Seagram heir almost falls in Brooklyn court
Seagram’s liquor company heiress Clare Bronfman nearly collapsed Wednesday while leaving the witness stand at a contentious Brooklyn court hearing, with two EMS workers wheeling her out on a gurney.
Her lawyer Mark Geragos caught his swooning client from behind with both arms and steered Bronfman back to her seat at the defense table after she staggered across the courtroom well. The defendant in the upstate NXIVM sex cult case, her legs temporarily turned to jelly, was spared a tumble when the lawyer stepped up.
The trial was then temporarily halted as the EMS employees placed Bronfman on the gurney and steered her through the courtroom doors to a nearby conference room.
Geragos later left the courthouse with Bronfman (photo) on his arm, and the pair walked side by side to a waiting black SUV before making their exit.
The unsettling episode followed a heated legal battle over whether the deep-pocketed Bronfman had hired recently arrested attorney Michael Avenatti as part of her defense team.
“I want the truth,” said an irate Brooklyn Federal Judge Nicholas Garaufis. “Did she retain Mr. Avenatti to represent her in this case? Yes or no?”
The query led to a sidebar, followed quickly by the 40year-old Bronfman’s woozy walk from the witness stand.
Geragos said afterward that he, Avenatti and the government were indeed negotiating last week, but insisted it was not to work out a plea deal. The defense lawyer added that he was not cooperating with Manhattan prosecutors regarding the Avenatti charges.
The spectacle played out before the assembled media after Garaufis rejected a defense motion to bar reporters from the pretrial hearing in the federal prosecution of the sex cult allegedly headed by Keith Raniere. The defense argued in vain that questions regarding Avenatti and Geragos were potentially prejudicial to their client.
The two sides were gathered for a hearing to determine if there were any conflict-ofinterest issues on Bronfman’s defense team.
The potential problem involves Bronfman’s decision to cover the legal costs of her co-defendants from a trust fund established specifically to pay those bills. The heiress set up the cash reserve a short time before she, too, was indicted in the case.
Garaufis, in his pointed questioning, also asked Bronfman if she was aware that defense attorney Geragos was cited as an unindicted co-conspirator in Avenatti’s alleged attempt to extort $22.5 million from Nike.
“OK, are you aware your attorney Mark Geragos is CC-1?” asked Garaufis.
The defense immediately objected that was hearsay.
Defense attorneys attempted to answer all of the judge’s questions for Bronfman, until Garaufis finally announced, “She’s going to have to answer my questions.”
Minutes later, the courtroom turned to chaos with Bronfman’s unexpected courtroom fade.