by TChris

A federal perjury charge must be supported by the testimony of two witnesses, or of one witness whose story is supported by an independent document. But what does "independent" mean?

Richard M. Strassberg, the lawyer for Martha Stewart's stockbroker and co-defendant, Peter E. Bacanovic, argued in response to a question from the jury that an "independent" document must be a document created by someone other than the testifying witness. That would seem a sensible interpretation. If the function of a second witness is to provide independent corroboration of the testimony of the first witness, it would stand to reason that a document which substitutes for the second witness should come from a second, "independent" source.

Unfortunately for Bacanovic, that isn't the way Judge Miriam Goldman Cedarbaum reads the law.

Judge Cedarbaum's ruling said effectively that the requirement was fulfilled by the testimony of an employee of Ms. Stewart's, Ann E. Armstrong, and phone logs kept by Ms. Armstrong.

The judge said that there were two reasons why the two pieces of evidence in question were independent and legitimate: Ms. Armstrong did not rely on the phone log for her testimony, and the phone logs were legitimate documents because they had been kept "in the normal course of business."

The judge gave that answer to the jury this morning. The jury continues its deliberations today on the charges against Baconovic and Stewart.