Tot Mom Jury Selection—Day 9

UPDATE JUST IN:

Local reporters and commentators have spent the afternoon speculating about the cause of Wednesday’s abrupt adjournment of jury selection at Casey Anthony’s murder trial. Many potential explanations are being thrown around, with theories as dramatic as a possible plea deal and as simple as an attorney becoming ill.

WESH is reporting that their sources say the recess was because defense attorney Jose Baez is sick. WFTV analyst Bill Schaeffer said that reason made some sense to him, and it could explain why Baez was absent from the courtroom when Perry asked defense attorney Cheney Mason if he had discussed an unspecified issue with Anthony and announced the delay around 1 pm.

A woman in Baez’s office declined to comment on the situation when contacted by the Orlando Sentinel.

A statement by Orange County Court spokeswoman Karen Levey on the recess offered no explanation, but some observers are focusing on multiple conflicts between Perry and the defense this week about the way jury selection was being conducted. The defense could be appealing to a higher court after Perry repeatedly denied their motions to question all of the remaining jurors, or they could be filing a motion to have Perry removed from the case—as they did with the trial’s original judge Stan Strickland.

However, Baez sent this somewhat cryptic statement to In Session’s Beth Karas late in the afternoon: “Today's adjournment was due to a private matter. Please stop the speculation, as jury selection will continue at 830 am tomorrow morning. No further statements will be made."

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BREAKING NEWS UPDATE:

Judge Perry has adjourned jury selection until Thursday morning.

Returning from Wednesday’s lunch break around 1 pm, Perry asked defense attorney Cheney Mason if he had an opportunity to speak to his client, Mason said he had and court was adjourned until 8:30 am. No explanation was given.

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Judge Belvin Perry said Wednesday morning that he plans to hold opening statements in Casey Anthony’s murder trial next Monday at 9 am in Orlando if he has a jury seated. Jury selection for the case continued Wednesday, albeit slowly, with the state exercising a peremptory challenge on the only potential juror questioned in the morning.

The day began with the defense renewing its objection to the way Perry is proceeding with jury selection. Attorney Lisabeth Fryer argued that it would be unfair to swear in a jury before all of the candidates in the pool are questioned, as Perry has said he plans to do.

Fryer contended that the defense should not have to decide whether to use its challenges without knowing what the remaining jurors might have said. She also claimed that it would be an abuse of Perry’s discretion to swear in the panel of 12 jurors at once and then swear in the alternates later, raising the concern that the alternates might then know their status and be less attentive to the trial.

Fryer and Perry argued over precedents for their positions, but he denied the motion and moved on to voir dire of a 42-year-old male personal trainer/playwright/composer. The state later used one of its four remaining challenges to strike him, keeping the total number of viable jurors at 11. The defense still has one challenge left, as well.

When defense attorney Jose Baez again raised the issue of being able to conduct “meaningful voir dire” with all of the 15 prospective jurors left from the 68 who were not excused for hardships before swearing in the jury, Perry informed the attorneys that they only had the courtroom until the end of the day Thursday so they would need to finish voir dire and pick a jury by then or start over in another county.

“I can’t operate in a parking lot,” Perry said, asking Baez how he wanted to handle the situation, given that they were averaging about an hour of questioning per juror.

However, after returning from a brief recess, Perry announced that he had spoken to the chief circuit judge for Pinellas County and secured a room for Friday and Saturday if necessary.

Jury selection continues Wednesday afternoon.