Sara Caplan figured she'd better get it over with before they threw away the key.

After the California Supreme Court refused to hear her appeal, the former member of Phil Spector's defense team acquiesced Thursday to the trial judge's order to testify and told the court that she had seen a possible defense witness pick up an object at the scene of Lana Clarkson's death.

Caplan was at the time working with Spector's then lead defense attorney, Robert Shapiro.

"There was something white that I saw, it was about the size of my entire fingernail, and I do not know what it was," said Caplan, who was on the stand for about 30 minutes today. "I called Dr. Lee's attention to it. He picked it up and put it in the vial."

Forensics expert Henry Lee, said to be one of the defense's key witnesses, has adamantly denied picking up any such thing in the hallway of Spector's Alhambra mansion on Feb. 4, 2003, the day after Clarkson died from a gunshot wound to her mouth. Earlier this week, the high-profile doctor said that he is leaving for China, and he has told reporters that he's no longer inclined to take the stand.

Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Larry Paul Fidler ruled May 23 that he believed Lee had picked up a small, white object that day, but he couldn't say for sure whether it was a piece of acrylic fingernail, as the prosecution contends. The Los Angeles District Attorney's Office is arguing that the nail indicates that a struggle may have taken place or that Clarkson's finger was in her mouth—and not pulling the trigger—when she was shot.

Autopsy photos presented in court showed a broken thumbnail on Clarkson's right hand.

"I do not know what happened to it," Caplan, who gave similar testimony during an evidentiary hearing in May, continued. "I don't remember where I saw it. I don't know what it was."

The veteran criminal attorney reiterated under cross-examination by defense lawyer Linda Kenney Baden that she had no idea whether Lee removed the object from the scene.

Claiming attorney-client privilege, Caplan had previously refused to testify in open court as to what she allegedly observed at Spector's house. On June 18, Fidler ruled her in contempt and an appellate court later upheld the judge's decision.

Spector's defense team upheld Caplan's side of the argument, knowing that her testimony could damage Lee's credibility in the eyes of the jury.

But when faced yet again today with the very real possibility of jail, Caplan relented.

"The Supreme Court denied having denied the writ and the court having stayed your incarceration until his time, I need to ask, are you prepared now to testify?" Fidler inquired of Caplan.

"Yes, I am, your honor," the Beverly Hills-based lawyer answered quietly. "This has taken so much time out of my work and my life, my family. I haven't been able to go on vacation with my son. I was supposed to start a trial today. I have other clients, too."

After Caplan was through testifying, Fidler told the jury that her testimony "will be put into context at a later time." The prosecution's case had technically been left open pending the resolution of the Caplan affair, and two witnesses have testified on its behalf since the defense officially opened its case a couple weeks ago.

As of today, Deputy District Attorneys Alan Jackson and Patrick Dixon have still not rested their case. The jury theoretically doesn't yet know about the legal hullabaloo surrounding Caplan's testimony or about Fidler's ruling regarding Lee's actions.

Also Thursday, the sister of one of the four witnesses who testified about Spector's alleged proclivity for mixing booze and gunplay in the company of women took the stand and said that Melissa Grosvenor had lied to the court.

Angela Pileggi Silverstein testified that Grosvenor, who has a prior embezzlement conviction, lied about Spector threatening her at gunpoint in the early 1990s at his Pasadena home.

Grosvenor bragged before the trial about getting to be on Court TV, Silverstein said, adding that her sister also once stole a plaque with the inscription "Attitude Is Everything" from a judge's home during a party in Augusta, Georgia.

Grosvenor, a waitress who characterized her relationship with Spector as platonic, testified in May that, during a visit to Spector's home, the famed music producer brandished a handgun and said, "If you try to leave, I'm gonna kill you."

She also said at the time that Spector was paying Silverstein off in return for disparaging her sister's character.

"Has he ever given you so much as a nickel for you to testify?" defense attorney Roger Rosen asked Silverstein Thursday.

"No," she answered.

Deputy D.A. Jackson suggested in his cross-examination that Silverstein was angry at her sister because Grosvenor sided with Silverstein's ex-husband in a contentious custody battle over the estranged couple's twin sons.

Jackson also inquired as to why Silverstein, if she had known Grosvenor was lying about Spector all along, waited until last year to get in touch with the Wall of Sound creator.

"I didn't know Melissa was going to testify," Silverstein said. She also admitted that she never contacted authorities about her sister's alleged lies.

Jackson also got Silverstein to admit that she did not know that Grosvenor had previously filed a motion with the court requesting that she not be shown on television, thereby puncturing a hole in the defense's 15 minutes of fame theory.