Notebook: Moussaoui Own Worst Enemy

CBS News producer Beverley Lumpkin has been covering the sentencing trial of Zacarias Moussaoui.

The defense began with an expert on corrections who was clearly called to assure any skeptical member of the jury that Moussaoui could be sentenced to life without their fearing he might escape or harm anyone.

James Aiken, with 30 years of experience in corrections, was quite forceful in testifying about how Moussaoui would be housed should the jury recommend he be sentenced to life in prison with no possibility of release.

Aiken's particular specialty is "classification" by which an inmate is assessed as to the level of security needed. He said Moussaoui would certainly receive the highest degree, being sent to Administrative Max, or what some call Super Max, the most secure prison in the federal system, located in Florence, Colo.

This is not only because of the nature of his crime, but also because if he were in the general prison population, other inmates might try to kill him.

"Other predators don't like what he did," Aiken said.

Aiken said that Moussaoui's behavior during his 4 1/2 year incarceration has been "fairly unremarkable" and that there is no indication of any "predator" behavior. His environment now is "sterile" and would continue to be so. He is isolated not only from the outside world but the prison world as well.

"He will never get lost in the crowd because he will never be in a crowd," Aiken said. "We are not preparing him for a return to society, not even preparing him for a return to the general population. What the mission is here is incapacitation."

He'll see his attorneys when the court orders, and he must see prison staff.

"There will be interactions but nobody's there to make friends with him," Aiken said.

He'll be checked periodically for physical and psychological condition, but, "he will deteriorate. He will deteriorate. Eventually he'll come to a realization" of what his future holds, "because time takes a toll on all of us … I've been in this business 30 years and I've seen them rot. They rot."

Aiken was so effective that prosecutor Novak went all out in a ferocious cross examination but ultimately the major points remained intact.

Moussaoui himself was then called to the witness stand by his long-suffering attorney Gerald Zerkin. During the first hour or so, there was a constant push and pull as Zerkin tried to show the jury how impossible Moussaoui has been as a client, how he has refused even to speak to most of the defense team for most of the case.

Moussaoui showed his irascible side but was cagey enough to avoid admitting that he has many times accused his lawyers of being a part of a conspiracy to kill him. Time and time again he wiggled out of responding directly to Zerkin's questions, and managed to insult him and another defense attorney, Edward MacMahon, with his rather fanciful recounting of case history. He basically maintained that he stopped dealing with his defense team because they denied him access to a Muslim attorney.

Zerkin nevertheless was able to indirectly explain what may have been mysteries to the jury, regarding the defendant's behavior, and the trajectory of the case.

Zerkin did his best to show through some of Moussaoui's past filings (handwritten pleadings such as one titled in huge block letters "God Curse the Queen/Little Bitch of Buckingham") that he's crazy, and his client continued to counter with crazy-like-a-fox retorts such as maybe it was a little "exaggerated," or "propaganda."

He kept throwing the fault back on his lawyers because Zerkin is a Jew and MacMahon an (alleged) racist, and they wouldn't allow him to have a Muslim lawyer. Zerkin, however, made clear the only attorney acceptable to Moussaoui would not have been granted a security clearance by the government.

It was also brought out that Moussaoui had met with prosecution experts on mental health, but not those retained by his own defense.

At last Zerkin asks Moussaoui why he hates America and Americans. The defendant went into a long ramble about the history of the past 1,427 years and how the Jewish state is the "missing star in the American flag." Once he and his Islamic brothers take over this country, they will "exterminate" Jewish-Americans but Christians will be OK as long as they don't fight the Muslims.

Chief prosecutor Rob Spencer brilliantly earned his salary during his cross-examination, first eliciting Moussaoui's fervent declaration that his earlier damaging testimony had been truthful, and then attacking his defense.

"For them it's cheap. They couldn't think outside the box, couldn't think any other strategy." He added, for the American people, broadly speaking, for anybody to fly into a building means he must be crazy. "But it's not based on any craziness, but on our religion."

Spencer asked if he'd do it again tomorrow if he could, and Moussaoui answered, "on the 12th, the 13th, the 14th, the 15th ...."

Moussaoui managed to declare in passing that Oklahoma City bomber Tim McVeigh was "the greatest American," because he wanted to strike the government.

He proceeded to tie his own noose tighter, as he denigrated the pain of the victim witnesses. The commander who testified? "Pathetic ... I was regretful that he didn't die." A military woman who sobbed on the stand remembering the deaths of her colleagues? "Disgusting." You were happy about the attacks on the Pentagon? "Make my day." You were happy about every death? "No regret, no remorse." More pain for the United States? "Like we say, no pain, no gain."

There was one issue on which Moussaoui testified that could give the jury pause, and consider whether he might genuinely be delusional — his seemingly sincere belief that George W. Bush will release him before the end of his term.

This he declared several times as his ultimate dream; he will be released because he has testified truthfully. He made clear that he doesn't believe his ultimate fate is up to this jury. No matter what happens in this court, he's confident that President Bush will announce his release within the next couple of years.