CENTENNIAL, Colo. (AP) — A judge’s decision to dismiss three jurors in the Colorado theater shooting trial who had been exposed to news reports about the case shows how hard it is to protect the jury from vast media coverage.
The discovery that a juror had heard news accounts of the trial and shared details with the other two stalled Tuesday’s testimony but did not derail the case. Judge Carlos A. Samour Jr. had seated 12 alternate jurors, an unusually large number, aware of the possibility of media exposure.
“The judge knew that given the attention and the amount of information that’s out there, there’s a good chance that some jurors are going to disobey him and do what’s natural,” said Alan Tuerkheimer, principal of Trial Methods, a Chicago-based jury consulting firm.
The dismissals came in the trial’s seventh week. The first juror said her husband told her on speakerphone that the district attorney had sent a tweet during testimony, which had been in the news.
The other two jurors, who sometimes socialized with the first juror on breaks, were dismissed because they likely overheard her. The judge questioned the jurors individually about what they had heard and wasn’t convinced they were being forthcoming.
He decided against releasing a fourth juror who said she had heard the word “mistrial” but didn’t know what it was about.
Samour also refused a defense request to dismiss a fifth juror who had informed him about the situation, saying she had been honest and wasn’t compromised.
“Thank you for doing the right thing,” he told her when she came forward, visibly distraught.
A total of 21 jurors and alternates remain, with the trial more than halfway done. The problem could have had greater consequences had it been discovered closer to deliberations, Tuerkheimer said.
A similar situation with fewer alternates might have caused a mistrial, he said.
Samour instructs jurors daily not to consult outside sources, but it’s difficult. Jurors are allowed to go home every night, but they can’t discuss the case with anyone or see or read anything about it. They are, however, allowed to use their phones on breaks. While being questioned Tuesday, some admitted they sometimes see headlines about the trial online.
“It’s so ingrained now for us to use social media in so many aspects of our life, that to completely shut it down, it’s hard for folks,” said Thaddeus Hoffmeister, a University of Dayton law professor who has studied juries, social media and the legal system. “They tell the jurors not to get outside information. But it happens.”
The bigger the case, the harder the coverage is to avoid. The judge in the Boston Marathon bombing trial chose six alternates, likely for similar reasons. But none of them were dismissed before deliberations.
Jurors aren’t alone in their missteps.
Last week, the judge scolded District Attorney George Brauchler for tweeting from the courtroom about a videotaped interview of Holmes shown to jurors. He said it was an accident and apologized.
The tweet and defense requests for mistrials were discussed while jurors were away from the courtroom, so they could have known about them only from outside sources.
Under questioning from Samour, the first juror said she got the call from her husband during lunch last week, asking her about Brauchler’s tweet while another juror was sitting next to her.
She said she and her husband argued because he knew she wasn’t supposed to discuss the case.
When asked why she didn’t report it, she said, “I just really don’t pay attention to my husband most of the time. So it wasn’t really important, at that time.”
The juror wiped away tears when the judge dismissed her.
Jury selection took nearly three months after 9,000 summonses were sent.
None of the jurors and alternates will know who will decide the case until deliberations are about to begin. At that point, the remaining alternates will be dismissed.
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Associated Press writer Donna Bryson contributed to this report from Denver.
