Final Prosecution Witness Testifies As State Rests Case Against Donna Adelson

The final prosecution witness in the murder-for-hire trial of Donna Adelson was Sgt. Chris Corbitt of the Tallahassee Police Department,. It was his second witness stand appearance in the trial.

Assistant State Attorney Sarah Kathryn Dugan called him to the stand to testify about, among other topics, text messages that refute any defense claim that Adelson didn't know about the hitman plot to kill her daughter's ex-husband, Dan Markel. Adelson's lawyer Josh Zelman cross-examined him.

This is his entire testimony.

59:59 Prosecution rests

Case background:

Donna Adelson, 75, is accused of orchestrating the murder-for-hire of her former son-in-law because she wanted her daughter and grandchildren to move to Miami.

Adelson is accused of conspiring with her son Charlie Adelson more than a decade ago to hire hitmen to kill Dan Markel, who was a Florida State University law professor and the father of her two young grandsons.

Her defense is that she had no knowledge of what hitmen Luis Rivera and Sigfredo Garcia were going to do, and that prosecutors are only focusing on her hatred for Markel to show she had a motive to want him murdered, when there's no evidence she was actually involved.

Rivera, a former gang leader, is serving a 19-year prison sentence after pleading guilty to second-degree murder and testifying against Garcia, who fired the fatal shots, as well as the woman who linked Garcia to the victim: Katherine "Katie" Magbanua, who was Garcia's on-again, off-again girlfriend and also was in a relationship with Adelson's son Charlie Adelson.

Garcia was convicted in 2019 and Magbanua in 2022.

Rivera also testified in Charlie Adelson's trial in 2023, and Adelson was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. After their son's trial, Donna Adelson and her husband, Harvey, bought one-way tickets to Vietnam. Police arrested her on the jetway at Miami International Airport on charges of first-degree murder, conspiracy to commit first-degree murder and solicitation of first-degree murder.

Her trial is expected to go through Sept. 5 in Leon County Circuit Court in Tallahassee, Florida.

Donna Adelson's lawyers are Josh Zelman and Jackie Fulford of Tallahassee. Assistant State Attorneys Georgia Cappleman and Sarah Kathryn Dugan are prosecuting.

The judge is Stephen Everett, who is the chief judge of Leon County Circuit Court.
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