4DCA Division 1 Oral Argument - 2025/12/30 - Dec 30, 2025

argument

4DCA Division 1 Oral Argument - 2025/12/30

California Fourth District Court of Appeal, Division One 51 min 8 chapters transcribed 7 days ago official recording ↗

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What formalities open the Fourth District Court of Appeal oral argument?

Unknown 13:41

Uh actually I need to see in particular. Wherever you'd like?

Unknown 14:02

I know, um if is this all just public seeing? No, you are all good.

Kenneth Fitzgerald 16:36

What I mean? Please uh okay. And appellate.

Unknown 16:44

And this side. This

Kenneth Fitzgerald 16:45

side? Correct.

Unknown 16:58

Make sure you adjust it so the microphones in my ear tip.

Kenneth Fitzgerald 17:11

Go like that? Good. Testing. Okay.

Unknown 18:14

Why I need a third phase because I don't get it.

Unknown 18:29

I live to the private. You have that was here. But C that's where they're staying on. Yeah. Yeah.

Kenneth Fitzgerald 19:39

Yeah.

John Williams 19:54

Ken, how are you? Nice to see you. How's your trip?

Kenneth Fitzgerald 19:58

It was great. Thank you for coming to me. Of course.

John Williams 20:03

It's so stressful when you have to deal with something like that. I'm going to do that for you as well for. Yeah. Where'd you go?

Kenneth Fitzgerald 20:08

Uh we started in Prague, Salzburg, Munich, Strasbourg, Press, and all the Christmas markets. Yeah, we did. Wow.

John Williams 20:17

I bet you it was lovely. It was lovely. And we got really luckily at the wedding. Yeah. That's great. Yeah. That's great.

John Williams 20:55

Yeah, that's good. Yeah, it was so short. I don't know why it always sneaks up on you, right? Yeah, it's always uh. Here are going.

Unknown 21:32

All rise. The Court of Appeal of the City of California, Fourth Public District, Division One is now in session with the honorable committee of public presenting.

Unknown 21:46

Good morning. Welcome to the Court of Appeal, Fourth Appellate District. With me on this panel are Justice Kelly to my right, Justice Rubin to my left. Uh keep in mind on each of these cases that we're very familiar with your briefs, so please just highlight those issues that are most important to you. We'll start with appellant. And when you after you state your appearance, let us know if you wish to reserve time to respond.

Kenneth Fitzgerald 22:12

Thank you, Your Honor, and good morning. It's Kenneth Fitzgerald for McKinnon Broadcasting. I'd like to save five minutes for All right, we may proceed. Uh first I'd like to thank the court and opposing counsel for accommodating my schedule request. I hope I didn't ruin anybody's holidays.

Unknown 22:28

Well I'm not gonna comment on that, but We're accommodating both council's schedules because I understand Mr. Williams' schedule is fraught also. So

Kenneth Fitzgerald 22:38

well I appreciate it. Um in this case the defense was deprived of equal time for closing argument. There was inadequate time for closing argument. The defense was constrained in its ability to present evidence on a central point of contention, which was whether Sandra Moss worked as hard as her co anchor Alan Denton. Plaintiff's counsel was allowed to misstate the evidence in closing on that important point. With a fabricated quotation of testimony from KUSI News Director Steve Cohen. Testimony that he never gave. The defense was constrained

Unknown 23:14

didn't they get instructed that if something one of the attorneys says or shows is different than what's in their notes or to go with their notes and not with what the attorney said? Sure.

Kenneth Fitzgerald 23:29

That that is a standard instruction among many, many instructions that the jurors get, and I think it would be naive to think that the jurors wrote down carefully The testimony specifically and the closing slide that was presented. Presented that misstatement in quotations as if it came from the transcript. This that was a misrepresentation of the record. That was not a characterization. But to answer your honor's question, of course they were given that instruction.

Unknown 23:59

Right, but my c the call of the question was

Kenneth Fitzgerald 24:00

why is that inadequate? Because, first of all, the Time for closing arguments was extremely compressed. So every statement in a very short closing argument has outsized importance. Secondly, the objection was overruled. We did object to it and I would submit the effect of representing to a jury what the trial transcript says.

Unknown 24:28

I was a trial judge for a very long time. And When you have that kind of objection, you say to the jury, Look, it's your recollection of the testimony that's important. It's not what the lawyers tell you. And I think that's uh what the instruction does here.

Kenneth Fitzgerald 24:46

Well

Unknown 24:47

you might want to move on to another point.

Kenneth Fitzgerald 24:49

I I will. Uh the plaintiff I mean The bottom line out of all of this is that there were a series of errors that we believe were cumulative and they had a cumulative effect.