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Thursday was the most eventful day in the $1 billion defamation suit against CNN – so far – as the testimony of Navy veteran and Plaintiff Zachary Young concluded. The previous day’s emotional testimony from Young seemed to temper the ability for CNN’s lead counsel David Axelrod (not to be confused with CNN commentator David Axelrod) to be combative and accusatory. With a night of rest after the testimony, Axelrod felt confident unleashing his rage at Young; at one point shouting at him about his time in the CIA, and drawing Judge William Scott Henry’s anger with an ambush document and repeatedly insulting Young on the stand.

The fate of the defamation case against CNN even hung in the balance at one point.

Axelrod picked up the cross-examination by questioning Young about taking operation security measures. But Axelrod didn’t seem to want an answer. Axelrod kept interrupting Young as he tried to explain how operational security measures (not knowing names) were meant to prevent unnecessary risk for the operation and the operators. Axelrod kept trying to make the security concerns about Young fearing for himself in Austria not the operator is Afghanistan.

The interactions between Axelrod and Young were tense throughout. At one point, Axelrod accused Young of being a war profiteer taking advantage of desperate people. “Were you profiting off of desperate Afghans desperate to get out,” Axelrod repeatedly attacked. Young pointed out that he only took money from corporations for Afghanistan evacuations.

“The way I word it or the way you word it, it doesn’t matter,” Axelrod raises his voice.

Axelrod’s anger boiled over as he tried to get Young to answer about his relationship with the CIA, even shouting at him over it. “What’s your relationship with the CIA?! I’m asking you now!” This outburst drew an objection from Young’s lead counsel Vel Freedman, which drew a sidebar between the lead counsels and Judge Henry.

When the sidebar concluded, Judge Henry ordered that information about Young’s history with the CIA off limits since it was classified.

Axelrod even had an attitude against Young’s methods of running his evacuation operations, without ever coordinating one himself.

Young’s close contact on the ground in Afghanistan was a Ukrainian national named Yuri who was the one overseeing the other local operators carrying out the evacuations. Axelrod took issue with Young’s trust with his man (who Young knew since his time in the CIA) and how Young would pay Yuri and Yuri would distribute it to the men under his command.

When the jurors were allowed to submit written questions to Young, one was about how his relationship with Yuri began. He was not able to talk about it because it was classified.

He also tried  to make an issue out of Young not knowing how many operators Yuri was working with and their names, despite Young’s noted adherence to operational security measures.

One of the more contentious moments was when Axelrod had tried to accuse Young of withholding evidence from discovery, namely his bank account in Austria. This drew an impassioned objection from Young’s lead counsel Vel Freedman. Afterward, Judge William Scott Henry told the jury that over the course of the case he had not ordered Young to turn over the bank account information. The jurors nodded in response.

In another instance of Axelrod’s antics possibly not swaying the jury was when he was hammering how Young referred to Kornetsky (CNN’s source to go after) a “spiteful bitch” after she accused him of being a mercenary and pocketing millions.

Of the six jurors and two alternates, six were women. There was no discernable reaction from them. When the jurors were allowed to submit written questions to Young, none of them were about his feeling toward CNN sources or reporters.

At one point, the fate of the trial seemed to be in question after an extended side bar gave way to Judge Henry ordering the jury to leave the courtroom. Clearly angry, Judge Henry announced that Axelrod had a “just discovered document” he wanted included as evidence and had casted “aspersions” on the plaintiff. 

Calling it an “ambush document” and “trial by ambush” Freedman objected to it being added to the record.  Axelrod declared that Young had “perpetrated a fraud on this court” as he produced a contract with Helios Global Inc. signed by Young a month after the CNN report aired. Axelrod made a grandiose show of the document and even threatened to file a fraud motion: “Later on today, after I confer with counsel, we’ll be filing a motion about fraud on the court and gross discovery abuses.”

Freedman noted that Young had answered questions about his association with Helios at a deposition 15 months ago and that CNN withheld the document to ambush Young in cross-examination. Judge Henry grilled Axelrod on why CNN only turned this document over on the third day of trial:

Why wasn’t this document or obtaining things from Helios, because it did come up during the course of his October 2023 deposition. So, I mean a year and three months ago…Why didn’t this get obtained until 2 o’clock yesterday afternoon on the third day of trial? And I know you’re going to say because they didn’t produce it.

Judge Henry left the courtroom to consider where things went next in his chambers. Upon returning, he would allow Axelron to make question Young on Helios, but warned: 

I’m going to be pissed off if we continue to do this [try to add new evidence] on a daily basis…I don’t expect this to happen again. I think I said that the last time. If there’s other things that y’all have that y’all haven’t put on an exhibit list, I don’t want to see this showing up for the first time in my courtroom.

Axelrod drew Judge Henry’s wrath again when he again insulted Young on the stand. Judge Henry threatened a “$100 fine” for personal aspersions going forward. The money would go toward North Florida Legal Services. Axelrod wanted to pay $100 right then and there in “good faith.”

But while Axelrod put on that show for Judge Henry, that bravado was largely absent when the jury returned; gone was that shouting and arm waving. And for all the suggestions that the document would blow up Young’s case, Alexrod didn’t hammer it the same way that he did with Young’s contracts and tax documents.

Axelrod didn’t give Young the proper opportunity to explain the contract with Helios.

During redirect, Young explained that the contract with Helios was not a contract for work or for jobs. According to Young’s sworn testimony, Helios allows those with a security clearance to essentially sign with a company that will hold their clearance so that they appear as being active when they’re between companies that utilize it, that way it doesn’t go inactive and they lose it.

And with that, Young’s time on the stand came to an end.