Trials in real court are not like television. Much. Evidence gets presented and witnesses get presented but its kind of interesting. The order is not so orderly, it appeared to be rather random to me and the other jurors. We were dismissed a LOT. There was so much evidence we were not allowed to hear or see, we were amazed at that. We would go into the jury room and look at each other and go "well, they're arguing again."
Apparently the defense won a lot of the arguments. We had no way of knowing just how much we were not allowed to know until after the trial was over and we could read the news coverage. THEY are allowed to see everything and print everything. Since this is the only trial I've ever done...I dunno, I'm telling you what I experienced. I asked my sister to make document of links to every single thing she read about the trial so that when it was over I could read it. Bless her, she did it for me.
It's rough to look at pictures of basically children (16 and 17) laying on a dirt road face down after being shot execution style. Autopsy results are icky, pictures of autopsy processes are really icky. At the same time, you have to pay attention to every single detail so you find an objective place in your head and carry on.
Witnesses were interesting. This trial is three years after the fact. The witnesses were very young at the time, and are still very young. It was hard for me not to be aghast at the whole thing. Kids. High school. Good Lord.
Then there were other witnesses, not so young, and not so innocent. The ones in prison for various crimes, all drug related. ICE, Crack, Cocaine, Pot, Armed Robbery. ICK.
There were witnesses that were obviously afraid. That was disconcerting and we all noticed it.
There was one point when we were dismissed and though we weren't allowed to talk about the trial one of the jurors said..."I swear if they brought out the box of ballistic evidence one more time I was going to just cry." Another (male) juror replied with a high-pitched "Noooooooo, not the box! Please not the box!" There were eleven envelopes in that box and four witnesses each identified each of the eleven envelopes. So we are talking forty-four times watching someone identify an envelope, then open the envelope, then open the contents, say what it was and put it back. The entire jury room burst into laughter. Sometimes, you just have to laugh even though the whole thing is life and death serious. That was also the only time we said anything about the trial when we weren't deliberating.
The defendant never took the stand. In a capital case the defense is actually required to do nothing. The onus is on the State to prove the defendant guilty literally beyond a shadow of a reasonable doubt.
There was no "hard" evidence. Every single piece of evidence against the defendant was witness testimony. Wednesday, day six of the trial and day eight for us jurors (I count weekends, you can't get really away from it though I tried hard) we heard closing arguments and went to deliberate. On that day when we arrived we were instructed to return our cell phones to our cars so we had no contact with anyone. Alternates were dismissed and it wasn't me :(
It took us five hours. Five hours. We reviewed every single piece of evidence, then we reviewed every single witness and evaluated the weight of their testimony, we reviewed notes for exact testimony (this is where my college note taking skills really were crucial--I had them all word for word). The verdict in a capital trial has to be unanimous. We strictly followed the law as the judge gave it to us (printed). We had one juror who was not convinced, basically she didn't believe my notes so we went back to the judge and asked that the transcript be read to us. Yep, word for word, I had what that person said. It was a crucial piece. The juror changed her mind and we had a unanimous guilty verdict.
So at 7pm ish we returned to the courtroom with our verdict. Courtroom was packed. The judge reads the verdict and then the defense wants the jury polled. They call your full name, ask if this is your verdict. Peachy keen. People were taken from the court room for being disruptive. Other people were crying. The jury is just trying to maintain and get through this. So we're dismissed again to the jury room.
When we are called back in the judge tells us that tomorrow we do the penalty phase and dismisses us to go home for the day. As we are leaving the court house (those of us who go the same way have begun a system of following each other to the various turn offs and keeping eyes out for each other as we drive home) we see tons of city police in the front parking lot. They have corralled a bunch of people. We get the hell out of Dodge. As each of us turns off we also realize we are all being followed. In the city we have city police, as we leave the city we have unmarked cars. Each turning off or making u-turns at specific points. *blink*
The penalty phase day was just as long. The defendant is now in a prison suit and handcuffed and shackled rather than being dressed in a suit-- you are innocent until proven guilty but once guilty it becomes painfully obvious. We hear prosecution and defense arguments. We retreat to the jury room to deliberate. I don't think any of the jurors slept the night before. We all pretty much knew our verdict but we did the process. Item by item, against the law as the judge gave it to us for the penalty phase. We voted in a blind vote this time to let each juror vote without concern. In the penalty phase the verdict does not have to be unanimous, it is the majority. Vote was three death, nine life in prison. Done.
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