Manhattan prosecutors came out swinging today against claims by philanthropist Brooke Astor’s swindling son that a furor among his deliberating jurors voids his October conviction.
Anthony Marshall had moved in February to have his conviction tossed on grounds that a lone, holdout juror was pressured to flip and convict when she was threatened in the jury room by another female juror.
But in papers filed today with the trial judge, Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Kirke Bartley, assistant district attorney Joel Seidemann offered sworn affidavits by 11 jurors saying the holdout juror’s intimidation claims are pure bunk.
Besides, the holdout — attorney Judi DeMarco, a legislative researcher for Mayor Bloomberg’s communications company — “was unwilling to attest to the truth of that story.”
Marshall’s lawyers have claimed that in speaking to a defense investigator after the conviction, DeMarco had accused fellow juror Yvonne Fernandez of flashing “gang signs,” and making references to gang violence during the heat of deliberations. But DeMarco has not since repeated or confirmed that accusation.
And Fernandez, a producer for TruTV, has adamantly denied threatening the holdout. “I don’t even know any gang signs!” she told the post in February.
Marshall, 85, was sentenced to one-to-three years prison on Dec. 21, following his conviction for stealing millions of dollars from his Alzheimer’s stricken mother.
He and his now-disbarred estates lawyer co-defendant, Francis Morrissey — who was also convicted, and who joined Marshall in the current juror-furor bid to void the conviction — remain free pending the outcome of their yet-filed appeals, a process that could leave them at liberty for years.
The defendants are due back in court May 21; the judge has yet to say when he’ll issue a decision.