Ask the murder trial juror!

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Last week I was called to jury duty for my first time ever, and I was selected to serve on a murder trial.

Unlike many people, I was excited about and interested in jury duty; I didn’t try to get out of it.

The trial lasted three days: Thursday, Friday and Monday. Closing arguments were Tuesday (yesterday) morning. We deliberated two hours and found the defendant guilty of malice murder and felony murder. Under Georgia law, mandatory sentence is life in prison.

Any questions about the case itself or the jury/trial process, I will happily answer.

2

Did the defense lawyer stay awake throughout the whole trial? Did he ask questions in such a way that you lost interest in the answer halfway through?

3

The defense lawyer was very good. He was hired by the defendant’s mother; he wasn’t a court-appointed public defender.

After the trial some of the jurors spoke to the assistant DA who’d prosecuted the case, and she praised her opponent, Tom Cook. She told us he’s a former DA himself (for Clarke County), so he’s familiar with both sides of the aisle.

The kind of incompetence you’re alluding to, spooje, is more common in Texas, where there are no public defenders.

I was very impressed by Mr. Cook and found him much more likable than the prosecuting attorney. The evidence just wasn’t on his client’s side.

4

Can you give us more details about the case?

It seems from my TV and movie watching experience that 2 hours is not a lot of time for the jury to be out. Was it that cut and dried? Were there any niggling doubts, or points that needed to be clarified to convince a juror?

I’m assuming it’s not an easy verdict to return. Was it easier knowing that the death penalty wasn’t on the table?

Paul

5

So what was the jury selection (voir dire?) process like? What sort of questions did they ask?

How did you select a foreman/forewoman? Were there two or three people who wanted the job, or did you just give it to the first person who agreed to do it?

What was the deliberation process like? Contentious, calm, boring, etc.? How did you arrive at a verdict?

Was it easy or difficult to separate yourself from the emotions of the case and focus on the facts?

That’s all I have (for now :)). I’ve always wanted to be on a jury, so I find this stuff interesting.

6

Paul The Younger:

Sure. On Easter Saturday, 2000 (April 22), a beat cop found a Chevy Baretta parked and running at Marbut Road Elementary School. In the passenger seat, wrapped in a comforter and positioned as if he was sleeping, was the victim, Savalas Cousar. He had been shot in the face with a slug from a 12-gauge shotgun.

The last person he’d been known to be with alive was “a coworker” (according to his mother, with whom he lived) later identified as the defendant, Sammy Belmar. Belmar was questioned, but said he hadn’t gone out with the victim after all. He referred to his girlfriend Shirley and a family friend, Debra, as alibi witnesses, and they both said he’d been with them that weekend. The two women’s stories conflicted with each other and with Sammy’s, but police had nothing else to go on.

Then on Easter Sunday, during the Easter egg hunt at Shirley’s family’s house (a two-minute walk from Marbut Road Elementary School), a 12-gauge shotgun was found in the woods behind the backyard.

Then the following week at work, Shirley confided to a coworker that Sammy had told her on Saturday “I think I killed someone,” and asked her to lie to the police for him. The coworker told the police, who came to question Shirley again, and she recanted her earlier statement. Debra changed her story too, and admitted Sammy had told her he killed someone and asked her to lie for him.

There’s a lot more, like the fact that there was a third person at the elementary school that night and that a fourth person’s driver’s license (the person, coincidentally, who owned the shotgun found at Shirley’s home), but I don’t want this one post to go on for pages so I’ll share more details later.

Yes. In fact, if the death penalty had been “on the table,” I never would have made it onto the jury, because I don’t believe in it and that would have come out during the voir dire.

7

Did the experience make you more or less impressed by the jury process? I mean, was anyone on the jury so dim that it made your blood run cold in fear for the future of our society, or did you find that your fellow jurors were a good bunch of people who gave 100% of their thoughtful attention to the matter at hand?

Were any questions asked in the selection process (of you or anyone else) that surprised you? I was once in a selection group that was asked about college majors, and we then tried to figure out if the answers to that question caused anyone to be dismissed, and why.

8

headshok and delphica: I was among a pool of 48 potential jurors drawn for the voir dire on Wednesday. We were questioned in groups of twelve and I was sixth in the first group.

We were asked if we had any formal training in law, if we or any of our relatives had been victims of violent crime, if we were members of any religious or community associations, and if we had any beliefs or philosophy that would preclude us from judging people.

I thought for sure my experience as legal officer on my ship in the Navy, where I oftentimes served as a de facto prosecutor, would disqualify me, but it didn’t. I must have struck them as intelligent and fair-minded regardless (suckers!).

They asked if we had any hardships that would prevent us from serving. Many people claimed they did but really didn’t, like the grad student who had finals this week (she was able to get them deferred) and the real estate attorney who had 30 closings to finish by the end of July (the judge asked, “How long ago did you get your summons?” and that shut him up).

One man was a Wal-Mart store detective who admitted his presumption of guilt against “young people.” He didn’t make the jury.

A woman said she’d just ended a 10-year relationship, just lost her job and had three children at home. She wasn’t made to serve.

Fourteen of us were selected; twelve jurors and two alternates. The alternates weren’t needed, and in fact couldn’t even sit in on the deliberations: they went to what I called the “alternate jurors playroom” down in the sheriff’s office. They had magazines and a TV.

Jason, a political science graduate who intends to go to law school, asked to be the foreman and was unanimously elected.

We started off by going around the table and asking everyone their initial opinion. Three or four (including myself) said Not Guilty.

I was mostly impressed by the intelligence, patience and wisdom of my fellow jurors, who were all ages and professions. Four of us were white men; three were black men. There was one black woman and the rest were white women.

I did have to roll my eyes at Freddie, a middle-aged woman who “knew in her heart” Sammy didn’t pull the trigger and told us she’d “prayed to God” to guide our decision. Whatever, Freddie.

9

I thought jurors weren’t supposed to know each other’s names - you’re supposed to use the numbers they give you. Not sure where I picked that up.

10

HOw was Freddie turned around? Did she realize “in her heart” that he did it, or did God come down and tell her to vote guilty?

Also, what did you think of the lawyer’s arguments? Did they help at all? Were they persuasive? Did they make any difference at all to the deliberations? Did you pay attention for the opening argument, but not the others?

What did you think of the judge’s instuctions? Any problems following the law?

Finally, why didnt you liek the prosecutor? Was he/she smarmy? Dumb? Unorganized?

Thanks for the thread. Its very interesting to me.

11

Two questions:

I’ve seen studies that showed that the person who sits at the head of the table the first time the jury goes into the jury room usually winds up as foreman. Did your poli sci graduate sit at the head of the table when you first went into the jury room?

How did the jury respond to objections? (Were they annoyed by them? Was there a sense among the jurors, when an objection was made, that the lawyer was trying to hide something from you? Did that cause any vague resentment of objections?)

12

a35362, after we announced our verdict the defense attorney asked the judge to “poll the jury,” perhaps to confirm our unanimity. Each of us stood, identified ourselves by juror number, and repeated our verdict. So in that context we went by juror number. Among ourselves we called each other by name, and after the trial was over we were free to chat with the judge, either attorney…anyone; and share any personal information we wanted.

Hamlet: I’m really not sure what turned Freddie around. And, I didn’t dislike the prosecutor; she just wasn’t as warm or personable as Mr. Cook. Her demeanor was cool, professional, distant. She didn’t have a Southern accent, unlike Mr. Cook.

More about the case: Shirley told us on the witness stand that Sammy told her he went out with Savalas and a third man, Kenneth Smith, on Good Friday. Sammy passed out at the bar, then woke up with his pockets emptied of cash. He suspected Savalas, so he went to get a “gauge” and drove Savalas (in Savalas’s car) to the school, where he shot him. Savalas must have been asleep or passed out at the time; he was found with his hands folded across his lap, not in a defensive posture at all.

Kenneth Smith was present, and would have been the prosecution’s star witness, but he died of natural causes last fall.

The shotgun found in Shirley’s backyard was identified by an Arleigh York as one he owned, but had lent to Sammy because York’s mother didn’t want it in the house. Curiously, Arleigh York’s driver’s license was found in Savalas’s car along with the body, although York testified he had never met Savalas.

Sammy has a tattoo on his back: the words “12 GAUGE.”

13

If the evidence as presented wasn’t enough to convince you of his guilt upon hearing it throughout the trial, how did your fellow jurors convince you to change your initial verdict? Was there one specific thing that swung your vote the other way in the end or did you just acquiesce to avoid a hung jury?

Jeg elsker dig, Thomas

14

spoke-:

No, he didn’t. Personally, I’d always surmised we’d elect the real-estate attorney as our foreman, or if not him, then Spencer, who’d served on the most juries. But neither volunteered for the job, and Jason clearly wanted it, so there we were.

There weren’t many objections, and when they were made they seemed reasonable and didn’t inspire any resentment (in me, anyway). For example, the prosecutor asked the victim’s mother what he’d said he was going to do on the last night of his life, and before she could answer the defense attorney objected on the grounds that her answer would be hearsay. Made sense to me.

Actually, now that I’ve brought that up, the victim’s mother’s testimony added so little to the case that I feel certain she was only called to poison us against the defendant: she was in tears throughout her testimony. I felt manipulated, as if the prosecutor was trying to tell us, “Look at this poor mother who’s lost her son! Don’t you want to get the guy who did it?” So that tactic backfired, inasmuch as it engendered ill will against the prosecutor (in me, at least).

Obviously I thought about you often during the case, spoke-. Have you ever worked a criminal case? Ever had business in the DeKalb County courthouse? Ever stood before Judge Clarence Seeliger or had dealings with Tom Cook or Assistant D.A. Connors?

15

At first I read that as “present in the courtroom” :o :wink:

After you’d done the initial survey of jurors, how did discussion proceed? Did the foreman take charge and make people speak in turns, or did people just jump in on top of each other in discussion? Did jurors get mad at each other?

Did you tell the defense attorney you thought he was a great lawyer with a crappy case?

16

Is your username from Watership Down? :slight_smile:

17

I’ve had many cases in DeKalb, only a couple of which wound up in trial (the rest settled). No criminal stuff, and nothing before Judge Seeliger, though.

Cook’s name rings a bell. How old a fellow is he?

18

Huh??? The guy whose shotgun was used in the murder, and whose driver’s license was found with the body wasn’t the defendant??? I sure hope the defense lawyer worked this angle.

19

spoke-, Tom Cook is in his fifties, and according to martindalehubbell.com he’s a UGA Law graduate, like you, and from 1971-1986 he was the DA for Clarke County. His face looked familiar to me, too, and I can only assume that’s because I was in Athens in the mid-80s.

He definitely made much of York’s license being found at the scene. Tried to, anyway. But no witnesses placed York at the scene, and Sammy Belmar was known not to possess his own driver’s license, and he was known to possess the 12 gauge shotgun actually owned by York, so we weren’t terribly concerned about the license. And in fact, the license wasn’t even admitted into evidence even though it was energetically discussed.

ENugent: The deliberations were very calm and civil, although Denise, a long-haul trucker, kept interrupting the others while they were trying to explain their thoughts. The foreman didn’t control us very well. I didn’t get a chance to speak to Mr. Cook after the trial, but I would indeed have told him how impressed I was by him (in point of fact, it’s his gorgeous Chinese-American assistant I wanted to talk to, but she wasn’t there the last day, dammit).

Shayna, my main concerns were that there was no physical evidence connecting Sammy with the crime: no prints were found in the car or on the shotgun. And I didn’t see much of a motive: it was a senseless killing all around.

But during discussion someone brought up the possibility that a drug deal or drug money might have been part of what was going on at the bar. While it was only speculation, it provided a reasonable scenario for Sammy to have enough passion and anger to kill over. Plus, I looked at the photo of his tattoo again. I have a tattoo myself, and know that you don’t get a tattoo unless it’s of something you’re very interested in, even fascinated by. I think Sammy had such an interest in guns, or maybe in the power they conferred, and was looking for an opportunity to use one. The alleged “mickey” and theft were just the excuse he needed, apparently.

And besides all that, we knew Sammy was present at the murder. His attorney admitted as much. After I’d thought about that a while, the lack of physical evidence didn’t bother me anymore.

20

Did Sammy take the stand? If not, did his failure to testify come up in your deliberations?

(And yeah, Cook was the DA in Clarke County when I was in Athens, too. Also mid-80’s.)