A renowned pathologist is expected to testify for the defense Monday at the Manhattan trial of a wealthy former pharmaceutical executive charged with murdering her young son.
Werner Spitz, 88, who has investigated the assassinations of John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr., will be the first witness to testify for multimillionaire Gigi Jordan, who is on trial in the 2010 death of 8-year-old Jude Mirra at the five-star Peninsula Hotel.
He did not examine Jude’s body, but reached his findings by reviewing autopsy records supplied by the medical examiner’s office.
Spitz’s findings could pave the way for new defense theories in the case.
Jordan’s lawyers have argued Jude’s death was a preemptive mercy killing, painting her as a mother desperate to protect her son from a life of sexual torture at the hands of his biological father — who was never charged with any such conduct.
Jordan feared being killed by her ex-husband, with whom she was having a bitter financial dispute, and that Jude then would be helpless to defend himself, her lawyers say.
But prosecutors say Jordan, 54, callously forced a fatal cocktail of crushed pills into her autistic and nonverbal son in a luxe room at the Fifth Ave. hotel.
As Jude slipped into death, Jordan, who could not come to grips with his developmental disabilities, coldly transferred money from the child’s trust fund to her account, prosecutors said.
Spitz will be the first witness called by Jordan’s defense team.
In 2004, Spitz was paid $5,000 a day to testify at the trial of Daniel Pelosi, who killed financier Ted Ammon in the Hamptons. He also testified at Casey Anthony’s 2011 trial in Orlando, where he slammed the prosecution’s theory that Anthony suffocated her toddler Caylee with duct tape.
Jordan and toxicologist Alphonse Poklis are also slated to testify in Manhattan Supreme Court.