- "You're a liar! You were nothing until you met me, just some stuck-up bitch until I made you interesting! You think that you're anything without me?! You are nothing! You're just some basic bitch who better watch her back! That's right! You're next, whore!"
Commonwealth of Pennsylvania v. Mitchell was a case surrounding high school students Zoe Mitchell, Molly Bartlett and Megan Harris and the death of Rachel Glasser. After starting school, Zoe and her childhood friend, Rachel, started hanging around with Molly and Megan because they were popular. After Rachel started talking to Molly's boyfriend, the others supposedly urged Zoe to help them kill her for it behind the school in the woods. The girls stabbed Rachel over 52 times while she begged them to stop. Around a year after moving schools, Zoe alone was charged with Rachel's murder due to the A.D.A Rita Kaplan making a plea deal with both Molly and Megan so they'd testify against Zoe for the trial.
Case[]
Zoe began by telling her story to Annalise's law office with a minor interruption from her dad. She explained that she and her best friend Rachel started hanging out with Molly and Megan. Eventually Rachel started talking to Molly's boyfriend and Zoe says she was forced into killing Rachel by Molly and Megan as a result.
In court, Annalise said in her opening statement that the prosecution made a plea deal with Molly and Megan so they'd testify against Zoe. She continued that the prosecution wanted the jury to believe that Zoe brainwashed the two of them into murder. Annalise said the truth was Molly and Megan used their social clout to recruit Zoe into a murder club for revenge over a boy. Rita Kaplan said in her opening statement that Zoe was the ringleader who orchestrated the murder of Rachel. She said Zoe bullied Molly and Megan into luring Rachel into the woods behind the school where they stabbed her 52 times because she was a sociopath.
Later, Annalise had Wes, Connor and Laurel dig through the prosecution's expert Dr. Healy's previous cases to find mistakes so that she could discredit him on the stand. Michaela wasn't there because she was sent on the 'use your boobs' assignment, and Asher was meeting with Emily Sinclair to sign an immunity deal to testify against Annalise. Later when Dr. Healy was on the stand, Annalise was zoned out due to Nia Lahey asking her for pills to commit suicide. Court went into recess and Annalise checked back in on the three researching Dr. Healy. Laurel found that in 2009 he released a patient from the hospital back into his parent's care in time for Christmas. The patient then set the house on fire. She presented this in court and was able to get him to admit that his diagnosis of Zoe being a sociopath could be mistaken because his field was no exact science.
Later, Laurel stole Zoe's phone and showed Frank the infamous 'skanks get shanked' video. Frank showed this to Annalise, who showed it to Zoe's parents, who instructed her to bury the footage so they won the case. Back in court, A.D.A Kaplan had Molly on the stand and she testified that she was afraid to testify because Zoe would try to kill her, Annalise objected and it was sustained, so the A.D.A moved onto presenting the video to the court. Zoe's parents lectured Annalise for letting it happen during recess then sat down to analyse the video. After recess, Annalise pointed out that Zoe was mirroring Molly's behaviour in the video and suggested it was because Zoe was afraid of her. Molly tried to explain, which got Zoe quite upset and caused her to get up and start screaming at Molly in front of the entire court.
Following that, the trial was concluded and Zoe was taken away by officers. Annalise realised Connor slipped the prosecution the video and threatened him, saying she knew where his car was and he was to never mess with her cases again or there would be implied consequences. It is to be assumed there was a mistrial and Zoe was held in contempt of court following her outburst but was released later, and Annalise didn't represent her during the second trial.
See also[]
Appearances[]
| Season 2 | |||||||||||
| "It's Time to Move On" | "She's Dying" | "It's Called the Octopus" | "Skanks Get Shanked" | ||||||||
| "Meet Bonnie" | "Two Birds, One Millstone" | "I Want You to Die" | "Hi, I'm Philip" | ||||||||
| "What Did We Do?" | "What Happened to You, Annalise?" | "She Hates Us" | "It's a Trap" | ||||||||
| "Something Bad Happened" | "There's My Baby" | "Anna Mae" |