self-defense, which is an affirmative defense where you say, in addition there are these facts that exonerate me. is there a suggestion that the jury may get the case today, or will it extend to tomorrow? it s likely. you never know. there are sometimes last-minute motions the judge needs to hear before it gets to jury instructions. jury instructions can take a long time. they re long, often boring, they re confusing, and they can take up a couple of hours sometimes, depending on objections the lawyers have, if there s a charging conference. so they should get the case today, but i wouldn t be that surprised if it got delayed till tomorrow. let s turn back to the rittenhouse case and the verdict found of not guilty late last week. the decision, you know, which is in the national spotlight, rittenhouse has become this sort of figure, hero worship by some of the right. across the left.
they knew he would be eviscerated. he was on the stand because he had to be. the most important part of this case right now is happening today and no one will charge it is the charging conference. as bad as it was, it went as well for the defense as it possibly could because it prevented anyone else from having to testify. if you watch this trial and i know reverend al has to agree with me, it kept attorney golf on his feet. david, just looking at this, i know it s impossible to get inside the minds of jurors, if you are the prosecution, how are you feeling today? if i am the prosecution, i am not resting today. here is a reason why. a senior lawyer told me this when i first started practicing law. if law is all you understand, you are never going to be as any
that. they are complaining about a transcript of a deposition that took place saturday about not having that. the chairman took to the microphones actually in the hearing room to make clear that whatever portions the republicans were seeking for the purpose of today s hearing they would make available and that the process right now is the witness is reviewing that transcript. the other complaints seem to be something about the process being unfair. but they did seem to focus, chuck, on trying to suggest that any crime that doesn t have a first hand witness. so any murder that isn t, you know, caught on video camera or witnessed by a dozen people doesn t result in the murderer going to jail. that s not how our justice system works, is it? thank goodness. i think i can explain this if you give me a moment. please. near or at the end of every federal criminal trial the judge holds what we call a charging conference. she asks both sides to propose
thanks. dana: closing arguments set for tomorrow morning the paul manafort trial. the defense rested earlier today without calling any onces. catherine herridge is live outside the courtroom. where do things stand right now, catherine? in the last half hour, the jury has come back in to the courtroom on the ninth floor of the building behind me. they heard directly from the defense that they will not be presenting witnesses or evidence and that the defense is resting its case. the judge reminded the jury that the defense is under no obligation to prevent a case to rebut the government s arguments. we have a really good sense of the tech talk of the next couple days. there s what is called a charging conference this afternoon where the judge meets with the lawyers so jurors are absent and they talk about the instructions to the jury and whether the parties want to weigh-in or have any objections to what the judge is proposing. he anticipates the closing
technical phase called a charging conference which is when the lawyer and attorneys for both sides run through some of the instruction before closing arguments, and whether the parties may have objections about the course that the judges laying out. as you mentioned, closing arguments are now expected to begin tomorrow morning. both sides have been instructed to keep it to 90 minutes or less. as a final footnote, we have still a lot of mystery surrounding the closed hearing this morning. it was sealed for two hours including the judge and others. there has been a lot of speculation about whether there may have been a problem with one or more of the jurors, but whatever happened at the conference this morning seems to have been resolved at least temporarily and they are moving forward. melissa: thank you so much. let s bring in the dublin barrett, the national security reporter for the washington post and he s been covering this trial.