redman is not simply an observer of the Bent case. He appeared on the prosecution’s witness list as a computer forensic expert.  He did not testify, however.

According to the mirror site, Brennan is a true crime author and a romance novel book reviewer.

On December 15, 2008, a jury in Taos, New Mexico found Bent guilty of one count of second-degree criminal sexual contact of a minor and two counts of contributing to the delinquency of a minor.

Fifteen days later, the leader of the Lord Our Righteousness Church was sent to prison for ten years.  He’d received an 18-year sentence with 8 of those years suspended.

As of this writing, the transcripts provided Online include preliminary motion discussion,  the prosecution’s opening statements, defense attorney Sarah Montoya’s opening statement,  Montoya’s direct questioning of Wayne Bent and closing remarks from the prosecution and defense.  The prosecution’s rebuttal to Montoya’s close is also provided.

Expect more to come.

“We will be adding daily and the plan (lord willin’ and the creeks don’t rise) is to do every last word in the trial from gavel to gavel (including Wayne’s last comments, as he is taken from the courtroom in cuffs).  Everyday, there will be more,” Redman wrote to Beyond90Seconds.com in an e-mail received today.

On January 27, 2009, Beyond90Seconds.com addressed its concern about posting the trial “transcripts”. After ordering the transcripts from New Mexico’s Eighth Judicial District, they arrived as audio files on seven CDs.

Reached by telephone, Union County Court Deputy Clerk Karen Vieites explained that the court usually preserves transcripts as audio—not text—files.

While this blog could have posted those audio files, the decision was made not to do so because the names of the victims could be heard throughout the audio recordings.

The considered tasks of removing the victims’ names from seven days of court audio or transcribing the audio and redacting those names would be too time consuming for this blogger.

For reasons of time and sensitivity to the victims, Beyond90Seconds.com decided not to post the transcripts here in any form.

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BACK AT THE RANCH…

Wayne Bent’s son, Jeff, has published a new post at strongcity.info.  Find out what has Bent & “Esther” drawing a line in the sand, here.

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Mark Horner Video & Photography Kit