The trial of Steven Hayes is a somewhat parochial matter, where the 2007 murders in Cheshire of Dr. William Petit’s wife and daughters are on display for the sole purpose of showing that when rich white folk are killed, it’s not the same as when poor black folk are killed. After all, Hayes tried to plead guilty but was rebuffed. Connecticut was not going to be denied.
But even a carefully orchestrated show has its occasional production problems, and the Hayes trial produced a beauty. Via Norm Pattis :
Before the lunch break today, a juror sent a note out to the judge. He had concerns he wanted to discuss. The note was tendered apparently during the gripping testimony of Dr. William Petit, the sole survivor of the Cheshire home invasion. Judge John C. Blue decided to wait until after Dr. Petit finished testifying before addressing the juror’s concerns.
When the juror was questioned, he offered the following: He did not think he’d be able to render a verdict in the case given the evidence. Is the case too gruesome, you might wonder? No. That was not the issue. The state’s case was disorganized and made no sense, the juror said. It appeared as though the case was poorly prepared, he opined. During the most dramatic and sympathetic testimony of the case, that of Dr. Petit, a juror all but raised his hand and asked: “What the Hell is this all about?” The sucking sound you heard early this afternoon was that of the prosecution’s gonads retreating to a safe, dark place.
It doesn’t get more bizarre than this. The defense has conceded Hayes’ guilt. There’s no desk pounding going on during Petit’s testimony, no screaming or outraged objections. It’s just a prosecutor putting carefully planned and prepped questions to his star witness, a man whose family has been murdered. How much simpler could it be?
Judge Jon Blue put the juror, John Lively, on the witness stand to explain, and the New Haven Register provides the testimony:
“As a juror in this case,” he said, “I’m confused by the presentation of the state’s case and bewildered by what seems to be a lack of preparation on their part.
“The order of it seems arbitrary,” Lively continued. “What’s worse, the evidence has no explanation with it and no context.”
He criticized “all the fumbling around with the evidence.”
Lively added, “All of these things are keeping me from being fully able to evaluate authoritatively the evidence and make a reliable determination of the testimony.”
As a result of Lively’s explanation, the prosecutor, State’s Attorney Michael Dearington, moved for his removal from the jury. Judge Blue agreed:
After Lively went into a closed side room, Blue said to the attorneys, “I’ve been a judge 21 years and I’ve never known a juror to have this kind of concern raised. It’s like going to the Boston Marathon and at the halfway point complaining about the way the race is being run. It doesn’t make sense.”
Blue said he was going to dismiss Lively because “he seems so agitated” and might have “further outbursts.” Blue said he was worried Lively might “contaminate” the other jurors and cause a mistrial.
There’s no doubt that this is “unusual”, to say the least, but for a judge to worry that a juror’s concern might “contaminate” the other jurors is even more peculiar. The very word choice suggests that a juror who isn’t favorably inclined toward the prosecution carries a “disease” that could “infect” others. The report fails to suggest that there was any outburst by Lively, but merely that he raised his hand (as jurors are allowed to do) and calmly reported his concern to the judge. That said, how could the judge be concerned about “further outburts.” Obviously, there can’t be “further” anything until there’s a first.
Moreover, the analogy offered by Judge Blue makes little sense. The duty of a juror is to weigh the testimony. If a juror is having difficulty understanding the significance or context of the testimony, thus making it difficult or impossible for him to weigh it, he’s doing nothing more than alerting the court to a problem.
Rather, the proper reaction from the court is to inform the juror that this is an adversary process and the attorneys for the respective sides are entitled to present their evidence in whatever fashion they deem appropriate. That the prosecution’s presentation makes it difficult, if not impossible, to understand what they heck they are doing isn’t a problem for the court to resolve, but rather for the juror to take into account when called upon to decide the case. In other words, if they did a lousy job and failed to persuade you, for whatever reason, then speak to them by your verdict.
But not in Connecticut. Not in the trial where rich white folks were murdered. Get that heckling juror out of here so he doesn’t spoil the plot line. The show must go on.
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I think you’ve really hit on some of issues. The judge seems concerned “how it looked” to the public regarding the juror’s incendiary comments about the prosecution. I do not think the judge was acting rationally when he dismissed the juror in front of everyone. It reeked of showmanship. It also seemed a punishment of the juror. At the very least, give the juror one last chance to “understand” the prosecutors. If the juror still appears truculent, the judge has plenty of ammunition to dismiss him at that point.
If the two have already plead guilty and have been proven to do it to boot, why is there even a trial? Shouldn’t it just go to the sentencing phase? Is the state of Connecticut required to hold a trial?
Well, it’s not entirely correct. He was asked a few times if he could follow the oath and wait till the end to decide and he said it would be difficult “for him” to do that. He didn’t exhibit any bias against either side, but was excused anyway because he couldn’t commit to being able to follow the court’s instructions due to his irritation with the State.
They haven’t pleaded guilty. The first defendant’s lawyer, during opening statement, said that they wouldn’t be contesting most of the state’s allegations. They’re contesting some, but not all.
Is this, perhaps, to avoid a death sentence or is there the possibility they could avoid LWOP as well?
Thanks for the clarification.
I didn’t see anything about that in the Register account. And assuming (as I do) that you’re correct, we both know how easily a judge can rehabilitate a juror when he wants to.
I am trying to imagine a judge relieving a juror of duty because the juror is critical about the DEFENSE case:
Juror: Judge, hold on just a second. I find the defense theory of the case just laughable.
Judge: Obviously, you aren’t fit to be a juror in this matter and further, I am afraid you will spread your thought germs to the other jurors, therefore I am putting you out the airlock.
It wasn’t in the account. Mine is an eyewitness account.
You’re absolutely correct on that. But flip the script: juror complains to judge that he can’t stand defense lawyer or their tactics or method of presentation. Wouldn’t we be screaming bloody murder (pun unintended) to get him off the jury? I think judge is trying to err on side of caution and let anyone with any hesitation/doubt/disinclination to serve go.
His acceptance of responsibility is most likely an attempt to avoid the death penalty. Since one can never say never, I’d say there’s a 0.00001% chance he avoids LWPOR.
I was trying to envision the same thing. Somehow, I can’t seem to get that vision in my head.
Sure we’d be screaming. But would the judge back us up?
If the juror was asked if he could put aside his personal bias against the lawyer and focus only on the facts, and he said no, I think any reasonable judge would let him off. In this case, that’s what happened. There was some rehabilitation. Not enough, in my opinion, and it did straddle the line, but it wasn’t blatant prosecution protecting by Blue. He’s not that kind of judge.
The part about him “contaminating the jury” was pure BS, and I think Blue realized that as soon as he said it, because he clarified that the primary reason for excusing him was his failure to assure the court he’d follow the instructions of law.
So basically, you’re saying that although the event was truly unprecedented, we’ve all been misled by the press reports (and Norm’s summary)?
I can’t imagine that juror with qualms about the defense theory or presentation being dismissed, either. But maybe Connecticut’s really different from where I practice.
Surreptitious “prosecution protecting” is worse than the “blatant” kind, don’t you think?
It is, but Judge Blue isn’t the kind to do that and certainly not in this case.
I think the press missed some things. This is my impression of what I observed in court.
Again, in this case, I think Judge Blue is treading very, very carefully and trying to avoid any controversy. He wants a really clean trial.
As for the CT part, I’d be surprised if a juror who expressed dissatisfaction with the defense presentation being permitted to remain, if he/she expressed an inability to separate that from a fair and impartial evaluation of the facts of the case.
With your courtside view, it appears that the dismissal of Lively isn’t nearly as bad as Norm and the New Haven Register made it appear. I still wonder whether it would have happened had Lively been antagonistic to the defense, but I will trust your view that he’s not that kind of judge. In any event, the media accounts really failed to give an accurate story.
Which is a useful reminder. We (or at least many of us) are probably too inclined to trust the media when it reports the sort of stories that ring true and to distrust it when it says things we don’t expect. We should retain our skepticism even when the story is dog bites man.
Absolutely true, and we were fortunate to have our own man in the courtroom this time.
Almost every time I’ve tried to blog about a breaking story, I’ve had problems because the supposed facts of the story kept changing. It’s especially bad in a complex legal story–shootings are a good example–because a lot of the reporters don’t know which of the details are important.
I figured with Norm on top of it, it being right in his backyard, he would have the real story. Since he didn’t link to a source, I figured he might even have been there. Obviously, I relied on the wrong blogger.
I know a juror who was excused during voir dire in a case because she said she was becoming biased against the defendant solely because she had formed a negative opinion of his lawyer during voir dire.
This Connecticut murder case is impossible. It doesn’t surprise me that a juror would rebel against it. The trial is not about innocence or guilt but about life in prison or death, and the jury knows it.
Not that there might not be bias anywhere in the connecticut judiciary in favor of the state.
When I was called to jury duty in Connecticut they played a tape that offended me. It cautioned jurors to remain impartial even if they understandably feel sympathy for the victims or defendant, but that’s not how the video’s narrator said it.
the narrator said something like you might feel sympathy for the victims or the state’s case, something to that effect. The narrator then said, you might “even” feel sympathy for the defendant, in a tone that made that sound, you know, just how you might think would accompany the word, “even.”
If I were a defense lawyer I would challenge the whole jury panel based on that tape, which all of us viewed before voir dire as an introduction to jury service.
Check out @NotesFromHel on Twitter, she’s been liveblogging the trial and her version is a more detailed account of what Gid tells above.
I was more perturbed by the part where Judge Blue would not throw out Hayes’ statements made at the stationhouse interrogation because they were not recorded. The reason he gave was that recording was not required by statutory law. But, of course, that ignores the more important question of whether the rules of evidence effectively requires recording (where eminently feasible) in this day and age.
Perhaps this juror misunderstood his role or his obligations. He should have taken his misgivings to the rest of the jury during deliberations. He (or she) thought they were doing a good thing by discussing it with the judge. Not!
The rules of evidence do not require recording. Whether they should is a separate question having nothing to do with this post.