From the cutting room floor: Cameron Brown murder retrial closing arguments - Part II
- Key-Marer sought child support from Brown through the Orange County District Attorney's Office. He ended up paying approximately $1,000 per month for "a child he didn't want." "And $1,000 a month is a lot of money to a guy like the defendant," who was working as a baggage handler, living on a boat, surfing, skiing and "having a great time."
- Brown told a friend he wanted to get the support reduced by asking for more visitation with Lauren. He askes for joint legal custody with 32 percent visitation - about four months per year. At that point, he still had not met Lauren. "How would he know what's in Lauren's best interests? He's never even met her." "We all know the reason he's doing this is to cut his child support and that's what he cares about - himself - and that's all he cares about." "It's all about the money."
- The initial visits with Lauren go OK until Brown begins telling Lauren that his own mother is an evil, bad person (Key-Marer had begun visiting Lynn Brown with Key-Marer and allowing the two to foster a grandmother-granddaughter relationship).
- Then, Key-Marer offers to have her new husband adopt Lauren, and Brown agrees. "Why would Sarah lie about that?" Brown tells his friend he's "happy" to give Lauren up for adoption because he and his fiancee, Patti, are planning to move to Utah. Brown insists the adoption goes through right away, and gives Key-Marer 30 days or "things are gonna get ugly." This was approximately one month before Brown got married.
- But, Patti wants a family and she is 47, so can't have kids. "There is no way she will give up Lauren; she wants her for herself." Brown didn't want that, so he knows he needs to finalize the adoption before he gets married.
- But when Key-Marer puts in court documents that Brown agreed to the adoption, he gets angry because everyone finds out. Brown threatened Key-Marer: "I'm gonna get you for this" and "what goes around comes around." "He sure made good on those promises, didn't he?" Brown is "vindictive, angry" because there is no way now he will get what he wants, so he becomes "despiteful, nasty."
- "He'll pay her back for this." "Clearly the defendant is using Lauren as a tool to punish Sarah."
- Meanwhile, Lauren refuses to talk about what happens during her visits with "Papa Cam." (that was the nickname Key-Marer made for him). She does, however, come home and say: "Papa Cam is gonna put you in jail for stealing my money" and "you're a bad mommy."
- Brown made "false accusations" of child abuse against Key-Marer in court documents. He lied and told a neutral court mediator that Lauren told him Key-Marer kicked her, threw down in the kitchen and grabbed her face with her fingers. "The defendant is using Lauren to hurt Sarah." "And the defendant also does things to try to torment Sarah through Lauren."
- (in response to the defense argument that some of the things Brown did was bad parenting - like trying to put her on his motorcylce without a helmet, throwing her in a pool when she can't swim, having her ride in the front seat - and without a car seat and telling her to get her suitcase from the middle of the street): "That's not bad parenting skills" but "designed to get back at Sarah." "It's calculated to terrorize Sarah when Lauren was out of her sight." It shows the lengths to which the defendant will go to hurt Sarah, and how much he hated her and how vindictive he was. "It's payback for messing up his life."
- (at this point, Key-Marer appears to be crying while sitting in the audience listening). "She was the perfect tool the defendant could use to hurt Sarah."
- On the morning of Nov. 8, 2000, Lauren was happy on the way to school, singing and chatting with her mother in the car. But when Key-Marer told her her father was picking her up from school that day, Lauren began to cry, and doesn't stop. "Lauren cries the entire day." "The last time Sarah sees her daughter she's crying and she cries all day long."
- She is still crying when Brown picks her up. (Key-Marer had testified she had checked up on Lauren by phone during the day and then decided to come to the school to stop the court-ordered visitation - deciding to deal with the consequences of disobeying the court over putting Lauren through this. But the teacher said it was too late - Brown arrived early).
- Noting how upset Key-Marer is, even nine years later, Hum said: "He's nasty, vindictive and spiteful. How Lauren's death effects her nine years later and it's just what the defendant hoped."
- After Lauren's death, Brown never said anything to Key-Marer about how she died, "no matter how much she begged, pleaded and cried." "No matter what, the defendant refused to tell her about the last minutes of her daughter's life." When she called, he "mocked" her, pretending not to hear by saying, "Hello? Hello?" "That's how much he hated her, he enjoyed torturing her."
- Detectives put a microphone on Key-Marer and sent her to confront Brown outside his job at LAX. She begged him for information about Lauren's death, and he replied repeatedly: "I'm ignorning you" in a "childlike" way. He doesn't deny responsibility, but taunts her and enjoys it.
- After that incident, Brown told the police that Key-Marer cursed and threatened him and said he wanted her prosecuted. "That was a flat-out 100 percent lie and it's on tape that that's a lie." This, too, "shows how much he truly hated her" that he was willing to have the mother of his dead child arrested and prosecuted on false accusations. "Who does that? This man does that." "It shows what he's capable of." - At the time of her death, Lauren was four years, two months and 10 days old.
- She was warm, upbeat, happy, friendly, cheerful, affectionate and well-behaved. Riding the slide and the swings at the park was as daring as she got. She was careful, cautious, afraid of heights and not the "down and dirty type." She was scared of a worm, screaming that it was a snake. She got scared when she came too close to the side of the Huntington Beach Pier. "Do you really think that a little girl like Lauren is gonna lead the defendant on a hike to Inspiration Point? There's just no way."
- At least a dozen people testified about Lauren - she would absolutely not hike. In August 2000, she was the only child on a camping trip that refused to hike. "There is no way that the defendant's story is true."
- There were other witnesses that were important to corroborate not just Key-Marer's word, but to show "absolutely unequivocally that the defendant is a liar and that he's lying about what happens on Nov. 8."
End of Part II. Stay tuned for Part III.
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Larry Altman has covered crime in the South Bay since 1990. He's seen it all - the missing model who turned up dead in the desert, the wives found dead in trunks, the high-school coaches who get a little too close to their players. He drives his young colleagues nuts with his "I remember when" stories. He welcomes your tips and observations about the present, and you can mix in a little Lakers basketball talk if you like.
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Excellent recap Denise. You captured a good portion of the highlights of Hum's opening argument.
Thanks Denise! Waiting for Part III of closing arguments.
Please post anything you hear about the verdict coming in.
This is an interesting experiment that I will likely not replicate in the future!
The motive in this case was always said to be money. Yet it is said that the defendant did not allow the adoption by Key-Marer and her husband {which would have cancelled the child support} because the adoption was not completed within 30 days and before he was to be married. He could not have postponed his marriage? You state that "everyone finds out" that he was going to surrender custody. So the secret was out. This whole thing does not make a whole lot of sense. And if one hates someone enough to commit murder it seems logical that the one they would want to kill would be the one that they hate the most. Not their own blood. Can you clarify this for me?
Diego: I have to admit, this element has never been 100 percent clear to me either. I *think* what the prosecution is saying here is that this adoption business shows, first, how willing Brown was to give-up Lauren and how not willing his soon-to-be wife was. I believe it also ties in to the prosecution theory that Brown sought vengeance on Sarah through Lauren. Your point was fleshed out more in the defense argument (which I'll hopefully post today) in which the defense says - why not get back at the one you're really mad at if you're going to kill? or something like that. I hope this helps a little bit.
A few possible reasons Cam Brown went after Lauren instead of Sarah:
1. Sarah suffered more from Lauren's death than she would have from her own, from November 2000 to this day;
2. had Sarah been unable to care for Lauren, Cam most likely would have contined to be responsble - fiscally and otherwise - for Lauren; and
3. it would be much more difficult to get Sarah into a vulnerable position than it was to do so with Lauren.
The way I understood it was:
1) Cameron wanted the adoption done within 30 days--before he married Patty Kaldis.
2) When Sarah filed court papers and mentioned it, Cameron denied he ever agreed to it.
3) Patty wanted custody of Lauren. I don't think Cameron ever told Patty he agreed to the adoption. After that came up in the papers I think he was trapped.
4) We know Cameron was not truthful and that was proven with the tape at LAX and the charges Cameron tried to file against Sarah.