Stephen Snyder arranged to meet for dinner in late March 2018 with another Steve -- Stephen Bartlett, an executive at the University of Maryland Medical System, who had previously headed the transplant division and the surgery department -- and their partners.
Before dinner, Snyder sent his girlfriend and Bartlett's wife to the table while he and Bartlett had a private drink at the bar.
The maître d' handed Bartlett an envelope that contained, among other things, graphic photos of one of Snyder's clients, who died two months after a kidney transplant at the University of Maryland Medical Center in Baltimore.
Snyder demanded $25 million or else he would publish the photos and other information he believed would be catastrophic to the UMMS transplant program, Bartlett testified Thursday during the second day of Snyder's trial for attempted extortion and related charges.
According to Bartlett, Snyder said the wife of the dead patient wanted "revenge" and that the consequences of his media blitz would be "devastating both for the hospital and for me personally."
After their drinks, they went to the table, where Snyder repeatedly redirected the conversation from small talk about family, golf and his lifestyle in Florida to what Bartlett and his wife, June Jaekels, who also testified Thursday, perceived as a threat.
Snyder repeatedly told Jaekels that "as long as he does what I want him to do, everything will be OK."
"He was red-faced, his eyes were bloodshot, his hands were trembling some," Bartlett told the jury.
"I really wanted to learn what it is he knew," Bartlett said. "I didn't show him my reaction, but internally I was shocked and disgusted."
"I was sick inside," he continued. "I felt as if I'd just had dinner with a very bad person."
Jaekels said Snyder was "sweating," "intense," and "agitated," and that she and her husband felt scared and threatened.
"I felt like he was unstable," Jaekels testified.
After the dinner, Snyder followed up with Bartlett via text.
"If I don't get a straight answer I'm going forward full blast," Snyder texted. In another, he referred to the information he collected about the UMMS transplant program as a "GOLDMINE!"
Bartlett, who is now at the University of Illinois Chicago, also testified that the UMMS transplant program occasionally used kidneys with higher risk of failure in order to help older, sicker patients who otherwise may never get off the waitlist.
Thursday's witnesses added detail about the meetings at which Snyder and UMMS officials discussed a potential consulting agreement -- an agreement prosecutors call a "sham."
Their testimony offered more evidence that UMMS was wary of Snyder, that officials felt threatened and that Snyder didn't intend to perform any work for the $25 million he demanded.
Alicia Reynolds, senior director of claims and litigation at the Maryland Medicine Comprehensive Insurance Program, the system's captive insurance provider, attended those meetings and kept copious handwritten notes.
According to Reynolds' notes, Snyder told them that he knew members of the UMMS Board of Directors and wealthy donors, who would be "shocked" about his revelations.
Reynolds also said the $25 million would only buy Snyder's silence.
"The only thing that was clear at the time was that he would not publish those commercials," she said. "That was the only thing we understood we would be buying for that fee."
"I don't care if I don't do anything," Snyder said in a video of the June 2018 meeting.
Reynolds wrote that Snyder had referred to the hospital system's potential legal exposure as a "gold mine."
Reynolds echoed the Wednesday testimony of her boss, MMCIP CEO DePriest Whye, saying Snyder threatened the job of Susan Kinter, another risk-management official.
"I'm feeling threatened," Kinter said, according to Reynolds' notes.
But according to Snyder, it was an effort to protect them.
"I don't want to do it, so don't make me do it," Snyder said, according to Reynolds. "That means it's not a threat, because I don't want to do it."