Sunny Hostin addresses resurfaced reports questioning her claim she was a holdout juror in 1991 murder trial
"The View" co-host Sunny Hostin addressed reporting about her identifying herself as a holdout juror in a gruesome murder case in the 1990s during the show's podcast Monday after resurfaced reports from multiple outlets said it was a man who was the holdout juror.
"Someone on the internet dug up a Daily News article from 1991 that profiled another, different person that was a holdout juror. You were quoted in this article too, but they were talking about a man that other people pointed to as saying this is the reason we couldn't come to a verdict," Brian Teta, the producer of "The View," noted during the "Behind the Table" podcast.
Hostin said she remembered him and explained that there were different counts in the case.
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"So, as I recall, and look it up for yourselves, there were three counts, I believe. One was second-degree murder, but it was intentional. Then there was the defense to that was, we could consider the insanity defense, meaning that he committed the crime, but he was not criminally responsible because of a mental disease or defect. And there was a third count, or a third issue that we dealt with, and that issue was the desecration of Monika Beerle's remains," Hostin said.
The co-host of "The View" said she felt strongly that he tried to hide the fact that he killed Beerle by dismembering her remains and that he should be found guilty of that count.
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"He was insane when he killed her," Hostin said. "And he said that, he confessed that he didn't realize that she was even dead. But then he decides to dismember her. I just thought that was so clear and gruesome and despicable to do that to someone's remains. I thought that he should be found guilty of that. And everyone else did too, except for this one guy. And we were, like, kind of looking at him, like, 'That was the easy one.' It was always the easy one. But we could not reach a unanimous verdict on that count."
Teta noted that Hostin didn't mention this male juror on the show when she identified herself as the holdout juror in this trial. She clarified during the podcast that she was the holdout on a different count, the count related to the insanity defense.
During the liberal talk show earlier this month, Hostin said she was a holdout juror on a case in which a man murdered his roommate and dismembered her. Hostin felt strongly that the man, Daniel Rakowitz, also known as "Butcher of Tompkins Square Park," was insane.
The co-host shared an excerpt from a report in The New York Times about the trial, which was held in 1991. Rakowitz was acquitted by reason of insanity. Hostin, whose maiden name is Cummings and whose first name is Asunción, was quoted in a Feb. 23, 1991, New York Times report about the trial, which said, "Several jurors questioned afterward said one holdout juror was principally responsible for preventing them from returning a guilty verdict."
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"The View" co-host presented the article on the show while explaining the case.
"That was me. It was because I saw clearly that he was psychotic," Hostin said during the show Sept. 22.
After revealing she was the holdout juror on the case, the New York Post reported that other contemporaneous accounts identified an unemployed man as the principal holdout. The Post wrote that "Jurors told The Post, Newsday, the Daily News and the Associated Press that the actual holdout was an unemployed man who wanted to keep the trial going so he could continue getting paid by the court for his civic duty."
"He was unemployed and liked the $15 a day and the three free meals," juror Valerie Holmes told Newsday after the verdict, according to contemporaneous coverage.
The Post also cited a law enforcement source familiar with the case who said, "We were told that the juror who held out was a man. There was no other description."
Another factor, the New York Post said, was that "Hostin was quoted as a juror on the case in multiple news clips at the time, but she did not identify herself as the holdout, nor did any of the fellow jurors who talked to the press after the trial. Her statement to Newsday from the time even seemed to contradict her story."
"Unfortunately for Sunny, one cannot simply put the toothpaste back in the tube. Hopefully, she's realized what kind of internet fervor she's created with this take that goes beyond her daily hare-brained political takes," Newsbusters Managing Editor Curtis Houck told Fox News Digital in a statement regarding Hostin's latest update on the story.
"Rather, touting her juror status on such a gruesome case hopefully cuts across politics and into basic common sense. Her invocation of "shared experiences" is an utter crock. Bringing up a term from Woke 1 won't make her supposedly proud admission any less disturbing."
Teta also asked Hostin to address what he described as the "lazy take," that she "got him out of jail, and she's proud of it," referring to criticism on the internet about her revelation.
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"Why would I be proud of that?" Hostin asked. "It's an experience that I had that I shared so that people would understand better. I think our lived experiences are a very good way on this show, in particular, to explain to people, current events, right?"
The discussion started when the co-hosts weighed in on the holdout juror in the Lindsay Clancy case.
Clancy's defense attorney has criticized the holdout juror in the case.