The Los Angeles Times has an article on the mock trial the prosecution staged in the Kobe Bryant case.
They wanted to gauge how their chief witness would hold up under hostile cross-examination.
The answer: Disastrously.
For more than three hours, a lawyer playing the role of Bryant defense attorney Pamela Mackey pounded away at the accuser and the account she had given police. The lawyer pointed out that in her police statement the woman said she had kissed Bryant consensually for five minutes before the alleged assault.
“All right, let’s start now,” the lawyer said, looking at his watch.
For the next 60 seconds the courtroom was silent.
“You’re still kissing him,” the lawyer broke in, continuing to look at his watch. “You kissed him for four more minutes.”
“That’s too long,” she responded. “We didn’t kiss that long.”
The lawyer pounced: “Well, you said five minutes.”
The woman crumbled, and seven days later so did the criminal case against Bryant, superstar guard of the Los Angeles Lakers and one of the nation’s wealthiest and most celebrated sports figures.