Law & Order Part Two

The prosecuting attorney was more intersted in my ability to be impartial. He asked me, “If you were sitting at the defense table or the procecution table, would you be comfortable with you as a juror, in your current state of mind.” Like an idiot, I confidently replied, “Absolutely.” That one, simple word changed the way I see my world.

The remaining jurors were selected and it was time to be sworn in. I thought we had already done that when we swore as prosective jurors. After that, the attorneys gave their opening remarks. Interestingly, the prosecutor basically told us there was no evidence and that we wouldn’t like certain witnesses. Their lifestyles were very different than ours. He sort of summarized what his case was going to entail. The defense attorney gave his opening statement and then we were off to the races.

The first witness’s testimony was very hard to follow. I couldn’t figure out why he was even on the stand. Most of his testimony this day was regarding a previous crime that took place. It was a robbery he was involved with, along with the defendant, the defendant’s brother, the victim, and another guy. We were advised that the witness had immunity in the robbery case. There was a lot about the night of the shooting that this guy answered, “I do not recall.” He did not seem very credible to me.

The next day, we waited around quite a while. We, the jurors, concluded it was because the witnesses attorney wasn’t present yet. He had been there the previous day, but was not present when we first were lead into the courtroom, before being dismissed to what I would call our “holding cell” for the duration. At some point we thought we should keep track of how much time we spent listening to testimony, versus how much time we spent in our holding cell. I don’t think any of us ever actually did keep track. If I had to guess, I would seriously say it was 40% in the holding cell, 60% courtroom.

Testimony continued, and it remained VERY confusing. We were allowed to take notes, which was nice, but to be honest, it was  hard to know what would be important! I really couldn’t figure out the relevance of some of the questions and answers. At times I got confused about whose team certain witnesses were on!

As the days went on, we heard from the victim’s wife, the medical examiner who performed the autopsy, a firearms expert, several detectives, and neighbors who lived in the area of the scene of the crime. One key element of the case seemed to be the presence of a “silver SUV.” The defendant had clearly rented a silver Pontiac Torrent. We had a copy of the rental contract and a picture of him returning the car to the rental agency. The problem is that a witness who I believe would know the difference, said he was positive he saw a silver Mitsubishi at the scene of the shooting. This testimony gave me some serious “reasonable doubt.”

By the way, there was no bullet or casing recovered from the victim or the scene. No murder weapon. The medical examiner could not say for certain that a hollow point bullet went through the victim’s head or a regular bullet.

Stay tuned for the next episode!