Pretty sure that’s a bog standard question. They want to identify people who might have grudges against cops or prosecutors.
Moderating:
What a great discussion to have. Just not in this thread. Please drop it here now. Thanks.
I think that was the original question from @Buck_Godot:
Bolding mine.
Ahh, thanks for pointing out my mistake! I should have read more closely. I was preoccupied with cleaning up dog vomit. Not an excuse, just an explanation.
My apologies to @Buck_Godot. My response was poor.
"One juror was just dismissed after disclosing that he was born and raised in Italy and then comparing Trump to Silvio Berlusconi, the former prime minister of Italy.
Berlusconi was an infamous womanizer and was convicted of tax fraud in 2013"
(NBC site)
(While we don’t know the final makeup yet, the foreign-born component of this jury might be interesting. Is the Irish-born person still on it? Overall, I think this is a good thing – perhaps more likely to decide on the evidence presented, all other things being equal, rather than being fully enmeshed in US politics – but I’m generalizing. A foreign-born person can be biased, too, of course – indeed, I’ve met pro-Trump residents of Ireland).
Thanks. Makes sense. It would have to be his own arrest/conviction, or if not, he’d really have to admit that he knew about stuff and actually lied about it (versus just not having any idea and assuming his family had never been in trouble with the law).
NYT reported it’s all sealed so we may never know for some time:
The reasons for the juror’s dismissal will remain a mystery for at least some time: Justice Merchan has sealed that part of the record. All we know is that there were concerns about his credibility.
But he apparently was making everyone laugh (except the Judge) when he was being asked questions.
The conversation with juror #4 was inconclusive, but did not go like I expected, given that he was accused of lying. His answers appeared to make a defense lawyer, Todd Blanche, laugh out loud…later, juror explained something at length, gesticulating and setting off more laughter…
cnn is giving out a lot of info. 18 have gone through the judge’s questions. and they are heading for a lunch break.
court on break until after 2pm.
Presumably they would mean some fairly close relative who you interact with regularly and whose situation you would be in a position to know about, not some distant 5th cousin thrice removed still residing in Lower Slobovia and convicted of making fun of Dear Leader’s toupee.
I could confidently answer “no” to that question.
They ask you if you know or are aware of any obviously. They don’t expect you to be omniscient. If it happened and not one told you it wouldn’t count. Come on.
From some Washington Post reporting, a bit more information about Juror 4, who was dismissed.
Juror 4 arrived in the courthouse shortly before noon; he was supposed to get there at 9:15.
Prosecutors flagged him as a concern because someone with his name was arrested in the 1990s for tearing down right-wing posters and is married to a woman who entered a deferred prosecution agreement over corruption charges.
I hate people who don’t show up on time. It’s a major pet peeve of mine. I’m of the “if you’re not 15 minutes early then you’re late” school.
I wonder if this is the same “Juror #4”?
Got it. It’s wasn’t obvious to me, i just took the question as I saw it. There is a bit lost in translation when the info comes in via reporters.
There was a non-low-profile case in Oregon (at least two of the defendants were named Bundy) in which the jury did ask for a juror to be replaced, and that person was. The alternates sit in the box for the entire trial, so they are fully qualified for deliberations.
I saw somewhere that he thought he was supposed to come to court on Friday. I can forgive some confusion - when he left court Tuesday, the judge told them to come back Monday. Then maybe he gets an urgent email or text saying something like you must come to court tomorrow, but he doesn’t read it until today, or he mixes up his days.
so far no one has mentioned the sdmb as a news source…
No problem. I knew that after the verdict/hung jury its too late, but its good to hear that argument in deliberations can be used to flag potential jurors. Because while it may be possible for a Trumper to hide his views during Voir dire, when he has to defend ignoring the evidence against 11 other jurors who want to get on with their lives but are stuck here because of one pig-headed obstructionist its going to come out that his reasons are primarily partisan.
This is exactly what happened with the last jury I was possibly going to be selected for. It was a civil case, and the defense was obviously dismissing anyone who’d had a job requiring any kind of analysis or logic. I made it through most of one day, and then was dismissed.
This way the judge, not the defendent, controls the agenda and timeline. Reacting to Trump gives him a mechanism to create more delays.
from cnn:
Judge Juan Merchan said another batch of 96 jurors will be brought in to be sworn in.
He’ll then send them home for the day and plan for them to return tomorrow around 11 or 11:30 a.m. ET for questions.
Court typically starts around 9:30 a.m. ET. The reason they are starting later with this panel is because there are still prospective jurors from the second panel they haven’t gone through yet, which they will likely do Friday morning.
Wouldn’t telling the bailiff to drag him off to Rikers constitute a rather dramatic instance of the judge controlling the agenda?
Surely you can’t appeal being jailed for contempt of court? You could file a complaint against the judge at some point in the future, but you’re still spending the weekend in a cell.
Once the jury is seated I don’t see how sequestration can be avoided. The jurors are going to need alot of security and shielded from third party contact attemps (and from their own families in some cases.)