A witness in former Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell (R) and his wife’s federal corruption case testified Thursday that McDonnell was “in denial” about the first lady’s mental capacity.
The Washington Post reported that Sarah Scarbrough, the former Executive Mansion director, described the couple as “so sweet and in love” in public. In response to questioning from one of McDonnell’s attorneys, however, Scarbrough also testified that the ex-governor “was in denial about Mrs. McDonnell’s mental capacity.”
Scarbrough testified that Maureen McDonnell could be sneaky and sometimes used her husband’s name to get things done without his permission. Scarbrough recounted that the first lady once said her husband wanted a dietary supplement manufactured by the donor at the center of the couple’s gifts scandal to be included in gift bags at a National Governors Association meeting, when the governor actually did not, according to the Post.
That testimony parallels what Maureen McDonnell’s onetime chief of staff, Mary-Shea Sutherland, had told the court on Wednesday. Sutherland testified that she’d called the first lady a “nut bag” in conversations with prosecutors and described her as extremely difficult to work with at times.
Scarbrough said Thursday the governor never spoke to her about either his personal finances or the state of his marriage. But she did testify that she believed the relationship between Maureen McDonnell and the donor, Jonnie Williams, was “inappropriate.” The former staffer judged the relationship “inappropriate” when she learned in April 2011 that the married Williams had taken the first lady on a shopping trip for expensive clothes, according to the Post.
Scarbrough’s description of the relationship between Williams and the first lady may feed into the defense’s argument that there was a romantic connection between the two, precluding any conspiracy between the McDonnells to promote Williams’ company in exchange for gifts.
Huff Lite here all day at TPMz but I must say I’m enjoying myself.
Talking about running Maureen over with the bus, backing over
her–then forcing her to stay in the same place while they park
the bus permanently over her.
It seems the guv was just cluelessly driving expensive sports cars that weren’t his own and wearing twenty thousand dollar watches he knew he couldn’t afford. But, Maureen was the problem. I wonder what she
gets for being the greedy,idiot, love struck loon?
Obviously, I’m not a lawyer but this seems a bad strategy. I get that McDonnell believes he can resurrect his political career if he isn’t convicted but this has slime ball written all over it. I realize you can’t convict someone for being an asshole yet I can’t imagine he’s doing himself any favors with the jury by so publicly trashing and humiliating his wife.
Despite all that’s so far been described as evidence of some sort of mental illness, none of it sounds like anything more than a mean, spoiled, power-hungry wife of a powerful man.
“Slimeball” is too mild. F*ing chickensht coward is closer to it.
Actually, its sounding like a pretty decent legal strategy. They are going to lay all the blame at her feet, then have both her and him testify that its not her fault…and thus the jury is left with doubt as to which one to blame.
So far, McDonnell isn’t actually saying anything about her. This is all from staffers. So the theory is, he isn’t driving the bus running her over…the staffers are. He is just watching the wheels go round and round.