A California plastic surgeon’s socialite wife accused in the hit-and-run killing of two boys whined in the emergency room that her Mercedes’s safety system disabled her car after the crash or “I would have been at home in my garage right now.”
Rebecca Grossman, 60, is standing trial on two counts of murder, vehicular manslaughter, and hit-and-run in the deaths of Mark and Jacob Iskander, 11 and 8, where were crossing the road with their mother on September 29, 2020, as CrimeOnline reported. Police found her next to her vehicle, which was disabled after the airbags when off following the crash, which her attorneys insist she was not involved in despite the heavy damage on the front end of her car.
An emergency room technician at Los Robles Regional Medical Center told the court on Thursday what Grossman said at the hospital, according to the Los Angeles Times.
“If they didn’t disable my car, I would have been at home in my garage right now,” Teryl Grasso said, quoting Grossman said.
Grossman’s attorney, Tony Buzbee — who defended Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in his impeachment trial — accused Grasso of “stalking the news” and sneered at the time it took her to come forward.
“I was stalking the news, and I had to go therapy too,” Grasso replied. “I was traumatized.”
Grasso said she was in therapy for nine months. after the crash and still can’t “talk about that night without crying.” She took time to come forward, she said, while she sought guidance on whether doing so would violate the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA).
Buzbee and his co-counsel insist that Grossman did not hit the Iskander children and that instead it was her lover at the time, former Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Scott Erickson. The two had been been drinking together prior to the crash. Both of them allegedly sped through the intersection where the Iskanders were crossing, but prosecutors say it was Grossman who killed the children.
Erickson was charged with a misdemeanor and resolved his case in 2022.
Buzbee has not yet explained the front end damage on her car.
On Wednesday, Los Angeles County Deputy Rafael Mejia testified that Grossman told him, when he found her next to her disabled SUV, that “she hit something, but she didn’t know what she hit.”
Most of Thursday’s testimony involved Buzbee and his team attempting to discredit a field sobriety test conducted at the scene. A breathalyzer conducted at that time showed Grossman’s blood alcohol level to be just under the legal limit, but a blood sample taken at the hospital registered at the legal limit. That test also found valium in her system.
Grossman, however, is not charged with driving under the influence.
For the latest true crime and justice news, subscribe to the ‘Crime Stories with Nancy Grace’ podcast.
[Featured image: Rebecca Grossman/YouTube/Grossman Burn Foundation and her damaged vehicle/Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department]
