COLORADO Kobe Bryant emotionless as lawyers sling graphic details

The defense was able to force a witness for the prosecution to contradict some testimony.
EAGLE, Colo. (AP) -- Prosecutors wasted no time painting a picture of Kobe Bryant as a callous rapist who wouldn't take no for an answer. Defense attorneys didn't take long, either, to show they would attack and spare no one -- even the alleged victim -- to keep Bryant from prison.
Bryant sat stone-faced during a preliminary hearing Thursday as the woman's story of a flirtatious encounter gone bad came out for the first time with graphic details of Bryant grabbing her by the neck and attacking her at the mountain resort where she worked.
"You're not going to tell anybody about this, right?" he allegedly asked the woman repeatedly.
Bryant's attorney, Pamela Mackey, quickly tried to show the woman's story was just that -- a story. She used the woman's name six different times, and at one point suggested that her injuries might be "consistent with a person who has had sex with three different men in three days."
That drew a quick recess from Judge Frederick Gannett, but also gave an early taste of what could likely turn into a messy and nasty trial when it is finally held sometime next year.
"The defense threw some serious mud and now we will see if it sticks," said former prosecutor Craig Silverman, now a Denver defense attorney.
The only witness
While most of the attention was focused on the woman's version of the encounter she had with Bryant the night of June 30 at the Cordillera Lodge & amp; Spa, Mackey managed to poke some holes in the testimony of Eagle County Sheriff's Detective Doug Winters.
Winters was the only witness during the hearing, which will resume next Wednesday with Bryant present. Sometime after the end of the hearing Gannett will decide whether there is enough probable cause to order Bryant to trial on sexual assault charges -- something legal experts believe is a mere formality.
But it was clear right away that winning a preliminary hearing -- where prosecutors need to show only that there is probable evidence for trial -- and winning the trial itself are two different things. And Mackey not only got Winters to contradict some testimony in a brief cross-examination, but also got an opportunity to see how he will stand up during trial.
Winters seemed sure of himself when questioned by prosecutors, but wasn't so sharp when Mackey had her shot. At one point she asked Winters whether he had seen a bruise on the woman's neck allegedly caused by Bryant when he interviewed her the day after the incident.
"She talks on how Mr. Kobe Bryant grabbed her neck and choked her," Mackey told Winters. "You looked at her neck to see?"
Winters said he had, then Mackey asked him if he saw any injuries on her neck.
"Not from the front, no," he said.
"Not a red mark?" she asked.
"That's correct," he said.
"Not a scratch?"
"That's correct."
Defense gains some knowledge
Most legal experts had predicted the defense would skip the hearing and go to trial to keep details of the alleged assault from being made public. The details got out, but the defense also gained some valuable knowledge of how the prosecution will try the case.
"He committed himself to a lot of 'I don't knows' and 'I believes,"' Eagle defense attorney Jim Fahrenholtz said of Winters. "There's no way he'll have better knowledge of it at trial."
Outside of Winters, most of the prosecution's case will center on the testimony of the alleged victim. The only other direct witnesses identified so far are a bellman who told the woman to report the incident and a nurse who treats rape victims.
Still, much of the day's testimony was terribly damaging if nothing else to the reputation of Bryant, 25, who could face life in prison if he is convicted.