My Martha Stewart Story Part II
A Dark Celebrity Encounter
Click here to read Part I.
I still remember the courtroom. It was a grand, old-school, cathedral of a room with wood-paneled walls, grand arches, Ionic columns and gold leafing. These elements combined to suggest a commitment to high-minded principles. It was the kind of courtroom you could use for a show trial — to try a deposed king for high treason, for example — but probably overkill when used to railroad a lifestyle personality on trumped up federal charges arising from an innocuous stock trade. All words uttered inside reverberated to the back of the gallery. It was far superior to modern courtrooms, which are built sturdy and are functional, but are not suitable for putting on a show. This was a show.
Somewhere down the hall, there was an “overflow” room with a hundred folding chairs and a TV set up for those who wanted to watch the trial live, but were not fortunate enough to snag a seat inside the courtroom. Despite this internal broadcast, the trial was not available on television for the folks at home. For some reason, I was part of the privileged adult audience who got to watch the action live.
Junior lawyers at big firms generally do not like courtrooms, especially when you are there alone with only a vague sense of what your role is supposed to be. That is what we call a no-upside situation. After two years representing Martha Stewart’s company in this ordeal, I had become irreversibly wary of prosecutors, and there was a pack of them gathered in the front of the room at all times. In my mind, whenever they looked back, they were considering who they were going to indict next. I therefore always averted my eyes down so as never to meet their gaze.
I was mostly there to observe and report. I would go to court each day during the trial, sometimes alternating with another lawyer at the firm, also a mid-level associate, also exhausted, also embittered. We still had to do a bunch of work for this and our other clients, and it was not fun starting your work day at six p.m. because you were sitting in court all day. Each day after court was adjourned, I got into a phone booth somewhere inside the courthouse, dialed into a conference number and told everyone on the company’s executive board what happened in court that day. I then fielded questions, which generally coalesced around the same theme: “What was Martha’s reaction to THAT?”
For those of you who were not alive or don’t remember, in the early 2000s, Martha Stewart was on TV all the time. She had her own lifestyle show and about a dozen different magazines bearing her name, image, and likeness. She was a billionaire on paper. She was the founder, chairperson, CEO, and largest equity holder of a publicly traded company built around her brand. The company had almost 500 employees. Martha Stewart also had a lot of celebrity friends. I know this because we had to read every last one of her e-mails as part of that case.
Word of advice, which all of you will hear but which none will do anything about. Every e-mail you send on your company e-mail can be reviewed by anybody at any time, including your bosses, and you will never know or be able to do anything about it. If your company gets sued, or if you or someone else gets into trouble, your e-mails might even be read by the next me, an overworked junior lawyer at a big firm who doesn’t like his job. In fact, assume they will. Anyway . . .
If the trial was already something of a spectacle, the ubiquitous presence of celebrities in the courtroom cemented this as a high-class circus. Martha Stewart regularly invited one or more of her “closest friends” to appear at her side in court each day. These included Bill Cosby (before the hypocrisy), Barbara Walters (when she was still alive), the actor Brian Dennehy (also RIP), and Rosie O’Donnell (Huh? Why?). Note to self: if Bill Cosby offers to accompany you as a show of support at your criminal trial, reminder to plead guilty.
But the consequential celebrity story for me involved someone who wasn’t yet a celebrity at the time, although he would eventually become one.
One day towards the end of the trial, I had already claimed my preferred seat in the courtroom, which was on the far-left side facing towards the judge’s bench, about a half dozen rows behind the defense table. All the action was taking place in front of me and to the right. If you wanted to be close enough to see the action, but inconspicuous enough so that the press wouldn’t ask you any questions, this was an excellent seat. You could also scurry out of the room quickly without the press or the prosecutors noticing you.
There was a bustle in the courtroom that day, as everyone knew that there was a chance that the star prosecution witness, Mariana Pasternak, was going to testify. The word was that the witness, Martha Stewart’s former best friend, was going to recount what Martha had told her on the plane right after hanging up the phone with her stockbroker (’s assistant). Even Barbara Walters had returned to the courtroom that day to get close to the action.
Right before the afternoon proceedings were about to start, one of the executives I knew from Martha Stewart’s company, our client, approached me. Next to her was a well-dressed man with short, dark, curly hair, probably a few years older than me. She introduced her companion as Chris, a lawyer who was now a journalist, and asked whether it was okay if he could sit next to me “in case he had any questions.” I said sure, even though I hoped he didn’t ask me any. I leaned back to allow him sit to my right (because I obviously preferred the aisle), but he settled in the choice aisle seat next to me on my left. My seat.
Although we were just introduced, I already knew who Chris was. His brother, Andrew, had recently been a lawyer at my firm, and would later serve as the governor of New York State, just like their father, Mario Cuomo, had served several decades earlier. Chris, in fact, was briefly a lawyer in my firm as well, although his tenure predated my arrival. I knew him as Christopher Cuomo, a news guy that I saw on TV from time to time. I don’t know whether he knew anything about me or my role with Martha Stewart’s company. I do know he’s not writing about me twenty years later.
The gavel was struck and the afternoon proceedings commenced. Chris Cuomo took out his pad and took copious notes. He was diligent and studious and he did actually end up asking me some questions, always in a loud whisper. Thankfully, they weren’t about my opinions, they were more technical, like “why did he object,” or “where is she going with those questions?” I was always careful in my responses because sound traveled so aggressively in that room.
The previous witness was excused, left the stand, and walked out of the courtroom. After the door swung closed there was a deep silence that engulfed the courtroom. Who was going to be the next witness?
And that’s when it happened.
I didn’t anticipate it. No one could have seen it coming. But it did happen exactly as described.
With a silent courtroom as the backdrop, Chris Cuomo let out the loudest fart I’ve ever heard.
There was no mistaking what it was. It wasn’t a creak, a shuffle, or a bang. There was no seat-shift, bag-drop, or cough that was going to create reasonable doubt. It was the Fart Heard Round the World.
But here’s the kicker. I was so shocked, and to this day I’m not sure why I did this, but I reflexively looked to my right to see if anyone in the courtroom would have a reaction. They must have heard it, after all. The acoustics of the old, ornate room acted as an accelerant. George Lucas, with the most advanced technical tools at his disposal, could never have dreamed of such perfect surround sound. The gallery was enveloped by its reverberations.
Every face turned towards where the sound was coming from. Take a wild guess whose face they met on the other end of their stares. You guessed it. It was mine, the junior lawyer who wanted nothing more than to stay out of sight.
Chris Cuomo, because he’s such a freaking pro, never looked up from his note pad, instinctively knowing that it was not going to be him that took the heat for this. In fact, no one could even see him, as I was upright looking towards everyone else, while Chris was huddled next to me with his head buried in his notes. I suspect he was just writing “Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!..” over and over.
While I gazed slack-jawed at the faces of a hundred accusing strangers, there was one face that I recognized above all others. Our eyes met. It belonged to Barbara Walters. Barbara Walters, giving me the ol’ stink eye.
In a criminal case defined by intertwining story lines of corporate greed, celebrity hubris, class-contempt, misogyny, schadenfreude, and prosecutorial overreach, there is one moral reality that is inescapable.
If there was one person in that courtroom who deserved to be thrown in prison, it wasn’t Martha Stewart. It was Chris Cuomo.
The End.
This is some of your best work. I inherited Chris Cuomo's extension at the firm. Every time I called my now husband and then boyfriend, he would freak out because the caller ID would say C. Cuomo. So at least I will always have that (and now your Fart story). Keep going, I love your work!
Shame on Chris Cuomo!!! Hahaha!