In some courtrooms, jury selection in a case like Buck Hammond’s would take days. In Judge Leon Long’s courtroom, we’ll wrap it up before lunch. I know this from experience. “People are fundamentally decent,” Judge Long is fond of announcing. “No need to search for skeletons in the average citizen’s closet. Oh, you’d find plenty. But old bones won’t tell you anything about a person’s ability to be fair and impartial.”
During my decade as a prosecutor, I tried at least a dozen cases before Judge Long. I am used to his rapid-fire approach to jury impanelment. And to tell the truth, I tend to agree with his assessment of the average person’s ability to judge fairly. J. Stanley Edgarton III, though, does not. The scowl he wears this morning makes that abundantly clear.
We all agreed there was no need to interrogate the potential jurors about what they’ve seen on television or read in the newspapers. They’ve all seen the footage dozens of times. They’ve all read the reports and the editorials for weeks on end, first when it all happened, again as the trial date approached. We’d have to go to Mars to find a juror who hasn’t been saturated with media opinion about the now infamous shooting on live TV. The tabloids are calling it a modern-day public execution.
Instead, Judge Leon Long asks the first prospective juror if he can disregard what he has heard from the press, and base his verdict solely on the evidence presented in this courtroom. Of course he can, the juror claims. The entire panel nods in agreement.
Judge Long asks the next candidate in the box if she understands that Buck Hammond is presumed to be innocent as he sits here in the courtroom today. She is dumbfounded. “But he isn’t,” she blurts out. “We all saw him do it.”
Buck stiffens between Harry and me. Stanley gets to his feet, but Judge Leon Long doesn’t acknowledge him. “Thank you, Mrs. Holway,” the judge says. “Thank you for your candor. You are excused with the sincere thanks of the court.”
Mrs. Holway appears to take offense at her dismissal.
Stanley intervenes on her behalf. “Your Honor,” he says, his voice rising in pitch, “perhaps I should voir dire this juror?”
Stanley is hoping to rehabilitate Mrs. Holway, get her to say that of course she has an open mind, of course she won’t make a decision until all of the evidence is in. Mrs. Holway is a juror J. Stanley Edgarton III wants to keep. He likes the way she thinks.
Harry and I agreed that I will handle jury selection and he will deliver the opening statement. That way the jurors will hear from both of us on day one. Ordinarily, I’d be on my feet by now to oppose Stanley’s request for voir dire, to state my opposition on the record before the judge has a chance to rule. But Judge Leon Long is shaking his head at Stanley-losing patience, if I’m reading him correctly-so I stay put. Never argue with opposing counsel if the judge will do it for you. I have to remember to thank Geraldine.
“Mrs. Holway is not a juror, Mr. Edgarton,” the judge says. “I just excused her.”
“But Your Honor…”
“That’s all, Mr. Edgarton.”
Stanley has the good sense to sit down, and Mrs. Holway leaves the courtroom in a huff.
Judge Long’s courtroom clerk, Wanda Morgan, selects a new name from the glass bowl on her desk. The new potential juror comes from the gallery to the box to replace Mrs. Holway. His juror résumé identifies him as a fifty-six-year-old restaurant owner. More important, he is the father of three adult sons.
We will select fourteen jurors this morning, including two who will be told-only at the close of the case-that they are alternates. Judge Long addresses the panel first. “Ladies and gentlemen,” he says, smiling at them, “let me tell you at the outset that the lawyers handling this case have assured me that this trial will take three days, no longer.”
The judge points at Stanley, then at Harry and me, and we all nod our acquiescence.
“That means,” the judge continues, “that they’ll finish not later than Thursday afternoon, at which time the case will be turned over to you. Now, no one can predict how long your deliberations may take. But I believe it’s safe to assume we’ll all be home for Christmas on Saturday morning.”
Stanley leans over his table and stares at Buck, his expression suggesting that Buck shouldn’t include himself in the judge’s assumption. Buck doesn’t look back at him.
Next, the judge conducts a general inquiry into matters such as the presumption of innocence, the burden of proof, and reasonable doubt, then asks each potential juror a series of more specific, and more personal, questions. Only then do Stanley and I get our turns.
Each of us is allowed just two follow-up questions per juror. Judge Long is clear about the two-question limit, but Stanley doesn’t seem to believe it. No such cap exists, apparently, in any New Bedford courtroom. Stanley begins a third question with every candidate, and the judge cuts him off every time. Stanley whines like a thirsty dog each time it happens, but the judge shuts him down anyway, always with that dazzling smile.
After our questions are asked and answered, the judge calls upon Stanley and me to state our challenges for cause. I have none. Stanley has just one. Juror number nine should be excused, he says, because she has a seven-year-old son.
“Denied.” Judge Long shakes his head and rules while Stanley is still talking.
“But Your Honor,” Stanley protests, “I’m not finished.”
“But Mr. Edgarton,” the judge replies, his smile enormous, “you most certainly are.”
The jurors laugh at this exchange, and Stanley glares at Judge Long. No prosecutor wants a panel laughing at any point during a murder trial.
“But Judge,” Stanley persists.
“Mr. Edgarton, let me be perfectly clear about this. No juror will be removed from this panel-or from any panel, in my courtroom-because she is a parent.”
“But that’s not it, Judge. That’s not it at all. It’s not that juror number nine is a parent. It’s that her child happens to be a seven-year-old boy.”
“Denied, Mr. Edgarton.”
“But Judge…”
My gut tells me Stanley just uttered one “But Judge” too many. Judge Leon Long dons his half glasses, lifts Stanley’s trial brief from the bench, and pretends to examine the signature line. Judge Long has done this before, more than once. Harry and I both know what’s coming.
“Oh, pardon me,” the judge bellows, his voice thick with sarcasm. “I must be using the wrong name, sir. You don’t seem to understand that I’m talking to you. Mr. J. Stanley Edgarton the Third,” the judge roars, “your challenge for cause is dee-nied.”
If he is true to past pattern, the judge will call Stanley “Mr. Ed-gar-ton the Third” for the rest of the trial. I put my hand over my mouth and swallow a laugh. Buck Hammond watches me, his eyes saying he doesn’t know what to make of this. Harry, of course, looks like the Cheshire cat.
In the end, Stanley gets rid of juror number nine by using one of his three peremptory strikes, challenges each side may exercise without cause, without explanation. The new juror number nine is a young construction worker who does not have a seven-year-old son. But he does have a three-year-old daughter.
Stanley’s concerns about the first juror number nine tell me that Harry and I are on the right track. We agreed weeks ago to keep as many parents as we could on the panel, more men than women, if possible. We use all of our peremptory challenges to oust three of the four candidates who don’t have children of their own. The one we opt to keep is an elderly woman who never married. She did, though, teach English literature at a private girls’ school for thirty-eight years.
We impanel nine men and five women. We have twelve parents, the retired schoolteacher, and a young male pharmacist engaged to be married, planning a family. These fourteen people will be outraged by what happened to Buck’s son, by Hector Monteros’s crimes. But they are law-abiding citizens; they’ll be outraged by Buck’s crime as well. And his is the only one they will watch played out in living color.
We’re not elated with our panel, but we’re satisfied. No criminal defense lawyer can ask for more. We explain all of this to Buck Hammond before the guards lead him away for the one-o’clock lunch break, but he doesn’t seem to care.