Rebecca Grossman murder trial kicks off in LA with prosecutors telling jury how socialite ‘mowed down’ brothers Mark, 11, and Jacob, 8, Iskander on crosswalk after ‘flying down road at 81mph while impaired’, in opening statements

Wealthy Los Angeles socialite and philanthropist Rebecca Grossman “floored” her car moments before mowing down and killing two young brothers with her Mercedes while racing with her lover after cocktails, then tried to flee the scene, prosecutors said the jury on the first day of testimony at her murder trial.

Opening arguments began Friday in Los Angeles, when LA Deputy District Attorney Ryan Gould told jurors that “those guys didn’t have a chance” after Grossman got behind the wheel of her car while “impaired by alcohol and Valium.”

“She didn’t stop after hitting the kids — she kept driving,” Gould said, adding that witnesses will tell the court that Grossman’s white Mercedes was “flying down the road” at 80 mph before the crash .

And after a paramedic told her that two young boys had been hit, she “didn’t return to the scene” from her car, which ended up a quarter-mile away, he said.

The 62-year-old Grossman appeared at her trial on Friday wearing a dark blue vest over a white blouse and a skirt

The LA socialite is accused of fatally beating brothers Mark, 11, and Jacob, 8, Iskander at a crosswalk in Westlake Village in September 2020

While prosecutors say it was Grossman’s car that struck and killed the boys, her defense team claims the black SUV of her then-boyfriend, ex-MLB star Scott Erickson — or possibly another mysterious black vehicle — was to blame.

Grossman, 62, appeared for her trial Friday at a court in Van Nuys, 20 miles northwest of LA, wearing a dark blue vest over a white blouse and a blue-and-white floral skirt and with her husband, prominent plastic surgeon Dr. Peter Grossman, by her side.

She is charged with two counts of second-degree murder in the gruesome deaths of eight-year-old Jacob Iskander and his 11-year-old brother Mark at a marked crosswalk in September 2020.

Grossman – who faces a maximum sentence of 34 years to life if convicted – also faces two counts of manslaughter by vehicular abuse with gross negligence and one count of hit and run resulting in death.

She pleads not guilty to all charges and has a website proclaiming her innocence called The Truth Matters.

Grossman, the founder and her husband of the Grossman Burn Foundation in West Hills, has been free on $2 million bail since the charges were filed more than three years ago.

During a preliminary hearing in May 2022, the boys’ heartbroken mother, Nancy Iskander, cried on the witness stand as she recounted how she was standing in a Westlake Village crosswalk with her four children when she saw two vehicles coming toward her at high speed.

She desperately tried to wave at the cars, one a white Mercedes with Grossman at the wheel and the other a black SUV driven by ex-Erickson, 56, — with whom prosecutors say Grossman had margaritas earlier the day of the crash had been drinking – just seconds before her two sons were mowed down.

“I still see it every night – it haunts me every night,” said Iskander, who managed to get to safety and pull her five-year-old son Zachary out of the way.

“The speed was crazy,” she said of the two cars. ‘They zigzagged with each other as if they were playing or racing.

Prosecutors say Grossman drove into the boys at 80 mph in a 70 mph zone, damaging her Mercedes

The Iskander brothers ‘didn’t stand a chance,’ prosecutor Ryan Gould said in opening statements in Rebecca Grossman’s trial

‘They didn’t stop before the intersection. They didn’t stop at the intersection. They didn’t stop when there was an 11-year-old sitting on the hood of the car… No one stopped.”

LA Superior Court Judge Shellie Samuels, who presided over the earlier preliminary hearing, ordered Grossman to stand trial, telling the court, “The defendant was not in a hurry to get home.” She played a quick game of chicken with Mr. Erickson.

“The suspect acted with deliberate, knowing disregard for life.”

Now, at her full jury trial with Judge Joseph Brandolino on the bench, to get a second-degree murder conviction, prosecutors will have to prove to the jury that Grossman acted with “implied malice” knowing that the driving at an alleged speed of 130 km/h with a speed limit of 70 km/h was dangerous to human life.

Scott Erickson, Rebecca Grossman’s alleged lover, is pictured in 2018. He was charged with a felony over the 2020 crash and settled his case in 2022.

Grossman’s murder charge is unusual, as no DUI charges have been filed.

The LA district attorney decided against a DUI charge because, while a blood test taken by Grossman showed 0.08 percent, California’s legal limit, a previously taken breathalyzer test showed 0.076 percent.

Prosecutors say Grossman also had Valium in her system and was impaired by alcohol when she got behind the wheel.

They also claim that she continued driving for another quarter mile after the fatal crash and only stopped because the engine of her car – badly damaged at the front from the collision with the boys – stopped working.

Erickson allegedly had a relationship with Grossman while she was separated from her husband. Prosecutors say he drove his black SUV across the crosswalk where the Iskander family was walking, seconds ahead of Grossman’s car.

He was charged with reckless driving and his case was resolved in February 2022, with a judge ordering him to make a public service announcement to high school students about the importance of safe driving.

Erickson, who is divorced, was a star with the Minnesota Twins and Baltimore Orioles. He then played a year with the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2005, ending his career with the New York Yankees in 2006.

Grossman’s $2 million bail, plus the slow pace of the case — including several hearings at which Grossman failed to show up — sparked outrage over previous court proceedings from protesters who believe her wealth and “connections” will keep her out of jail for more than three years kept in prison. year

Earlier this month, the boy’s mother, Nancy Iskander, wished her son Jacob a happy heavenly birthday, posting a photo of the shared grave where the two brothers are buried.

Karim and Nancy Iskander, the boys’ parents, are shown at a court hearing in April 2022

Two petitions have been filed claiming a total of more than 50,000 signatures have been circulated, calling for Grossman — who lives in a $7.6 million ranch home in an upscale, gated community in Hidden Hills — to be incarcerated and given justice for the parents of the dead boys who did the same. has filed a civil lawsuit against her.

“Justice must be served regardless of Grossman’s financial resources, status, privileges and connections,” one stated.

“We demand that Grossman be prosecuted and convicted to the fullest extent of the law and face serious consequences for her actions in taking the lives of Mark and Jacob.”

The other petition read: “Let’s do our best to raise awareness about this case and put Rebecca Grossman behind bars. Justice for Mark and Jacob Iskander.”

Grossman’s legal team is preparing to argue that she was neither the first nor the last car to hit the children the night they died.

Images from the scene show the front of Grossman’s luxury car badly damaged in a crash that prosecutors say was caused by the youths she mowed down while speeding in a 45-mph zone.

Prosecutors say Grossman chased Erickson after a cocktail lunch.

Erickson, now 55, was charged with a felony, and his case was resolved in February 2022, with a judge ordering him to make a public service announcement aimed at high school students about the importance of safe driving.

Despite the slew of scandalous allegations, her plastic surgeon husband, Dr. Peter Grossman, behind his wife.