Attorneys: John Edwards unaware of payments GREENSBORO, N.C. -- The defense strategy for John Edwards came into sharper focus Tuesday morning in front of a crowded courtroom here. Questioning a succession of witnesses, the former presidential candidate's attorneys sought to depict Edwards as being completely unaware of huge payments made in an effort to conceal an extramarital affair that threatened to derail his apirations. John Moylan, an Edwards confidante and South Carolina political consultant, testified that his friend seemed "surprised" when the heiress Rachel "Bunny" Mellon told him in August 2008 that she had been sending money to Edwards's aide, Andrew Young, through a North Carolina interior decorator. "Bunny, you should not be sending money to anyone," Moylan testified that Edwards told Mellon during a meeting at her estate in Upperville, Va. The other lynchpin of the defense strategy is to discredit Young, the prosecution's star witness. Elizabeth Nicholas, a former Edwards executive assistant, testified that she and staffers in other Senate offices considered Young "dishonest." The Moylan and Nicholas testimony, though, is merely a warmup for the big event Tuesday. Later this afternoon, the former senator's daughter, Cate Edwards, is expected to testify, unless questioning of a financial records analyst takes longer than expected. Edwards is accused of violating campaign finance laws by allegedly not reporting nearly $1 million in payments from Mellon and his friend, Fred Baron, to help hide his affair with videographer Rielle Hunter, with whom Edwards fathered a child. Edwards's defense team characterizes the payments as gifts that did not need to be reported to federal campaign authorities.