While putting on a public face of marital bliss, behind the scenes, Virginia’s first couple were barely on speaking terms for much of McDonnell’s governorship, their lawyers said in opening arguments of a corruption trial that could land the pair in prison for life. They questioned Williams' character and said the couple couldn't have been scheming together because their marriage was falling apart. At one point, he said, “she said she hated him” – there was not enough money, he didn’t spend enough time at home, and there was nothing left for her. The former CEO of a diet supplement company called Star Scientific, Williams is expected to be the prosecution’s star witness, testifying that he showered the McDonnells with more than $160,000 in lavish gifts, loans and other favors in exchange for the first couple’s help in promoting his products. Maureen McDonnell's lawyer, William A. Burck, told jurors during opening statements that the former first lady had a crush on Williams but was "duped" by him into thinking he cared for her. “It was a relationship that some people would consider inappropriate.” 
 
 The two exchanged some 1,200 phone calls and text messages, he said, and Maureen McDonnell hid many of Williams’ favors from her husband. “He always thought of himself as a big fish,” Burck said, “but he knew that Bob McDonnell was a bigger fish.” 
 
 Williams’ dealings with the McDonnells amounted to “just a business relationship and nothing more,” Jessica Aber, one of the prosecutors, told the jury in her opening statement. Assistant U.S. Attorney Jessica Aber said during opening statements that McDonnell and his wife betrayed the public's trust by lining their pockets with "secret gifts and cash." and Mrs. McDonnell knew what he wanted, and they gave it to him.” 
 
 Bob McDonnell enjoyed a six-figure salary, a mansion, a chef, a butler and a security detail all at taxpayer expense, Aber said, and he had “a duty not to sell the power and influence of his office to the highest bidder.” 
 
 The McDonnells were financially strapped because of losses in real estate investments, and Williams came to their rescue, Aber said. Among the favors he bestowed on the first couple were $120,000 in loans, trips on his private jet, a vacation stay at his luxurious home on Smith Mountain Lake, the use of his Ferrari sports car, $20,000 worth of designer clothes for Maureen McDonnell, and a $15,000 check to cover the catering costs for the wedding reception of the McDonnells’ daughter Cailin. The former governor is accused of setting up a meeting between Williams and a state health official, hosting a product launch reception at the Executive Mansion and attending a dinner and seminar aimed at persuading doctors to recommend a Star Scientific product. Acknowledging that as governor her father was generally driven around by members of the state police’s executive protection unit, she said that he had driven the car to brunch while the family vacationed at Williams’s home. "Bob McDonnell eats Virginia ham, he drinks Virginia wine, and my guess is if he smoked he'd smoke Virginia cigarettes," Brownlee said. Brownlee said the government went to great lengths looking for people to say bad things about his client, even sending investigators to interview former presidential candidate Mitt Romney and his wife, and "came up empty." When her father found out about the gift later, after federal investigators questioned Maureen McDonnell about it, “he was very upset that she had taken that check,” Young testified.
– Bob and Maureen McDonnell's corruption trial got under way this week, and it's yielding no dearth of grist for the mill. While it appeared financial problems drove Virginia's former first couple to accept $165,000 in loans and gifts from a donor, the McDonnells' lawyer put up what the Virginian-Pilot calls "a line of defense worthy of a Shakespearean tragedy" during yesterday's proceedings. Namely, that the McDonnells' marriage was so terrible that they "were barely on speaking terms," and thus couldn't have conspired. Maureen McDonnell "said she hated (her husband)," said lawyer John Brownlee. Bob McDonnell's long hours on the job and the couple's dreary finances resulted in "a rift so wide" that "an outsider"—in this case, Star Scientific honcho and mega-donor Jonnie Williams—"could invade and poison the marriage." Adding insult to injury, Maureen McDonnell had a major "crush" on the gift-giving Williams. An ex-federal prosecutor tells the AP that lawyers for the McDonnells are trying to build up the lovelorn-wife story to show that she was "duped" by Williams—who reportedly showered her with fancy clothes, trips, and cash in exchange for the governor's promotion of his business—and to break down the prosecution's case by "[creating] some sympathy" for Bob McDonnell. The Washington Post has a liveblog of the trial here, including a photo of the seemingly happy couple posing in Williams' Ferrari.