With over-whelming evidence, 11 out of 12 jurors coming to a quick verdict, one juror completely unaware of key elements in the testimony and evidence, I have to say that juror missed the trial. I was on jury duty for 3 days. It was an assault case where one guy, who had been drinking, became obnoxious at an acquaintance's apartment. The apartment resident chased the guy out of the apartment, jumped on him and the drunk guy comes away with a cut face and stab wound resulting in a collapsed lung. The main charge was first degree assault. All that is needed for a guilty verdict is 3 elements. (1) The defendant acted intentionally, (2) the defendant used a deadly weapon and (3) the defendant caused serious, life-threatening wounds. Slam dunk I say. The defendant, in a recorded interrogation, admitted to chasing the victim down the stairs and out of the apartment so there is the intentional part. (The defendant said he blacked out while on the victim and didn't remember stabbing him. He then ran away until he turned himself in 3 weeks later.) A trauma doctor who treated the victim said the punctured and collapsed lung was not only life-threatening, but also caused by a knife. So that takes care of the other elements. We heard testimony from a couple of witnesses and saw another videotaped interview with another witness. Order me up some lunch Bailiff and let's get out of here. Hold everything - one juror decides it's not that clear. She missed several key elements during the trial so we had to watch the interrogation videos over and over until it sunk in. We had to look at the bloody clothes and she wanted us to ask the judge for a copy of the transcript of the trial. Um, no. Finally we got her cleared up on those issues but then she decided she couldn't be sure that the defendant stabbed the victim. I tried to reason with her and rule out the improbable (did she think someone else came along after the defendant ran off and stabbed the victim - the victim who identified the defendant from memory and picked him out of a photo line-up?) There was about 1 minute between when the victim got up and stumbled into the street stopping a car to have them call 911 after being stabbed. Then I tried discussing the three elements we needed to agree on. Nope. At first I thought she had seen too many episodes of CSI - she wanted more eyewitnesses, the weapon, blood splatter evidence, forensics, confessions, video of the crime, satellite views, and probably a declaration from heaven above. But then I realized that was all excuses. No reasonable person could ignore all of the evidence. I think she just didn't want to make a decision that would send the bad guy to jail. And there was no convincing her otherwise. So we marched back into the courtroom and the judge declared a mistrial. What a shame.
What is NOT a shame is Elliott at his lacrosse banquet. He has the best GPA of any of the players and looked really good when they called him up on stage. He got his varsity letter that night. Lucie is the booster treasurer and I did the DVD of the season pictures which ran all night in the background. Here is the video:
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