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Will the real Pamela Mackey please stand up?
From the Wolf Blitzer Reports staff in Washington: WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Pamela Mackey's reputation may depend on the day -- or whatever hearing we've just been through. Is she the attorney who's just doing her job, whose team today claimed to have forensic evidence pointing to someone other than Kobe Bryant possibly causing the accuser's injuries? Or is she the person accused of misrepresenting evidence, in order to publicly smear the alleged victim? Which lawyer is the real Pamela Mackey? The one who used the accuser's name six times in court last week or the one who never mentioned the name today? There's not much gray area when lawyers discuss the performance of Kobe Bryant's lead attorney. "I think she did it knowing what she had, and what she had to do," says attorney Pamela Hayes. Former prosecutor Wendy Murphy takes a cautionary note. She says, "We don't want people to be harmed through their participation in the criminal justice system." So which reputation sticks?
Former prosecutor Karen Steinhauser, who often went up against Pamela Mackey when Mackey was a public defender in Denver, told us Mackey is a worthy adversary, known as, quote, "the ultimate professional and ethical" defense attorney. The prosecutor has never known Mackey to knowingly violate a court order and says Mackey's firm, Haddon, Morgan and Foreman, has an excellent reputation in Colorado. The 47-year-old has spent most of her professional life at the foot of the Rocky Mountains and has taken on at least one other high profile case involving an athlete. Mackey represented former Colorado Avalanche Goalie Patrick Roy in a domestic violence case. Charges were dismissed. She's had a firm grasp on the management of Bryant's defense from the start. But last week, when she cross-examined a detective and asked if the accuser's injuries were "consistent with someone who had sex with three different men in three days." It seemed everyone had a strong opinion on that move. Norm Early, a former Denver district attorney called the comment "nothing but contemptible and disgusting and sleazy." Colorado defense attorney David Lugert says Mackey was doing her job and acting on behalf of her client. "She was sending a message to the public that she was going to zealously represent her client." She's also clearly shown an ability to change tactics, like no longer referring to the accuser by name. "I think Pamela Mackey felt ashamed of her performance last week and in fairness to her, she corrected it," says CNN legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin. But also in fairness, the former prosecutor pointed out it was Pamela Mackey who'd previously tried to get these hearings closed to the media, knowing what was coming.
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