Martha Didn't Lie, Just Dumb: Lawyer

By Stephen M. Silverman

Wednesday March 03, 2004 06:12 PM EST

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Martha Stewart and Peter Bacanovic: Dumb and dumber?

In his closing arguments Tuesday in the federal trial against Stewart, the domestic diva's lawyer said his client's supposed "cover-up" was too dumb, too poorly executed and too inconsistent to be a carefully planned lie, as prosecutors claim.

Lawyer Robert Morvillo also insisted that no one has disproved the central element of Stewart's defense -- that she and broker Peter Bacanovic had a plan to sell her ImClone Systems stock when the price fell to $60 per share.

"The government is accusing Martha Stewart of participating in a confederacy of dunces," he said, as quoted by the Associated Press. "Nobody could have done what Martha Stewart and Peter Bacanovic are alleged to have done and done it in a dumber fashion."

He also said Stewart never would have risked her life's work and reputation to participate with her broker in a conspiracy to lie. (Prosecutors insist that the $60 story was a lie to conceal the true real reason Stewart sold, which was that she was tipped off by Bacanovic's assistant after ImClone CEO Sam Waksal and his family were selling their ImClone shares. The stock took a dip because the Federal Drug Administration was about to reject approval for the biotech company's promising new cancer drug.).

"Just because somebody misses things, because somebody makes an inaccurate statement, doesn't mean that they're lying, doesn't mean that they're intending to deceive," Morvillo said.

The jury is expected to begin deliberating Wednesday.