Trial of Rebecca Grossman, accused of killing two boys with her car, comes to a close

LOS ANGELES (CN) — The fate of Rebecca Grossman, a wealthy woman living in the West San Fernando Valley who is accused of hitting and killing two young boys with her car, will soon be in the hands of the jury.

Prosecutors say Grossman was under the influence of alcohol and valium, speeding at 81 mph in a 45 mph zone, shortly before striking 11-year-old Mark Iskander and his 8-year-old brother Jacob as they crossed the street with their mother Nancy. Grossman was charged with two counts of second-degree murder, two counts of vehicular manslaughter and one count of hit and run since she fled the scene after the crash, though her car's safety features disabled the vehicle about a quarter of a mile down the road.

"We are all here today because Mark and Jacob Iskander are not here," Deputy District Attorney Jamie Castro said in her closing statement Wednesday. "This was not a tragic accident. This was murder. Rebecca Grossman, after drinking, drove at 81 miles per hour in a residential area, in her own neighborhood. And she hit and she killed these two precious children in a crosswalk."

Grossman's attorney blamed the tragedy on Grossman's then-lover Scott Erickson, a former professional baseball player, with whom Grossman had been having margaritas at a nearby Mexican restaurant. Grossman was at the time separated from her husband, Peter Grossman, a renowned plastic surgeon.

Erickson and Grossman were by most accounts racing each other, speeding and weaving between lanes shortly before the crash. The defense team argued Erickson's car hit the two boys first, likely fatally, followed by Grossman's car which also hit them.

"Where is Scott Erickson?" said Grossman's lawyer Tony Buzbee, in his Texas drawl, during his closing argument. "Where is the guy? If I was accused of murdering and killing those two kids, I’d be beating the courthouse door down. Where is he?"

Erickson was charged with reckless driving and agreed to appear in a public service video about safe driving in lieu of jail time.

Buzbee, with hyperbolic flourish, dismissed the prosecution's case as "weak" and "grasping at straws."

"They're trying to convict this woman of manslaughter — I mean, murder is off the table," he said, adding: "She ain’t guilty of anything."

Much of the physical evidence supported the prosecution's narrative — pieces of Grossman's white Mercedes SUV found at the scene and the damage done to her vehicle. Grossman herself, when approached by a Sheriff's deputy on the side of the road, appeared disoriented. Her airbag had gone off, and though she wasn't aware that she had hit anyone, she didn't deny it and started crying, as if the weight of what she'd done was setting in.

Nancy Iskander testified that she saw a black SUV hurtling down the road and dove, pushing her youngest son out of the way. As she turned back, she saw the white SUV hurtling through the crosswalk at the exact point her two other sons were. She did not see the car hit the boys but insisted, "I know who killed them. I'm the one that loves them most on the face of this earth."

Grossman's lawyers sought to interject Erickson at every turn, despite the fact that pieces of his own black Mercedes SUV were not found at the scene and that his vehicle hadn't disabled itself. Buzbee repeatedly argued that investigators made an egregious error by not tracking down Erickson and examining his car.

A district attorney's investigator testified for the defense that Erickson had been "cold plating" — using one license plate for two different black SUVs — a felony — perhaps in order to avoid paying two vehicle registration fees, perhaps as a way of covering up a crime. And in one of the most dramatic and emotional days of the four-week trial, Grossman's daughter Alexis testified Erickson was hiding in the bushes as her mother was questioned by the sheriff's deputy. When confronted, Erickson threatened Alexis. Alexis said she never told anyone about the encounter, with the exception of her parents and an earlier defense attorney who has since died.

"Alexis Grossman is clearly a victim of her mother’s manipulation," Castro, the deputy DA, said Wednesday, calling the move an act of desperation.

Rebecca Grossman declined to testify at trial.

Many of the key facts in the case were fought over tooth-and-nail by both sets of lawyers. Prosecutors said Grossman had been driving 81 mph, braking gently a second and a half before the crash. Buzbee argued she had been doing just 52 mph. Where the two boys were in relation to the crosswalk, which lane they were in, how impaired Grossman was, how well lit the street was, and whether the neighborhood was "residential" or "recreational" were similarly subjects of dispute.

To prove the murder charge, prosecutors must convince the jury that Grossman acted with implied malice — that she acted with a conscious disregard for human life, that she knew that she what she was doing was endangering human life. If convicted of second-degree murder, Grossman could face up to 34 years in prison.

A vehicular manslaughter conviction carries a far lesser sentence. For that, prosecutors simply must prove Grossman acted with gross negligence.

When not casting blame on Erickson, Buzbee spent much of his closing argument telling the jury that many of the key facts of the case were unknowable.

"This case has been an incredibly tough puzzle to put together," he said, in part because of errors made in the investigation, which he described as "horrible," dubbing the investigators the "C-team." Chiefly among their failures, according to Buzbee: Not chasing down Erickson until a week after the crash, not discovering Erickson's second black Mercedes and examining it, failing to photograph every piece of evidence at the crime scene and allowing certain pieces of evidence to be moved and later destroyed.

"Was this a perfect investigation?" Castro asked. "No, it was not." But, she added, "In the end, we know that based on the evidence, that they got it right."

Rebuttals continue Thursday.

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