Defense · Defense team (Magbanua)

Kristen Kawass

Defense attorney for Katherine Magbanua, appearing at the jury-instruction conferences in both the 2019 Garcia–Magbanua trial and the 2022 Magbanua retrial.

Mentioned Garcia–Magbanua Magbanua Retrial

98 lines · 1 mention · 2 trials

About

Her appearances are a useful entry point for anyone tracing how the legal theories against Katherine Magbanua were framed for jurors in each trial. Because her recorded work sits almost entirely at the charge conferences, it documents the precise instruction language the defense fought over — principal liability, independent act, lesser included offenses, and how jurors were told to weigh testimony given under immunity or a cooperation deal. Following her across both trials shows what changed and what stayed the same in the instructions between the joint 2019 trial and the 2022 retrial.

Across Trials

Her role is strikingly consistent across the two trials: in both, she is the Magbanua defense lawyer who takes the podium once the evidence closes and the charge is being settled, and in both her arguments converge on the same theme — narrowing the legal theories by which the jury could convict her client. In 2019 that meant contesting principal liability and the independent-act instruction and pressing for immunity language covering Wendi Adelson's compelled testimony; in 2022 it meant attacking lesser included offenses and homicide instructions and building in a basis for the jury to discount a cooperating witness. The retrial record shows a modest expansion of her visible role, adding an appellate-authority argument on a deliberations-phase jury question that has no counterpart in the earlier trial. Her success rate also shifts slightly: nearly all of her 2019 requests were overruled or deferred, while in the retrial she secured the reputation-for-dishonesty factor and the court also removed carried-over non-standard instruction language even as her broader requests were denied.

Trial Record (1)

GM Garcia–Magbanua Sep 26, 2019 – Oct 11, 2019

Trial Summary

Appeared for Katherine Magbanua at the day-nine final jury-instruction conference, arguing the principal, independent-act, and witness-immunity instructions.

KM Magbanua Retrial May 18, 2022 – May 27, 2022

Trial Summary

Defense co-counsel at the charge conference and a deliberations-phase jury question proceeding, arguing jury instruction positions and citing appellate authority on exhibit playback access.

Mentioned (1)

Procedural

Lunch Break

Day 1