Blake Lively Settlement Revealed and Damaging Witness Testimony, with Kjersti Flaa - "In The Well" with Mark Geragos and Matt Murphy

Welcome to In The Well, I'm Matt Murphy, former homicide prosecutor and author.

I'm joined by my co-host and friend Mark Erigos, criminal defense attorney to the stars. Mark, I'm back with vacation, bless all you in crime, con and Vegas. Can you break down?

I was off the grid on the sideboat.

“Can you break down on what's going on in this crazy world?”

Well, I'll tell you, I don't know, actually where to begin. You were gone and we would have had a spirited discussion last week about Carmelo Anthony. And I'm not talking about the nicks or the basketball player, but a murder trial down at Texas and my rather unique take on it. I guess, unique in some circles.

You've been on vacation. I hope it was productive. And I brought photos. Okay, there I am. That's cave diving.

Right after that disaster in Malaysia or in the mall,

which is horrible, but they took us right to some caves. I got set up with these on my boat. Three different instructors were on vacation. And they were also professional photographer. So every 30 seconds I'm handing my GoPro to them.

So that's me. Every photo they took was like Ancel Adams. Turtles everywhere. So I went to a place called Palau, which was one of the, there's a battle in World War II, the Battle of Pelaloo,

which was one of the, one of the Buddhist battles in all World War II. And it was this bizarre contrast where it's some of those beautiful reefs. The coral is perfect. They ban sharp fishing a few years ago. So everything's just teemping.

And then you'll be swimming along and you look down. They'll be an artillery shell in the coral. It's just this crazy contrast. And I'm on a dive boat, a bunch of very happy people. He's see if you guys can throw up the next one.

I've been wanting to show Mark this since I got back. So, oh, yeah, here's Marking. You recognize that guy, Mark. That's, that's from CrimeCon. I love what a, what a blast that was, right?

I'm coming, it's really nice people.

People who haven't been there before, that was my second one.

It is quite an event, quite an happening, I'll tell you. Yeah, everybody's, everybody's so, they're into it. And it's fun and the energy's good. And here is the entire MK, MK true-cranked, Trump crew, Sans Mardukergas.

I don't know why you couldn't, you couldn't make it over. Some stopped you from coming. But that's, we got the whole, the whole group there. That's at a place called the Poodle Room in Vegas. And this is sort of funny.

So that is a, that is a group of attorneys and rule fallers. And of course, some of our fabulous producers here on the show. And we went in there and they put, to one of those places, they put stickers, like cell phone marks, so you can't take photos.

And I got, like, I think I got photos. I don't want to rat anybody, I want to get anybody in trouble.

“I think I got photos on my side from everybody's phone.”

Yeah, exactly. I elected prosecutors, and everybody is like exchanging photos from the inside after we left. But I, I am so, I feel so fortunate to be with such an awesome group. You know, and I feel like I got a new group of friends

that we got a new group of friends with these people, like such a great, great bunch, and they're fun. It's a great group from all over the country. I mean, you've got Ashory and Phil, Donald George, you've got John, you've got the, the, you were down, well,

you're now down in the South Bay. I toggle back and forth between New York and you've got eyeglass, down in Florida, it's quite a, it's quite a crew. Yeah, so anyway, we went from crime cont to the, we got a lot of both, that error burned out at Florida as well.

So yeah, you know, he, he did 12 years as the elected states attorney for Palm Beach. And that is, that is, it's interesting the way they do it in Florida, you know, because here it's one DA per county. And down there they will have, um, they put a whole bunch of counties together

and they do districts. So I just gave a training slash presentation to the fourth judicial district in Florida, so it included like, includes like three or four different counties and it's based in Jacksonville. They couldn't have been nicer, but Dave was Palm Beach,

“which is where, um, is afterhand, I think, uh, but it was where a lot of that”

Epstein stuff happened. Um, so, uh, the real deal and it's just gotten the world. And, uh, ended up a breeding ground for legal commentators. Stacy Hanna, what's your got? Dave, I remember you've got, uh, I guess South Beach is where you've got Jose

Florida's fairly fairly a Roy Black and, uh, the Lake Great Roy Black. You've got some, got some talent there.

I know that Texas always tries to say they've got the greatest

criminal defense lawyers. I know Dan Cajula always, uh, says that, but no less than, uh, John Quinn has remarked, you know, of Quinnimanuals who just stepped down as the chair. He and I years ago, we decided amongst ourselves are committee of two that the most hotly contested legal market in the country is Los Angeles.

So, that's, uh, both John and I had said that.

“I think to be, I think to get good, you need a good supply of weird, right?”

If you're really, if you're in criminal stuff, the weird are the cases and the, and the more of them you do, uh, I think it's the best possible case to sort of grow whatever talents we've got in God knows Florida has plenty of that, but I don't know.

They, they, we always hear about Florida man.

I, I would, I would stay in California, I can't stand you that. Yeah, it's become kind of a meme as it is, you know, where, where did that take place, Florida? But I still think the, you know, most competitive legal environment is all like. Next entertainment journalist and multimedia producer, uh, Shastee Flah joins us to discuss the latest in the Blake Lively,

“Justin Baldoni saga, and I get a few extra questions for her, too.”

So, I'm, I'm looking forward to this, stay tuned. Welcome back to In The Well, and I, you know, for those of you who don't know, Matt, not only can we define in the Well for you. He also and talk about spearing litigants. He also spears fish for a living on his, uh, off to ace of joining us right now.

His entertainment journalist, multimedia producer, Shastee Flah. Shastee's been covering what else, the, the Blake Lively, Justin Baldoni, uh, legal saga closely and personally been involved in the case. She was subpoenaed by Blake Lively back last year. Was even set to testify against Blake for Justin's, uh,

side welcome Shastee to In The Well. Thank you so much. It's such an honor to be here. You guys are legends. So, yes, thank you for inviting me. Shastee, I have a question for you, uh, because I have said that you, I assume you know what the strike sound effect is, where you end up starting a legal battle in order

to vindicate your rights and you end up magnifying your own issues and, uh, a hundredfold, uh, Blake Lively is now taking that to the next level on steroids.

“Do you think subpoenaing you may have been one of the three dumbest things in this case?”

Yeah, there's so many dumb things to choose from, but I think that's definitely out there. I mean, yeah, I mean, when you heard about that as a lawyer, I mean, yeah. And, and I, you know, I'm European. We don't do that kind of stuff in, in Europe. They don't even know what that is. So, I was really surprised. And of course, we didn't even realize that we were subpoenaed, because they didn't tell us.

So, a lot of people were subpoenaed without even knowing about it. So, it's the craziest story. And, um, yes. So, I think definitely it's up on the top three dumbest things that she did. I'll tell you, I want one dumb thing that I think happened today. I don't know if we have, you know, in the federal courts, you probably seen it, Shosti. They have Pacer, which is the fancy legal term for the docking sheet. And so, there's an entry today where Blake Lively's

lawyers are coming in and as they always do, they always overshoot what they should ask for.

They cannot. They are almost constitutionally incapable of reading the room. And they asked for more in the judge ended up now, basically bench slapping them and telling them, "Now, now you're limited to ten pages, single space." And I don't want to hear any more from you. Where they didn't have a limitation to begin with. They went overboard once again today, and Judge Lyman gave him what Judge Lyman does best is you obviously don't know how to play in the

sandbox. I'm going to teach you. It's just astonishing to me, um, the legal, lack of legal accurate in this case. For any of the, um, our audience that, that isn't familiar with it, you did a very, now famous interview with Parker Posey and Blake Lively from 2016,

temerity as an entertainment journalist to ask the question, "What was it like to wear the costumes?" Something completely, and it was, it's set in the 1930s, and it was apparently outrageously offensive, and the two of them just began talking to each other. It's, it's bizarre. I've watched that interview multiple times, and one of the questions I had for you, kind of beyond the Blake Lively, Justin Baldoni saga, is just for anybody who's watching this, your professional, you've got these two

“really famous movie stars. Um, you've interviewed over, I think 450 people. I watched a bunch of”

those two shots. You just say, you know, I loved your interview with the Henry Winkler, and even Jennifer Anderson. I kind of went down the rabbit hole on this, but, um, but what is that like? We've all been in a situation where, um, we're kind of getting, um, almost bullied, and what was that like for you, your professional, but they really, they just began kind of interviewing each other, give it a look. First of all, I'm going to add some on your bump.

Who grabs on your little bump? Who doesn't have my bump? You've got two nice ones. And these, they are kind of bumps, aren't they? No, not bumps. They're lovely, lady lumps. Check out. Thank you. Thank you. Are you like the movie or

your Woody Allen fan? I love most of his movies, and this one was so like visually amazing.

Yeah, it's gorgeous. Did you guys love wearing those kind of clothes like you? Yeah. Yeah. And you know, we're having dinner, I was talking about the clothes, but I wonder if they would ask the men about the clothes. I would. I love Jessie's. This is something that I'm saying. His wardrobe is beautiful. No, every wardrobe, we know, we use the highways of pans. He's so great. I wish men saw us, he can't say that.

Or maybe the father with his, with his, his tank tops, but it's so cool. It's just like, you have your, the table cloth on the, on the light and the Italian restaurant, it really is the bad thing. I thought you really maintained your composure remarkably well.

“And I think it, this applies to so many different areas in life, whether it's a job interview,”

whether it's a work meeting, tell us, tell us what, what was that like when all of a sudden they're turning on you, you, the expression on your face was, I mean, you could write a book about it, but I'd share that with us if you don't mind. Oh, my gosh. So, of course, it started off with me saying congrats on your little bump and I think a little bump now has been come like it's been mentioned so many times in her legal filings as well. And that, it started like that and I was like,

okay, she's threw it back at me and I was like, well, what, what happened is this her kind of

sense of humor, but then after that, when I asked about the costumes at first, I was like,

are they joking now? Oh, like, is this really happening? You know, I think there was so many important solutions going through my head at the time. It's been a while. I mean, it's 2016, as you said, so it's 10 years ago now, but I do remember the feeling just sitting there at first being really like, I don't know, I just felt like I lost all my confidence. And then I started

“feeling a bit angry and annoyed and then I was like, should I just leave? Should I leave? Should I not leave?”

And now there was so many emotions going through my head. And when I left the room, they actually caught off my interview early as well. I was supposed to be there. I had a double slot that was during this interview for Norwegian television and German television, but they cut it off short because I feel like they just thought, okay, this is not the best, uh, into new, so maybe we'll just throw this during the start of the room. And so when I left, I just, I don't know, I just felt really disrespected,

you know? And then when you start going in yourself, thinking like, what did I do? What did I do to provoke that kind of behavior? And so yeah, there was so many emotions and I didn't realize until after I watched it. I don't know if you noticed, but Parker Posey was like rolling her eyes when I left the room. And it was us, me, Matt notice. Yeah, so it helped us respect it. Yeah, you say you felt us respect it, it's because from any objective viewpoint, it was, I can't

remember an interview that was less respectful than that. And I don't know if that's because you're, you're your pin and you weren't from, you know, variety or TMZ or something that they immediately

recognize, but you've had, and you've had over a hundred million hits on your YouTube channel,

you, you're a kind of a gateway to, um, I guess it's secondary, but the Norwegian people in Norway, everybody speaks English, right? Or it's very common, at least. Yeah. And yeah, I don't know if

Or I, I don't know how to interpret, but she did roll the eyes. Another thing I noticed and

tell them if I'm totally wrong here, but it seemed like, so your, your face was, the expression was professional, but you can tell, and you can also tell us time went on. You can almost, almost read all that, but you were, you're, you're very well composed, but I noticed your fingers, you were, you appeared to be, it was like a poker tell, um, you were almost digging your thumbs into your fingers, and I do stuff like that, um, yeah, you know, in front of juries when I'm like, I'm either trying

not to laugh at something, or I'm, or I'm getting really angry and I'm trying not to show it. Am I right on that? Is that something you do all the time? It's very very, yes. Absolutely. That's a very

“observant thing, actually. I do, I do always do that when I do interviews, I do it to remember”

questions, it's like a thing that I do, and also if I, if I start to lose, like my focus,

I will do it as well. So it's a thing that I know I consciously do, but I noticed that in someone, there was like a body language expert that did a video about it, and he was talking a lot about how I was doing this. So yeah, so I did, I did do that, um, well, tell me a little bit, why, what were they going to have you testify to, if you know, how do I know? I don't exactly know, but my, well, I think I did speak a little bit to Brian Freeman about this, but, um, I think

it's, you know, because I had all the analytics to my videos. So I could go into YouTube and I actually see what happened to it when you went viral. And if anyone was pushing my video, I would see that they were like the traffic wasn't organic, you know? They would be spikes, they would be something telling that this video didn't go viral by itself, or I could also see

“if someone paid ads on it. And I think that's the only way you can really push a video,”

unless you're running an underground and traceable snack campaign. But I, so I could testify to what happened to my video. And as I told Brian Freeman at the time, you know, I received so many DMs from people like hundreds a day for a long time after I published that video. People saying you know, I'm so glad that you show this, I'm so glad that you know, now, no, who's like, lively with it is. And I can relate to the situation. I've been bullied and I felt exactly

like I could see that you felt. So, you know, all these things, those things wouldn't happen unless that video went viral, you know, organically. Unless they think they're bots, the ones that wrote me emails and DMs, but her theories, and here's one of the experts, I remember said that the reason how they could show that it actually was not a organic was that

“there were so many likes on the top comments on the video. He did like this long report on how a”

video can go viral because someone likes a top comment. So, it's so dumb. It's like people like top comment sometimes because they don't want to write their own comment because sometimes there's a lot of comments on a video and they're thinking, "No, it's going to disappear anyway. I'm just going to agree with this person who says that she was a boolean, a mean girl in this interview." And when you talk about conversation with Brian Friedman, that's long after you

shared it publicly, right? This was way before the lawsuit. Oh, of course, right. Yeah. So, you're to be for, I guess, years before when you posted it. No, so I posted, no, so I posted it

in 2024. After I'd seen the news. Yeah, but I never published it on YouTube until 2024.

Are you aware that? So, it was great of the perfect storm in a sense, but I didn't know about all the stuff that they that had been going on in the sets. I had no idea about any of that. I was like, okay, we were still in Hollywood, but I was like, we were kind of planning to move to Europe, so I was like, "I don't care. I'm going to post this video. They seem to be on with, like, Lyley, because I watched the movie." And I was like, "That just reminded me of, you know,

watching her again." I'm like, "Oh, I have this interview with her at home." Should I just publish that interview? Oh, okay. I'm wine. So, the interview is 2016. Yeah. Well, before the movie had ever been made. Yeah, you don't. Oh, shit. At the end real time, 2016, 17, all the way to 2023 or 2024, movie comes out. Or did you see a trailer, or did you see the movie? I watched. Yeah. So, I was at a press screening for the movie. So, I did watch the movie, but it was before the

premiere. So, they had a pre-press screening for it. And that's when I watched the movie. And that's

late to me." So, you saw the press screening and before the movie came out, you posted it?

“Yeah, I think it was around the premiere, or just before the premiere. I think I posted it on the”

August 10th. Maybe the premiere was on August 6th, but the movie hadn't been come out like to the public yets. Yeah, I couldn't say exactly the timeline there, but I did posted it around the time of the premiere. And then that's well before the filing of the lawsuit. Yeah. Yeah. As you know, I was meant, yeah, I was meant in the years. Well, the people are watching this. People are watching it, so it would know. It's from a lawyer's standpoint. You want to know something, I know they went

on to the internet. But there is something that was filmed a good 10 years before, because obviously

it was 2016. It just so happens. You see the movie, which is also the trigger for you to post it, which you had not posted before. What a great artifact to have. Yeah, and also, you know, thank you for doing that, because it really seemed like it had injected truth and what was going on in that case. We saw a different side of things. I think just as a general public that nobody knew about, um, now, I think that was super interesting. Just I would love to hear your

input on this. A lot of times when we cross examine a witness, we will go back to and there's kind of various rules depending on your federal and state court. How far back you can go on

“somebody's prior acts. And you can't just character assassinate them, but you have to find an act”

that took place prior and say, does it show something? Does it give me motive? Does it give me some kind of insight into the person or what they're claiming? And this is a perfect example to Matt's point, right? Matt isn't this kind of 1101 in some weird world? Yeah, yeah, or if there was, if there was a 1108 or 1109 mark for bitchiness, I wonder where that would fall on because it was similar to that. I mean, growing around evidence code sections and using your

interview as the kind of predicate act to get its admissability. So, yep, I would allow. I mean, if he's invited, it's also hard to keep me out. You know, Blake's team, like they did not want me there, obviously. So, yeah, I guess there's a, there's a reason for that. So, that an act real quick, in researching sort of about you and your background, I discovered

that true crime is a huge deal in Norway. They have a thing called Nordic Noir, which I'd never

heard of before. And there's a Easter crime weekend that a lot of people do where they go and they, they, they read murder mysteries. And it turns out, Mark, I didn't know this, but there's this incredibly rich, like murder mystery history in, in the country of Norway. And I, I, I, I had never done it that far. I found out because there was just a phenomenal series, hello, the producer. Yeah, Harry Holy, Harry Hole. I'm watching it right now.

Okay, yeah, it's normal, no. Harry grid it's so, it's so good. It's so good. All those nicknames kind of where, or is, is name's Harry Hole's kind of funny. We separate bar in Manhattan Beach. It's called Harry O's, but so, so what about you? Are you, are you, do you, do you enjoy

“true crime? Do you enjoy murder mysteries? Do you follow any of the stuff that Mark and I do?”

Your, uh, his obsesses, as, as we are with us. It's Blake Lively case. It's kind of, I feel like people got addicted to this as the same way as we get addicted to these true crime stories. Because there's so much going on all the time. There's so many aspects to it. There's so many layers, so many people got involved, so many industry got involved. So I think it has a lot of the same, I don't know what you guys think, but, um, same kind of aspects to it as, as true crime.

Well, there's definitely a voyeuristic element to it. I think, right, Hollywood gossip, and, uh, some of the things and often when it intersects, uh, as, you know, which is Mark's world, defending famous celebrities who cross the line into getting charged criminally. But we would, I would love to have you back. We would love to have you back. Um, sometime, none of you to talk about, uh, play clearly, but let's talk about, uh, some true crime stuff. If you're, if you're

also before I go. I have to have a very, very specific question. I'm wondering if you could answer,

“because do you have time for that? Sure. Because yeah, okay. So I, I've been so confused now”

with this case because, um, Brian Friedman came out the other day when he released a whole settlement. And he said, you know, they cannot, the reason why I feel like he released a whole settlement was so he, he could say, you know, there is no way that they could take these damages somewhere else. So go to California or try to get these damages somewhere else because whatever Bryant, know, whatever Lyman decides a ruleful zone that they can't appeal any of that. And then got

blame. Went to the media and said that, you know, we are going to try to get our, uh, our damages

through other vehicles. Uh, where is the truth here? Who was, like, what's got Leap's going to take the position that I'm in Bryant's pocket, but let me just tell you, every single thing that that legal team has said so far has turned out to be false. I mean, just false legally. And then and they're, they've been wrong tactically and strategically. It's unbelievable. At some point, somebody is going to write a long form article about the amount of money that Blake and Ryan

have spent on this dry hole that they have been digging of, uh, for, I don't know, two, three years or whatever it is. It's, it's astonishing. And everybody keeps telling me, I don't have any way to prove it. But that settlement agreement and the reason it was rushed into private mediation is there is a California Supreme Court case that says, you can't sue your lawyers for legal malpractice if you resolve the case in private mediation. And because you can't, there's a bar to bringing in

whatever happened in the mediation. Therefore, you can't prove your case. That's exactly why this case got settled because after Judge Lyman granted the motion that that in Blake Lively's case, if you read that opinion, it is savage in the way he dissects the lawyer in the case, but

“specifically Blake's lawyer. And that's why Brian, Brian, my guess is why he released it.”

That is the very thing, just to add what Mark just said. You know, interview with celebrities and being inside the Hollywood world, you know, you know, better probably than Mark and I do, how much ego will often drive decision-making. And if you've got the worst nightmare for any lawyer is, you know, and I don't know the behind-the-scenes on their, on their team or not, but the worst nightmare is when you've got a client with unlimited resources who won't listen to you.

And I want to give them the benefit of the doubt and say that some of these decisions were made against the advice of counsel. I don't know. I don't think anybody ever will, but yeah, you understand the engine probably better than we do when it comes to ego and Hollywood and reputation and how somebody thinks they're looking in the general public. You can sort of see that going off the rails against sound legal advice. That's my best thought on it.

“But do you think they're going to go to the house to get the damages? Can they do it?”

Yeah, not if they're insurance carrier as they think they would have thought it because they're going to get slapped with an action. But they're also trying to judge shop with federal judges tends to go very poorly for whoever does that and they will back each other up typically.

So there's an old saying in US legal circles. Nothing is more powerful.

Or what is it? Federal judges are second only to God himself when it comes to to power. So this is a federal case and that wouldn't sit well if any federal jurors don't think. Thank you, Shafty. Where does the audio find you? Where do they find you? Well, if they want to come to visit me in my yorka, they can do that on there now or they can find me on my youtube channel as well.

Oh, awesome, okay. We're going to hear you up again. We're going to have you back. We're going to talk about some true crime. I love that. Thank you so much. This was so much fun. Thank you so much for having me. Really, really appreciate it. Thanks for coming. That stopped Matt and I share a story from the past. Stay tuned.

you off the air that I said if you were going to give me another story that involved me having

“a compliment, Nate Hockman. I was going to get pissed off at you. And so we swore we wouldn't.”

But then I had occurred to me. Give him his dude. Did you see today? Maybe yesterday. Where he

is going to ask the judge in the LA Superior Court to call a halt to the $4 billion settlement

with the county on the sexual abuse claims. Did you see this? Because I did not see that. So one of the one things I've been missing while I've been gone. I guess it's fascinating. There was a $4 billion settlement against the county of LA and when I say settlement, there was not, what's it the most robust discovery in the world? But anyway, there was some, there's been some LA times articles where the LA Mag articles have been

“couldn't brew ha ha around it. And he just announced that he's going to go in and ask for the”

judge to put a halt to it. Because his analysis, this is wild to me. The shows at least 81 percent may be fraud. Think about that. Out of $4 billion that if you just do the numbers,

over $3 billion of that is fraud. And basically the county of LA was about to basically bankrupt

themselves. And somebody stepped in and said, "Prim out. I'm going to take a different look at this." Well, we grew up here right, Mark. It's like being LA Angelinos. I have, it just seems like by the day, I'm losing faith with some of the decisions that we're seeing at the local level. And that's a perfect one. Like, yeah, let's vote to bankrupt ourselves. You know, like the roads are, are pot-hold. You know, we still get homeless people everywhere.

I don't get it. You know, like, yeah, let's sign off on that. I just, it took me four years to get a settlement out of the Orange County Board of Supervisors on a legitimate sexual harassment case. We just finalized all that about a month ago. And the idea that they're, they're just pulling out the checkbook without any due diligence on 75% of the claims. I mean, you know, this isn't a partisan politics. You know, this is just, this is, this is, wait, and when you think about the fact

that the state enacted a law that allowed look back, that mind you, you've spent your whole career doing, you know, work for victims. I do both defense and playman's work, but the state past this law, that basically put a gun to the municipality's head and say, okay, we're not only going to, we're not only going to put the gun gear head by doing a look back, law to revive the statutes of limitation, but now we're going to pull the trigger and just make it so that everybody can make a

claim and, and now it looks like there's four out of five are, are fraudulent if you believe the analysis. Yeah, and it's just, it's like the LAPD hasn't met their recruiting quotas. It's the lowest number of sworn officers since 1995. There's so many problems in this city that the literacy rates, the testing scores of LAPD are just spiraling even worse every year, and they're going to, they bust out the checkbook for something like that. It is, yeah, it's like municipal suicide,

and it makes no sense, and, and the people that are applying for that, I mean, it's just, you know,

and again, this is, this is like just a public safety slash common sense thing, like a billion,

a billion dollars is so much money on the municipal level. It's insane. Like the difference, you ever heard that whole thing that the difference student in a million and a billion, a million seconds is 13 days. A billion seconds is like 33 years. It's such a vast amount of money. And the idea that nobody, that there's no due diligence required for that, we're just cutting checks for, it's just, it's insanity. All right, I just, I didn't even want to tell a story because

I thought truth is, truth is stranger than fiction. And I want to go back to my turtles and pull out.

“That's what that makes me want to do. I want to go see a battle. You won the thanks mark. Thank you,”

at. Thank you, everybody. Thanks to our guests, Shastith Law, and thanks to you for tuning in to in the well. Have a great weekend. Thank you.