When Your Own Notes Betray You

There's a reason experienced attorneys tell witnesses: answer the question you were asked, nothing more. Today in Monmouth County, we watched what happens when a witness forgets that rule.

Detective Debbie Basser has been the prosecution's financial crimes expert for three days now. She's spent hours walking the jury through charts showing Paul Caneiro taking money from a trust account that was supposed to pay his brother Keith's insurance premiums. The prosecution's theory is simple: Paul was stealing, Keith found out, and Paul killed his brother's entire family to keep it quiet and collect life insurance.

It's a tidy theory. And Detective Basser was doing a solid job selling it. Until she decided to volunteer something she wasn't asked about.

The $60,000 Problem

During cross-examination, defense attorney Andy Murray was asking about the businesses Keith owned. Routine stuff. But then Detective Basser decided to mention something "interesting" she'd noticed: over $60,000 a year in ATM cash withdrawals from the family businesses. The implication was clear. Where was all that cash going? Suspicious, right?

Murray didn't miss a beat. He asked Detective Basser about her interview notes from November 26, 2018. That's six days after the murders. She'd sat down with Tiffany Rivera, an employee at Square One, one of Keith's businesses. And in those notes, Tiffany told her something very specific about all that petty cash.

That's what Detective Basser wrote in her own notes. Keith took the cash. Not Paul. Keith. And nowhere in those notes did she write Paul's name in connection with the petty cash withdrawals.

Murray went in for the kill: "You thought it was important to put that information out there, that there were a lot of cash withdrawals from the business. I didn't ask you that question. You volunteered that on your own. But the truth of the matter is that money, that cash that you know from talking to Tiffany, was going to Keith and not Paul."

The detective had to admit her notes didn't mention Paul.

The $3 Million Question

Murray wasn't done. The prosecution's whole theory is that Paul killed Keith's family for money. So Murray asked the obvious question: Did you follow the $3 million in life insurance proceeds? Did you investigate who actually received that money?

Detective Basser's answer: "I do not know."

She never investigated who got the insurance payout. The prosecution is asking the jury to believe Paul killed four people for money, but their financial detective didn't bother to find out where the money actually went.

This matters because the defense's opening statement pointed directly at Corey Caneiro, the third brother. According to court filings, after Paul was arrested, Corey installed himself as trustee of Keith's family trust and allegedly used the insurance proceeds to buy a $1.8 million home in Fair Haven. The defense is planting seeds. And the prosecution's detective just admitted she never looked into it.

The Prosecution Fights Back

On redirect, the prosecution landed some punches of their own. They established that after Keith confronted Paul about the missing money in April 2018, Paul did pay $21,548 back into the business. But here's the kicker: after that, Paul made 16 more transfers totaling $33,300 from the trust account into his personal accounts. None of that money ever came back.

And then the prosecution dropped a bomb: the bank statements for May through September 2018 "were altered."

They also walked through all 32 transfers from the trust account between 2017 and 2018. Every single one went directly into Paul's personal bank accounts. Remember Paul's email to Keith claiming he "accidentally selected the wrong bill payee" and the money went to school loans? Detective Basser testified that nothing from the trust account ever went directly to pay school loans. Every transfer went to Paul's personal accounts first.

What This Means

Day 3 was a mixed bag. The defense scored points on the petty cash testimony and the life insurance question. But the prosecution's redirect was damaging. Altered bank statements. Continued transfers after the April confrontation. An explanation about school loans that doesn't hold up.

Here's what I'm watching: The prosecution has evidence of financial misconduct. That's clear. But financial misconduct is a long way from quadruple murder. The gap between "Paul took money from his brother" and "Paul slaughtered his brother's entire family including two children" is enormous. The prosecution needs to bridge that gap with more than financial charts.

And the defense just created reasonable doubt about whether investigators even looked at everyone who might have benefited from Keith's death.

▶️ WATCH NOW Defense Catches Detective Volunteering Testimony Her Notes Contradict

Financial testimony is done. Next up: expect the prosecution to move toward the physical evidence. DNA. Ballistics. The DVR footage that went all the way to the New Jersey Supreme Court. That's where this case gets made or broken.

The money tells a story. But it's not the whole story. Not yet.