LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Trevor Bauer intends to invoke his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination and will not answer any questions in the case of a woman asking for a five-year restraining order against him, his lawyer said in court Wednesday.
Bauer’s attorney Shawn Holley told a judge the only questions he would answer are his name and what he does for a living, and cited an ongoing criminal investigation by police in Pasadena, California.
The legal team looking for an order for a woman who claims Bauer strangled her until she lost consciousness and hit her in two sexual encounters said Bauer was the last witness he was witnessing. ‘they intended to call during the hearing.
Holley asked Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Dianna Gould-Saltman to allow Bauer to completely avoid testifying, as defendants do in criminal cases.
Normally, in civil matters, a witness would invoke the Fifth Amendment question by question.
Gould-Saltman adjourned the hearing for the day, saying she would read the legal precedent provided by Holley and render a decision Thursday morning. The judge could also render his ruling on the domestic violence ban order on Thursday, after hearing final arguments from both sides.
Bauer, who is challenging the order and has said through representatives that everything that happened between him and the 27-year-old San Diego woman was consensual, attended all three days of the hearing and was scheduled to testify .
Most of the hearing consisted of testimony from the woman herself, as well as brief appearances at the stand by the nurse who gave her a sexual assault exam after the second encounter, d ‘a doctor called in by Bauer’s team to analyze these findings, and the best of the woman. friend.
Major League Baseball put Bauer, 30, on paid administrative leave on July 2, days after the woman was given a temporary restraining order until evidence can be heard, as is often the case. cases in such cases.
On her third day in the witness stand on Wednesday, the woman said the satisfaction she expressed to her friends when the case first came to the public was a reaction to her treatment by the media, and not the happiness she brought down the Dodgers pitcher.
It felt good not to see me ashamed from the start, the woman said during cross-examination of Holley, who read her text messages sent at the time.
The media are panicking. For my part, one of the woman’s texts read. This is the best thing I could have hoped for.
Holley asked: What does the media panic have to do with your safety?
The woman replied that she felt that Bauer’s reps shamed her with a statement saying the nights the two spent were totally consensual, and she was happy to see that the media and the public on social media did not. did not attack him.
Holley asked the woman why she felt she needed Bauer’s protection when he hadn’t made contact with her for nearly a month when she requested the order.
That’s what worried me, the woman replied, saying that Bauer’s silence after constantly monitoring her in the days following the second incident made her fear that he was up to something and could pick her up in San Diego.
Did you have any reason to believe he was coming to your house 130 miles away? Holley asked.
Yes, I did, ”she said.
Holley also pointed to lies that the woman admitted to telling her closest friends in texts when and where the meetings with Bauer took place.
The woman said a friend warned her not to go to Bauer’s in Pasadena, so she told him the first meeting was in San Diego. Another friend was one of her bosses, the woman said, and she must have been lying about the time of Bauer’s second night because she declared herself ill.
Holley also asked the woman why she acknowledged in posts that she was watching Bauer’s games despite not wanting to have anything to do with him.
You’ve already testified that you have to cut all your communication with him, ”Holley asked, but you still wanted to watch him pitch, didn’t you?
Perhaps, the woman answered.
The Associated Press generally does not identify people who say they have been sexually assaulted.
Bauer accepted a three-year, $ 102 million contract to join his hometown Dodgers earlier this year after winning his first Cy Young with the Cincinnati Reds last season.
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