HOUSTON — A listening to to find out whether or not former Reynolds and Reynolds Co. CEO Bob Brockman is competent to face trial on tax evasion expenses continued final week in a Houston courtroom.
Attorneys for Brockman, 80, say he has dementia that’s each progressive and incurable and has left him unable to help in his protection towards 39 federal counts, together with tax evasion, wire fraud, cash laundering and proof tampering. Prosecutors contend that he’s exaggerating signs of cognitive impairment to keep away from prosecution in what they are saying was a $2 billion tax evasion scheme.
Listed here are highlights from the second week of testimony within the listening to.
Protection attorneys final week referred to as their medical skilled witnesses, whose findings contrasted with these of medical specialists retained by the federal government. Whereas prosecutors’ specialists testified earlier within the listening to that they believed Brockman exaggerated his signs — two concluded that Brockman was competent to face trial — the protection’s specialists mentioned they believed Brockman has dementia and would battle with aiding his attorneys in his protection.
These findings had been backed up by pictures of Brockman’s mind, the protection’s specialists testified, in addition to by his cognitive testing outcomes and the observations of individuals near Brockman in his each day life.
“Because of the nature of his cognitive impairments, I imagine he would have important issue having the ability to recall previous occasions precisely, evaluation paperwork and supply context to his attorneys,” Dr. Thomas Guilmette, a psychologist and professor at Windfall School in Rhode Island, testified. “I feel he would have issue understanding the complexities of the case, the methods of the case.”
Brockman’s signs are “most in keeping with Parkinson’s illness dementia,” Guilmette testified, including that “it definitely is kind of attainable” that he additionally has Alzheimer’s illness. He testified that he believed Brockman’s impairment extends to such areas as consideration, psychological processing velocity, reminiscence, problem-solving and judgment.
Mind scans cannot decide an individual’s cognitive skills, mentioned Dr. Christopher Whitlow, a neuroradiologist and professor at Wake Forest College of Medication retained by Brockman’s attorneys. However pictures that point out a affected person has misplaced some mind quantity, as Brockman has, would elevate concern about his cognitive functioning ranges, Whitlow testified.
“While you lose mind, you are dropping operate,” Whitlow mentioned.
Whitlow testified that he reviewed a number of sorts of pictures of Brockman’s mind, together with MRI and PET scans, as a part of his work on the case. Taken collectively, the photographs point out a sample that Whitlow testified he would anticipate to see in an Alzheimer’s affected person, and in addition elevate issues about dementia. The scans counsel that Brockman possible has an “aggressive, progressive” degenerative sickness that factors to each Parkinson’s illness and Alzheimer’s illness.
Throughout their cross-examination, prosecutors questioned Guilmette about why his reviews didn’t confer with proof akin to depositions and speeches Brockman gave in 2019 — depositions through which prosecutors say Brockman was capable of recall previous occasions and talk about complicated matters. Guilmette testified that these examples occurred two years earlier than he evaluated Brockman, and that he had been ready to attract on long-term information of the matters through the depositions — a efficiency Brockman may “completely not” ship at the moment.
Prosecutors additionally requested Whitlow if his opinion would change if he discovered that Brockman was faking his impairment on cognitive testing and along with his docs. Whitlow testified that it may, however solely to the impact of “here’s a affected person with dementia who’s malingering.”
“If we’re speaking about my opinion of the target imaging knowledge itself, I’d nonetheless be involved about that affected person, that they’d fall right into a class of dementia that is greater than early or delicate,” Whitlow testified.
Dr. Park Dietz, an skilled witness for prosecutors, testified on Friday, Nov. 19, that the one conclusion he can draw after reviewing a number of sources of proof “is that he is exaggerating the extent of his impairment.”
Dietz testified that Brockman’s cognitive functioning seems in another way relying on the context — from “clearly competent and extremely purposeful” in real-world actions, to “a narrative of progressive impairment and deterioration” as instructed to docs.
“It stays my opinion, as expressed in my most up-to-date report, that Mr. Brockman is competent to face trial,” Dietz testified.
Frank Gutierrez, a house well being care aide who has labored with Brockman since April, testified that he assists Brockman with each day actions — together with serving to him off the bed and to the toilet, and administering drugs — on 12-hour shifts through the day.
Gutierrez testified that Brockman has had episodes of confusion which have grown extra frequent. After a hospitalization in late Could and early June, he testified, Brockman began appearing confused, together with about his whereabouts, and talked about needing to go to the workplace and asking for his automobile keys.
Brockman lawyer Jason Varnado requested Gutierrez whether or not he has any doubt that Brockman’s bodily and psychological signs are actual.
“They’re actual,” Gutierrez testified in response.