LA socialite Rebecca Grossman who plowed into two boys killing them both asks court to approve lawyer despite major 'conflict of interest'

The LA socialite who was convicted of killing two young brothers in a horrific hit-and-run crash was back in court on Friday, assuring a judge that she wants to keep her new defense attorney, even though he has a ‘potential conflict of interest.’

During this hearing at Van Nuys court, northwest of Los Angeles, the focus was not on the wealthy socialite Rebecca Grossman herself, but on her attorney, James Spertus, who is asking Judge Joseph Brandolino to overturn her second degree murder convictions and grant her a new trial.

Spertus is also representing LA Assistant District Attorney Diana Teran who was recently arrested and charged with 11 felony counts of using confidential sheriff’s records illegally.

LA’s DA decided that this separate case was a potential conflict of interest, since Teran was the boss and immediate supervisor of the two deputy DAs who successfully prosecuted Grossman at trial, Ryan Gould and Jamie Castro.

And less than a month before Grossman, 60, is scheduled to be sentenced to up to 34 years to life in prison, Gould and Castro were dropped as lead prosecutors and replaced by Habib Balian, assistant head deputy of the DA’s Major Crimes Division.

James Spertus, Rebecca Grossman's new attorney, is seen leaving the Los Angeles Superior Courthouse for his client's hearing on Friday

Grossman's daughter Alexis and husband Peter are also seen departing Friday's hearing 

Nancy Iskander and her husband Karim are seen departing the Los Angeles Superior Courthouse for the Rebecca Grossman court hearing on May 17, 2024 in Van Nuys, California

Brothers Mark and Jacob Iskander, who were killed by Rebecca Grossman after she crashed her Mercedes into them

Grossman - dressed in brown jail overalls with her hair looking much more gray than it did during her trial - was led into court Friday with her wrists in handcuffs blowing a kiss to her husband, prominent plastic surgeon Peter Grossman, and their daughter Alexis, 19.

She sobbed as she was handcuffed to her chair between her two lawyers while Alexis sat behind her, crying and being comforted by her father.

Balian argued Friday that the judge had the option removing Spertus as Grossman’s defense attorney because of the conflict of interest.

He told the court that before her arrest, Teran was ‘intimately involved’ with making prosecution decisions during the Grossman trial.

One of those decision was for prosecutors not to interview a witness whom Grossman allegedly tried get her family to contact after the trial to persuade them to change their testimony, the court heard.

The Iskanders in their final photo together: parents Nancy and Karim with their sons, Zachary, Jacob and Mark; and baby daughter, Violet. Courtesy of the Iskander family

Alexis Grossman and Dr. Peter Grossman arrive at the Los Angeles Superior Courthouse for the Friday's court hearing where Rebecca Grossman argued to keep her new attorney despite a 'potential conflict of interest'

Rebecca Grossman, 62, was found guilty over the September 29, 2020 crash that killed two young brothers. She faces 34 years to life in prison

James Spertus, Grossman's new lawyer, is asking Judge Joseph Brandolino to overturn her second degree murder convictions and grant her a new trial

’She (Teran) had information in the Grossman case that she could have passed to Mr. Spertus,’ said Balian, adding that he was ‘not casting aspersions that that actually happened.’

Spertus hit back, calling Balian’s implications of possible unethical behavior by Teran ‘fantastical’ and adding ‘It would be improper to ask Ms. Grossman for a waiver (acknowledging conflict of interest) when the people have failed to identify any conflict.’

‘This case is tragic and we are going to have a hearing with prosecutorial misconduct issues.’

Saying that there’s ’zero overlap’ in the Grossman and Teran cases Spertus attacked Balian for implying ‘unethical conduct by me’ and for ‘impugning my integrity.

He added that when she was still with the DA’s office, Teran ran was ‘in charge of ethics’ and he objected to the suggestion that she would ‘use secrets (about Grossman’s case) to advance Ms. Grossman’s case.’

Judge Brandolino ruled that there is ‘no actual conflict’ and said, ‘There is nothing that leads me to believe that she (Teran) was passing information to Mr. Spertus about this (Grossman’s) case. The two cases do not intersect.’

The prosecution says Spertus has a conflict of interest because he's simultaneously representing LA Assistant District Attorney Diana Teran. Teran was the boss and immediate supervisor of the two deputy DAs who successfully prosecuted Grossman at trial, Ryan Gould and Jamie Castro. Despite this Judge Brandolino said there is 'no actual conflict'

Grossman's attorney old attorney Tony Buzbee, pictured, announced plans to appeal her murder convictions after the verdict was handed down in February

Nancy and Karim Iskander, whose sons Grossman murdered, appeared delighted by the verdict. The Iskanders spent a large portion of the trial slamming 'evil' Tony Buzbee, Grossman's lawyer at the time 

But the judge did find there was a ‘potential’ conflict and requested Grossman for a waiver, asking her, ‘Do you understand that there is a potential conflict of interest?

‘Yes,’ said Grossman.

‘Do you wish to proceed with Mr. Spertus as your attorney?’ Judge Brandolino then asked her. ‘Yes’ she answered again.’

The DA’s decision to remove Gould and Castro - instead of pushing for the removal of the ‘conflicted’ defense attorney Spertus - angered Nancy Iskander, mother of Mark, 11, and eight year-old Jacob, the boys Grossman struck and killed on a Westlake Village marked crosswalk in September 2020.

‘Our family is disappointed and confused about the decision to remove Ryan Gould and Jamie Castro from the case,' she said.

'Ryan worked on this so diligently from day one and only cared about the truth. The idea we now, all of a sudden, have to work with someone we've never met before feels so unfair,'

‘We were looking forward to closing the case. Sentencing was soon. For me, all of a sudden to have two meet another prosecutor and work with them. They don’t know my family or the boys.’

It was believed to be pressure from the Iskanders and others that prompted the DA to later backpedal and restore Gould and Castro would stay on the case to ‘assist’ Balian.

Peter Grossman leaves court with his two children after Rebecca Grossman was found guilty of murder

The DA’s decision to remove Gould and Castro - instead of pushing for the removal of the ‘conflicted’ defense attorney Spertus - angered Nancy Iskander, mother of Mark, 11, and eight year-old Jacob

Iskander and her husband Karim - who were both in court Friday - believe Grossman deliberately hired Spertus to ‘play games’ with her case.

‘There is a clear attempt by Ms. Grossman to not just create a conflict of interest, but to influence the justice system in her favor,’ Nancy told local TV station KTLA.

Spertus insists there is ‘no conceivable, arguable, theoretical conflict of interest.’

Meanwhile, Grossman has already been accused of using dirty tactics to try to get her convictions overturned.

Prosecutors say that from jail she told her husband, and daughter to hunt down jurors and seek out witnesses to try to get them to change their testimony and sway Judge Brandolino into giving her a new trial.

She also allegedly told Alexis to publicly release a sheriff’s deputy’s body-camera video that had been sealed by the judge.

On February 23, after a six week trial, a jury of nine men and three women found Grossman guilty of all five charges against her, two counts of second degree murder, two of gross vehicular manslaughter and one of hit-and-run resulting in death. She had pleaded not guilty to all the charges.

Jurors didn’t buy her defense team’s contention that it was her 6ft 4in ex-baseball pro boyfriend Scott Erickson’s black Mercedes SUV - not Grossman’s white Mercedes - that was responsible for killing the Iskander boys on the crosswalk.

The two - who were dating while Grossman was separated from her husband - had been sharing margaritas earlier in the day and were racing each other at more than 70mph, with Erickson’s car just in front of Grossman’s, when the tragedy happened.

Erickson, 56 - who received only a slap-on-the-wrist reckless driving misdemeanor citation as a result of the accident - became the elephant in the room during the murder trial in which he never showed his face.

Iskander and her husband Karim - who were both in court Friday - believe Grossman deliberately hired Spertus to ‘play games’ with her case.

Grossman said she understood there is a potential conflict of interest with having Spertus as her attorney, and she chose to go forward anyway

Iskander and her husband Karim - who were both in court Friday - believe Grossman deliberately hired Spertus to ‘play games’ with her case.

Time and time again, Grossman’s trial attorney, Tony Buzbee, brought up his name, pointing the finger of blame at him. Yet Buzbee never subpoened Erickson to appear as a witness, nor did prosecutors.

During Grossman’s criminal trial several rumors circulated about his whereabouts: he was hiding out in a high-rise Las Vegas condo, he was coaching baseball in Mexico, he was living quietly on the beach in Orange county, south of LA.

But in the upcoming wrongful death civil trial - in which the Iskanders are seeking unspecified cash damages for ‘battery, negligence and negligent infliction of emotional distress’ - Erickson won’t find it so easy to lie low, since he’s a defendant alongside Grossman.

In that complaint, the heartbroken parents - who say Grossman ‘drove drunk and killed’ their two young sons - also accuse Erickson of negligence that was ‘despicable as it showed a willful and conscious disregard of the rights and safety of others.’

Erickson - who played for six MLB teams during his 15-year baseball career - has hired attorneys to fight the Iskander’s accusations and he filed a motion to ’strike’ or cancel their complaint against him.

Spertus and his attorney partner Lara J. Grassley, make no mention of Erickson in their motion for Grossman’s convictions to be thrown out and she be granted a new criminal trial.

Spertus and his attorney partner Lara J. Grassley, made no mention of Scott Erickson in their motion for Grossman’s convictions to be thrown out and she be granted a new criminal trial. Erickson, a former MLB player, was Grossman's boyfriend while she and her husband were separated

‘Vehicular homicide second-degree murder charges require evidence that the defendant acted with a base anti-social motive and with wanton disregard for human life and there was no evidence presented at trial to support findings of such acts by Ms. Grossman in this case,’ say the lawyers in their motion.

‘The defense respectfully moves for a new trial mindful of the victims losses and the emotion crying out for accountability.’

The attorneys argue that to get a conviction of second degree murder, prosecutors had to prove she acted with ‘malice’ - that she knew what she was doing at the time of the crash.

‘But the evidence was insufficient to prove the required elements of second degree murder as it relates to implied malice,’ they insist.

The lawyers also say that testimony from a California Highway Patrol officer - who gave Grossman a speeding ticket seven years before the Iskander boys’ deaths - should never had been allowed at trial by the judge because it was ‘erroneous and prejudicial.’

Nor, they add, should evidence of Grossman drinking alcohol earlier on the day of the crash have been admitted at trial since she was never charged with DUI.

Grossman’s motion for a new trial is scheduled to be heard by Judge Brandolino on June 3 and she’s set to be sentenced June 10.