'He was not going to go along' - Reaction to Jose Bodega's testimony — Yella Beezy MO3 Murder Trial

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: Okay, well, we finally got Theodore Thomas and Jose Bodega, or a.k.a. Jose Bodega, this afternoon, and this did not go the way that they expected, right? [00:00:14] Speaker 2: It didn't appear that way to me, Tonya. All right, Zeke, you got something? [00:00:18] Speaker 1: I'm just going to grab this real quick. Oh, okay. Oh, there he goes. Okay, yeah, see, Zeke doesn't really like being in the shot. Okay, no, I didn't fall asleep, folks. I'm reading your comments. I did not fall asleep. [00:00:29] Speaker 2: No, we stayed away, because this was the part we were waiting for. [00:00:32] Speaker 1: No, this was the most interesting testimony that we heard all day, and frankly, the entire trial. So, to recap, you know, Jose Bodega, Theodore Thomas, he had taken the fifth last week, and over the weekend, they hammered out some kind of immunity deal to allow him to testify, and when he got on the stand, and when he got on the stand, right after lunch, it was very clear, very fast. Very fast. That he was not going to go along. No. And then suddenly he had, he said he lied about everything, and, you know, they were pulling teeth. [00:01:15] Speaker 2: And the state had to treat him as a hostile witness, and he still wasn't really forthcoming with anything. But watching it, his cross-examination that was done by attorney Toby Shook, it was like day and night. He was just answering everything Toby said, asked him, right, right, right. Suddenly he found his words. Yes, suddenly he found his words. He remembered things. [00:01:50] Speaker 1: His memory got really better. [00:01:52] Speaker 2: Yes, yes. And, but it wasn't in favor of the state. No. It was all, you know, very beneficial for Yellow Bee, excuse me, Yellow Beezy's defense. [00:02:05] Speaker 1: Well, and I thought what was really interesting was, you know, this timeline that he is facing 25 years. He's been an administrative seg for months, and he's getting word that he's facing a potential RICO case, and that's going to carry a life sentence. And suddenly. [00:02:26] Speaker 2: So does he have motivation to tell the DA what they want to hear? Perhaps. Perhaps he did have motivation to not be truthful in what he was telling the state, what he was telling the government. Now, Tanya and I did look up over the break about his dismissal from that STEPS program, which is sentencing. Let me. Oh, I had it pulled up. I had it right here. Hold on. Let me. Sentencing to equip people for success. And it's just a dismissal. It's not a dismissal with prejudice. [00:03:04] Speaker 1: So they could theoretically come back and file on him. [00:03:08] Speaker 2: So perhaps they could come back on him because he did not do what he contracted to do, which was to be truthful in any testimony. [00:03:18] Speaker 1: Right. You see that happening potentially? [00:03:20] Speaker 2: It's possible it could happen. I mean, here he was looking at 25 years to maybe even a life sentence, and he got a dismissal on all that. I mean, I know very few people that get dismissals from the feds. Right. [00:03:36] Speaker 1: Yeah, I know. I was kind of shocked because I had never heard of that program. I hadn't either. I was like, what is this program? [00:03:41] Speaker 2: I was like, okay, so this must be some kind of deferred adjudication, I mean, deferred prosecution program for the feds. [00:03:47] Speaker 1: I'm like, I didn't know they had it. Maybe they, I had never heard of it, but, you know, basically 72 hours after, this is what Toby pointed out, that 72 hours after he had, you know, given his interview with the feds and apparently detailed a whole bunch of different stuff, he gets accepted into this program. Right, right, right. Is that a coincidence? I, it, you know. [00:04:11] Speaker 2: Now, Tonya, some things I found interesting in his cross-examination with, with Attorney Shook was the fact that he, you know, the trap house that they were talking about, Jerry's trap house, Yellow Beasy wasn't affiliated with that. Right. Um, and the question that Toby was asking him about the cell phones. Right. And what it's, if his cell phone, if Yellow Beasy's cell phone was pinging out in, where, Collin County? [00:04:46] Speaker 1: Mm-hmm. [00:04:47] Speaker 2: So that's leading me to believe that the defense must have some cell phone records and a cell phone expert that they may be introducing here to testify that, um, the things that Kewan was, excuse me, not Kewan, that Jose Bodega was talking about, what he told the feds, what he told the DA's office, it's not true. [00:05:12] Speaker 1: Right. [00:05:13] Speaker 2: And the cell phone would back that up. [00:05:15] Speaker 1: It's all very interesting and fascinating, and this clearly, clearly did not go the way that prosecutors anticipated. It seems like they thought they had cut this deal, this immunity deal, and they were going to get him in there. It wasn't to say that they weren't still going to have problems on cross-examination, but they were thinking that they had something hammered. It seems like, I mean, I've not talked to them, but it seems like they thought that they had something hammered out. [00:05:47] Speaker 2: And then they didn't. And then they didn't. [00:05:50] Speaker 1: And that's a, that's a real, that's a real problem for them. Because right now, we are, we are, we have now completed five days of a trial, and so far, I have not seen, um, I just have, I, you know, I, are you seeing it so far, five days in? [00:06:12] Speaker 2: No, I'm not, no, I'm not, and I'm not on anybody's side on this, but just, you know, a legal observer, but I'm, I'm not seeing it. Um, I don't know who else the state's going to call. Maybe those individuals will help tie up some loose ends, but, you know, what I was sitting here wondering about, and, um, some of the viewers about perjury charges being filed against, um, Jose Bodega, and, you know, just regular perjury is a misdemeanor. But there is aggravated perjury, which is a third-degree felony, and maybe what he has done here today rises to the level of aggravated perjury. [00:06:59] Speaker 1: Could be. Of course, I think he's got bigger problems than aggravated perjury. Oh, he has a lot. A lot of potential bigger problems. [00:07:05] Speaker 2: If the feds go back on that deal. Right. [00:07:09] Speaker ?: Yeah. [00:07:09] Speaker 1: But, yeah, he's got some issues on his hands, and someone's asking me, how do you think, um, and I'll ask you this, Valerie, how do you think the state turns this way? How do you think the state turns this around? [00:07:19] Speaker 2: It's going to be hard. That's why I said, I don't know who else, you know, we were talking about this, Tonya, about Detective Barnes's testimony, but all he can do is just show the evidence that he's, he gathered. He's not a fact witness, really. I mean, he can't say, yes, I saw this, and I saw that, I looked at the cameras, and we saw this. [00:07:43] Speaker 1: I mean, because ideally what you want him to do is come in and essentially back up what we got in this testimony today, if we had gotten the testimony that the state had anticipated, and that clearly just didn't happen. So, I don't know. You know, normally when you're five days in on a trial, you have a pretty solid sense of where things are headed, and you have a feeling of, okay, they're getting there, and we just really haven't seen that yet. So, I don't know. I find it, again, we could have a surprise witness. But I also think that if they'd have had that, we would have saw it in Kiwan White, right? If they had something, they would still have to turn it over to the defense. [00:08:29] Speaker 2: Yeah, they would have, but I don't know necessarily with that one, because they had Kiwan on so many other things. [00:08:36] Speaker 1: Yeah, they had Kiwan dead to rights, for sure. So.