Laura Babcock murder trial day 2

Dellen Millard had a chance to cross examine a key witness at the Laura Babcock murder trial but he had to take a few cues from the judge about how to do that since Millard is representing himself. His co-accused, Mark Smich has a lawyer.

A lot of people say they feel uncomfortable in the courtroom watching the accused killer acting as his own lawyer especially when the witnesses are Laura Babcock’s father and Shawn Lerner, who was the first person to suspect Dellen Millard had something to do with Babcock’s disappearance.

Shawn Lerner was Laura Babcock’s boyfriend for about a year and a half, until late 2011. They stayed friends and he tried to help her in June 2012, when she had no where to stay and was working as an escort. When she disappeared, he was the first to act, rallying her Facebook friends to track her down. He got her phone bill from her mom, saw that her last eight calls were to Dellen Millard and confronted him. Today on the stand, their next confrontation.

Millard, acting as his own lawyer, was cross-examining Lerner.

“Morning, Shawn, how are you feeling today,” Millard started, before asking questions about Babcock’s anxieties and fights with her parents.

“Shawn, you don’t like me much, do you” Millard then asked, and Lerner agreed.

“You find me sketchy?” he asked and Lerner agreed. Ever since the first night they met at a birthday party for Laura in 2011, when Millard gave Lerner several different stories about his background.

Millard asked if Laura was Lerner’s first sexual partner but the judge explained that was not a proper question.

“Are you trying to shift this case?” Millard asked. “Trying to put suspicion on me? Did you know Laura had interest in me as more than a friend?” Again the judge interrupted, “what he thinks of you is irrelevant at this trial.”

We haven’t heard much from Mark Smich yet at this trial, that should change tomorrow. We expect one of his friends to be on the stand in the morning.