Jury Duty Week

 I was assigned the number 150.  

Last Friday after I 5pm and the called up numbers 1-75

Monday evening no additional jurors were needed.

Tuesday evening no additional jurors were needed.

Wednesday evening no additional jurors were needed.

Thursday evening no additional jurors were needed.

So Alaska State court in Anchorage this week only needed 75 jurors.  I remember in the past when a couple of hundred people (or so it seemed) gathered in the large jury room awaiting someone calling them to serve.  

Either there are a to fewer cases now, or at least this week, or they got smarter and just called the number they thought they'd need for Monday and let the rest of us stay home.  And that first 75 was all they needed.  That saves money for the court system (for one, they pay parking for jurors who bring their parking tickets from one particular lot.)  And with way fewer people to track at court, they can use the court personnel for other purposes.  

Being on a jury is an interesting experience and defendants deserve thoughtful attentive jurors.  But if I wasn't going to be in a courtroom, it's better to be told the night before not to come in at all.  

As Trump's Jury Gets Chosen, I Get Summons ForJury Duty

 It was an email from the Alaska Court System.

The time I've been summoned for is in June.  So I'm guessing the folks who ended up as potential jurors in the Trump case in New York were probably summoned much earlier as well.

I was wondering why it came to my email.  In the past it's always come via the post office.  In Alaska, people who have requested a Permanent Fund Check are on the list.  

Next I had to fill out an online questionnaire to insure I was eligible - an Alaska resident, a US citizen, over 18, etc.  

Here's a link to the instructions jurors get.  Most of it is routine FAQs - will I get paid?  how much?  what about food?  parking?  how long will I serve?  etc.  

But given the attention to picking the jury in New York, I thought the section picking jurors for a particular trial might be of interest to people.  Of course, these are Alaska rules not New York rules so there may be some differences.  This is the voir dir - the choosing and removing of jurors by the attorneys.  

How are jurors chosen to sit on a jury?

There are several methods a judge may use to select a jury. The following paragraphs describe the most common methods.

When a trial is ready to begin, a group of potential jurors will be called into the courtroom. The clerk will ask the potential jurors to swear or affirm that they will truthfully answer the questions about to be asked of them.

Trials begin with jury selection. Names are randomly selected from those on jury service to form a panel from which the trial jury will be selected. The judge excuses those on the panel whose knowledge of the people or the circumstances would affect their impartiality.

    J-180 (7/22) 10

You will be told the names of the parties and their attorneys and the nature of the case. You will be asked such things as whether you know or are related to anyone involved in the case, have any financial or other interest in the outcome of the case, have formed or expressed an opinion, or have any personal bias or prejudice that might affect how you decide the case.

Depending on your court location, one of two methods will be used to select the first group of potential jurors to take seats in the jury box:

Method #1: The names of all potential jurors will be placed on slips of paper in a small box. The clerk will then draw a certain number of names from the box and ask those persons to take seats in the jury box. Method #2: A computer will produce a list of potential jurors in random order and the clerk will ask the first group of persons on that list to take seats in the jury box.

The judge and the lawyers for each side will ask you some questions. If you are reluctant to answer a particular question in public, you may ask the judge to be examined privately on that topic.

The lawyers will be allowed to ask that certain potential jurors be excused “for cause." The lawyer must explain why the lawyer believes the juror would not be a fair and impartial juror in the case. The judge may or may not grant these requests. After all seated jurors have been “passed for cause," the lawyers will be allowed to “peremptorily disqualify” a certain number of jurors (this means to disqualify them without stating the reason why). The number of peremptory disqualifications allowed depends on the type of case.

After the required number of jurors has been accepted, the jurors take an oath swearing or affirming that they will hear the case and give a verdict based solely on the evidence introduced and the instructions of the court. The trial is then ready to begin.

I see jury duty as one of the responsibilities US citizens have in exchange for the freedom and opportunities we have.  It's a less frequent responsibility than voting, but maybe even more important.  I also know that jurors are required to be impartial and that many if not most jurors struggle to overcome biases they have that could lead them to an erroneous decision.   

What Happens To Jurors Who Work To Get Defendants Acquitted?

Senate President McConnell has said he's working with Trump in preparation for the impeachment trial in the Senate and that there will be a quick acquittal.  Given that, it seemed appropriate to consider what can happen when a juror does this in a court trial.  Here's an example:

From the American Bar Association Journal:

Jovanda Blackson, a prospective juror in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia, answered no to each of those questions during voir dire last year, ensuring her place on the panel that would decide the fate of two men charged with murder.
Trouble is, Blackson did know one of the defendants. She did know his wife. And, while this mother of three had no criminal record, a couple of her relatives—including her brother—did.
Unfortunately, the judge and prosecutors didn’t know that until after Blackson succeeded in hanging the jury, prompting a mistrial for both defendants. Only later, thanks to a tip from a jailhouse informant, were suspicions from her fellow jurors confirmed and the truth emerged.
Blackson had known the defendant from grade school. When she appeared for jury duty, prosecutors say, Blackson recognized him, winked to let him know she would take care of him, and later conspired with his wife to either convince her fellow jurors to acquit or hold out for a mistrial.
Blackson is serving 61⁄2 years [published in 2006] behind bars after pleading guilty in May to conspiracy, contempt and obstruction of justice. The man she attempted to help, Lamiek K. Fortson, and his co defendant, Harry Ellis, are serving time too, having been retried and convicted, and an obstruction offense was added to Fortson’s record. Fortson’s wife, Erica Williams, was given a 74 month suspended sentence, five years of supervised release, 500 hours of community service and a $250 fine.

And in court trials, there's the process known as voir dire, where attorneys from both sides can dismiss jurors they feel are biased or likely to vote against their client.  They're estimating this process will take at least two weeks in the Weinstein trial that started this week.

Here are some notes from the Judicial Education Center at the University of New Mexico:

"Judicial Participation in Voir Dire
The judge overseeing voir dire, who is listening first hand to the attorneys' questions and the jury panel members' responses, is in the best position to determine whether voir dire has sufficiently exposed any biases that may preclude jurors from acting fairly and impartially. State v. Martinez, 2002-NMCA-036, ¶35. As previously noted, the judge has the right to control and limit voir dire with the limitation being the ultimate need for fairness in the process. To ensure fairness in the process to both the prosecution and defense, the judge should consider doing the following regarding voir dire:
Determine in advance how much time to allow for voir dire, advise the attorneys of that allotted time frame and work to ensure that it is divided as equally as possible between the two sides.
If the need arises to step in to resolve a dispute between the parties or deal with an objection, call the attorneys to the bench and take care of it outside the earshot of the jury panel. Alternatively, remove the jury panel from the courtroom and deal with the issue outside of its presence. The goal with either of these methods is to resolve the dispute and move on with voir dire while maintaining the critical neutrality of the judge and communicating that to the panel.
If asking the jury panel questions of his or her own, the judge should make efforts to do so sparingly and in a way that does not create the perception that the judge has "taken a side" in the case. In other words, in addition to working to ensure fairness between the prosecution and defense, the judge wants to present him or herself as being fair to both parties and neutral in the case. This is especially critical in stalking and harassment cases where the behavior can be seen as bizarre on its face and responses provided by jury panelists during voir dire can perhaps promote similar responses and reactions."

One might hope that Chief Justice John Roberts would be thinking about these issues.  Except that this is not a judicial trial.  Due Process - which gives the accused the right to a fair trail before their life, liberty, or property is taken away - is not the standard here.  President Trump doesn't risk jail, execution, or even a fine if he's found guilty.

This is more like firing someone for not performing his job duties satisfactorily.  Just cause - the idea that there must be a violation of the rules - is the standard when one is fired.

Perhaps a major news outlet could track down Jovanda Blackson today and interview her about the consequences of colluding with the defendant to hang a jury.  Right after having Sen. McConnell brag about working with the White House.

LA Times Headline Jumps To Conclusions: "Cosby case deadlock reflects our cultural split" (And Side Note On Google Search Problem) [UPDATED]

Does that deadlocked jury really reflect our cultural split?

Maybe, but since we don't know what happened in the jury room  there is so far no basis for that conclusion.  If it said, "Crosby case" (without the deadlock), I wouldn't have reacted like this.   I think it's worth calling out the headline writer and to some extent the reporter on this.  It seems a clear case of using this story as a pretext to discuss what the reporter was thinking about the case.  Not what the facts showed.  Because the only facts we have about the deadlock is that it deadlocked.

[NOTE:  I haven't figured out how to get the link to the article when I read print facsimile version of the LA Times.  So after I finished this post, I went back to get the link.  It gave me a different online version of the article which has a completely different headline.  Had I read this headline, I never would have written this post:

"One night, two stories: In the Bill Cosby saga of sex, race, celebrity and alleged assault, even the jury couldn't agree on the truth"

Online headline writers have more space to use than print headline writers.  But my point about the print headline is still valid.  I'm glad to see the online headline writer was more careful.  And since you'll get the other headline at the link, here's a screenshot of what I saw first:]

Here's the beginning of the article:

"BY STEVEN ZEITCHIK
NORRISTOWN, Pa. — The dozen jurors in the Bill Cosby sexual assault trial spanned a diverse demographic range: white men in their 20s and 30s, middle-aged African Americans, elderly white women.
With that diversity also came deadlock. On its sixth day of deliberations, the jury found itself unable to render a verdict — like so much of this country, unable to find consensus on charged questions of race, age, power and gender."

I'd also note that reporters are not usually the ones who write the headlines, though this sentence seems to give the headline writer the needed prompt:

"The jurors did not speak with reporters, but their inability to reach a verdict, after more than 100 hours of testimony and deliberations in this suburban Philadelphia courtroom, brought home how divided opinions are about Cosby — and about a lot more."

Before we can reach this conclusion, we need to know a few things:

1.   How many jurors vote for guilty and how many for not-guilty?

• If only one or two jurors held out, then their deadlock doesn't represent "our cultural split."  11 -1 or 10-2 are huge majorities.  I was on a jury where one woman refused to find the young woman defendant guilty of drunk driving because, as she told us, it could have been her daughter.  It's easy to imagine a juror who's had sex with a drunk friend identifying himself in the same situation, using the same sort of personal logic to say 'not guilty.'  
• If more jurors held out, and the debate focused on whether the plaintiff consented and/or whether Cosby was the victim of race discrimination, then perhaps the headline would be justified. Or not.   And if the debate was about reasonable doubt  (and the article says the deadlocked jury asked for a definition of that term) then it really might have been just that and not particularly reflective of cultural splits.  I'm assuming, for example, that the number of other accusers, who say they were assaulted the same way and who have not filed law suits, was not allowed into the trial.

There are lots of reasons juries deadlock.  One juror may so irritate another juror that the second just won't go along with whatever the first one decides.  Or a juror feels strongly that government is screwing over people.  We don't even know, in this case, whether the majority was for not-guilty or guilty.

[A Note On Juries.    I did try to find studies on why juries deadlock.  This revealed a problem with google's search algorithm - the first ten pages were almost completely about the Cosby case, nothing generic about deadlocked juries, and nothing about why they deadlock.

I did find one book The Jury Under Fire: Myth, Controversy, and Reform  by Brian H. Bornstein and Edie Greene.  Google got me to page 73 which discussed how jury size (12 or 6 jurors) affected deliberations and how the unanimous vote rule (as opposed to using a majority vote) affected decisions.  It also mentioned that only two states - Oregon and Louisiana have majority rule, but they require at 10 jurors in some kinds of cases and 11 in murder cases.  It also cited some numbers:  2% of federal trials and 4-5% of state trials result in hung juries.  There were also some caveats because most studies of juries are done on mock juries not real ones.]

[A Further Note on Google and Hung Juries.  Before posting this, I decided to try a different browser.  I used Bing.  And bingo (sorry), I got better results than with google.  Here are the reasons for hung juries from one study

This covers only 46 cases and presumably none with the kind of celebrity buzz as the Cosby trial.  I'd say 'cultural split' might fit in 'dysfunctional process'  or 'unknown.'

A study by the National Center for State Courts found:

"In examining the data, researchers found one or more of the following traits consistent in a hung jury compared to one that reaches a verdict:
• weak evidence
• problematic deliberations
• jurors’ perception of unfairness"

"Cultural split' might fit into the last two categories.  We just don't know what happened.

My point?  Even with reputable media, we need to be ever watchful that the facts support the conclusions.   Here I think the story reflects what the reporter thinks about the case, not about the hung jury.  When the article was posted we didn't know any more about the jury than it was deadlocked.  (I couch it that way, because I don't know if any of the jurors have said anything publicly as I write this.   Using Google and  Bing I can't find anything about a juror talking to anyone about the details of the split or the issues that caused the split.)

[UPDATE August 24, 2019:  A Los Angeles Times article discusses a current Supreme Court case about the constitutionality of Louisiana's majority rule..  It says Louisiana's voters changed the rule to unanimous in 2018, but the case is an earlier one.  Oregon is now the only non-unanimous jury verdict state and

"Michael Kron, special counsel to Oregon’s attorney general, said that if the Supreme Court rules in favor of Ramos, it would be reversing its 1972 ruling that the Constitution does not bar states from allowing nonunanimous verdicts."

Others argue that Oregon might have dozens, not hundreds of cases and that the original Oregon constitutional amendment to have non-unanimous verdicts 

"The decision by Oregon voters in 1934 to allow split-jury verdicts was fueled by white supremacy and anti-immigrant sentiment. One newspaper said immigrants from southern and Eastern Europe had made the requirement for unanimous verdicts 'unwieldy and unsatisfactory.'”]

Jury Duty Day 1

There was a line outside the court building for going through security when I got off the bus this morning downtown.  But we could keep our shoes on.

The jury assembly room is on the second floor.  I checked in and got a one page form to fill out - name, profession, past jury experience, organizations you belong to, hobbies.

Another third of the jury assembly room is to the right

It's a big room.  The phone call yesterday said they were taking jurors 1-415.  I had my computer, but never took it out.  I'm reading Vic Fischer's autobiography and I find it fascinating.  He was born in Berlin to American parents in 1924 - a time and place I've had a lot of interest in and have recently read about.  I just wanted to read.  So it was fine that I wasn't called in the first three groups - about 40-50 in each group.  But then they asked those still left there to fill out another form.  This one asked about whether we had experienced sexual abuse, knew anyone who had, or had been involved in organizations related to this issue.

Our group got sent to the third floor and we were called in alphabetically, so I was number 2.  The jury selection, we were told, was going to take the rest of the week.  Prospective jurors would be questioned in some cases individually.  It probably could have been done a lot faster if the judge hadn't talked so slowly.  And he said 'uhhh' so many times that I checked my watch for a minute.  25 times.  That's almost one 'uhhh' every other second!  The days would be from 8 to 1:30pm I think he said and only Monday through Thursday.  Then the trial would last through the week of November 11. 

He went through the questions again on the questionnaires we'd sent in when we first got the notices.  Anyone not an American citizen?  Anyone not over 18?  Not an Alaskan resident?  No one raised their hands.  For that last question he said, "Good, because the names are taken from the Alaska Permanent Fund Dividend applications."

Then we were asked if we knew the defendant, his attorney, or the prosecutor - who were all in the room - or any of the potential witnesses.  Their names were put up on a screen and read.   A woman knew all the police officers.  Turned out she's a police dispatcher.  Said she doesn't know them personally, just as a dispatcher.  He kept her in the pool but said the attorneys would surely have more questions. 

Then we got to scheduling.  "Does anyone have an important activity that will interfere with this trial or would take a financial hit because of the schedule?"  Another man said he had a doctor's appointment next Monday morning.  The judge said they could accommodate that.  I said I had a plane reservation for November 7 to visit my 91 year old mom who is not well.  I was excused.  As I was leaving another woman said she was the sole support for a young relative and couldn't take that much time from work.  I think she was excused too.  By then it was about 1pm. 

We have to call in each night this week to see if our numbers are called again.  The judge said that last week there was judge training in Girdwood, so things were extra busy this week.  (I called.  I don't have to go Tuesday.)
 

Then I walked across rainy and darkly overcast downtown Anchorage to meet J for lunch.

Past these Russian dolls looking out the closed gift shop window at the rain.

This car hood catching and mixing rain drops. 


















Past the Club 25 building and Cyrano's across the street.












There seemed to be a number of new places I hadn't seen before, like the Bubbly Mermaid.










And across the Museum grounds.

Jury Duty Day 1

There was a line outside the court building for going through security when I got off the bus this morning downtown.  But we could keep our shoes on.

The jury assembly room is on the second floor.  I checked in and got a one page form to fill out - name, profession, past jury experience, organizations you belong to, hobbies. 

Another third of the jury assembly room is to the right

It's a big room.  The phone call yesterday said they were taking jurors 1-415.  I had my computer, but never took it out.  I'm reading Vic Fischer's autobiography and I find it fascinating.  He was born in Berlin to American parents in 1934 - a time and place I've had a lot of interest in and have recently read about.  I just wanted to read.  So it was fine that I wasn't called in the first three groups - about 40-50 in each group.  But then they asked those still left there to fill out another form.  This one asked about whether we had experienced sexual abuse, knew anyone who had, or had been involved in organizations related to this issue.

Our group got sent to the third floor and we were called in alphabetically, so I was number 2.  The jury selection, we were told, was going to take the rest of the week.  Prospective jurors would be questioned in some cases individually.  It probably could have been done a lot faster if the judge hadn't talked so slowly.  And he said 'uhhh' so many times that I checked my watch for a minute.  25 times.  That's almost one 'uhhh' every other second!  The days would be from 8 to 1:30pm I think he said and only Monday through Thursday.  Then the trial would last through the week of November 11. 

He went through the questions again on the questionnaires we'd sent in when we first got the notices.  Anyone not an American citizen?  Anyone not over 18?  Not an Alaskan resident?  No one raised their hands.  For that last question he said, "Good, because the names are taken from the Alaska Permanent Fund Dividend applications."

Then we were asked if we knew the defendant, his attorney, or the prosecutor - who were all in the room - or any of the potential witnesses.  Their names were put up on a screen and read.   A woman knew all the police officers.  Turned out she's a police dispatcher.  Said she doesn't know them personally, just as a dispatcher.  He kept her in the pool but said the attorneys would surely have more questions. 

Then we got to scheduling.  "Does anyone have an important activity that will interfere with this trial or would take a financial hit because of the schedule?"  Another man said he had a doctor's appointment next Monday morning.  The judge said they could accommodate that.  I said I had a plane reservation for November 7 to visit my 91 year old mom who is not well.  I was excused.  As I was leaving another woman said she was the sole support for a young relative and couldn't take that much time from work.  I think she was excused too.  By then it was about 1pm. 

We have to call in each night this week to see if our numbers are called again.  The judge said that last week there was judge training in Girdwood, so things were extra busy this week.  (I called.  I don't have to go Tuesday.)
 

Then I walked across rainy and darkly overcast downtown Anchorage to meet J for lunch.

Past these Russian dolls looking out the closed gift shop window at the rain.

This car hood catching and mixing rain drops. 


















Past the Club 25 building and Cyrano's across the street.












There seemed to be a number of new places I hadn't seen before, like the Bubbly Mermaid.










And across the Museum grounds. 

Jury Got Filled Without Me

I caught the 7:19 bus (well it came at 7:29) and got to court with 15 minutes to spare.






Here's the jury waiting room. It got packed. The 12 jurors called today for Judge Volland were told at 9 that we could have a break til 10. So I went out and walked in the snow.



There were ice sculptures in the town square.





I stopped in the Hilton to warm up a bit and shake off the snow. I know this guy must be tremendously proud of shooting these bears. And I'm sure some biologist could make an argument about it being ok with the balance of nature. But personally I don't understand why he thinks killing this bear and having it stuffed is a great thing.


Well, sure, I remember the thrill of proving my power by breaking windows and other destructive acts, but I got over that when I was nine or ten. I understand it more when they actually eat what they kill. And I'm sure there's a hunting gene or two that helped humans survive when we had to hunt. But I can't help but think its a sign of arrested moral development when grown men spend tens of thousands of dollars to kill magnificent wild animals for trophies. Do you think he has a trophy wife too? (The sign is in the lower left corner of the bear case)






We had to wait until 12:15 before they told us we could go. But the twelve of us (minus one or two who weren't there) were pretty much the only ones left in the waiting room. And this clock. While being on the jury would have been interesting, this wasn't the right time for a three work trial as we're getting ready to head out for Thailand. So I was glad they were able to fill the jury without even calling us into court.




Well, the next bus wasn't for 30 minutes. I figured I could walk home in an hour, so off I went to the bike trail.





I saw a robin several times around the house last winter, but it is always a little strange to see them here in January. The second one was a little camera shy. It is a Robin, right Catherine? It isn't some bird I never heard of is it?


















Well, I didn't quite make it home in an hour. An old friend, PM, skied past me and then looped back and we talked for nearly half an hour.

[double click on a picture to enlarge it]

Kohring Trial Day 2 - Jury Selected

The street was white when I got the paper this morning. When I read Lisa Demer's article, I realized that the jury selection got further along yesterday afternoon than I expected. I debated whether to drive or get another bike trip in before the trails are too icy. So I didn't get to court until 10:50am.

By my quick count the jury had seven men and five women. The alternates were two men and a woman. Very different composition from the previous trials.

This was supposed to go up at lunch. Don't know why it didn't.

Kohring Trial Day 1 - Jury Selection and the Defense Attorney

9:00 AM

3:07-CR-00055-JWS

Judge Sedwick

Anchorage Courtroom 3

USA vs. VICTOR H. KOHRING
TRIAL BY JURY - DAY 1

Today was devoted to jury selection. Judge Sedwick used the same process he used in the Kott and Anderson trials. The first part already happened - the elimination of potential jurists based on their questionnaires. From what I understand, those who expressed bias about the case there, have been eliminated. When I walked into court today, about 9:15 am, the gallery was packed by people with little blue stickers on their chests that said "Juror."

I missed the first part, but I imagine it was the same as the Kott trial - jurors were introduced to the various parties, told the charges, given instructions about their job and restrictions about talking to others or viewing news about the case. Another court observer told me that one of the potential witnesses, Fred James, was given permission to be in the courtroom for the jury selection process. He's one of the two writers of the USA v. Victor H. Kohring blog I mentioned yesterday. What I hadn't realized was that the two writers have different views on the defendant and the blog will reflect this. James, I was told, is a long time, good friend of Kohring's.

Anyway, the jury was sent out and then they were brought back in, one-at-a-time to answer questions about their awareness of the case, the people involved in the case, and whether they could be fair and unbiased. The basic questions the judge asked were:
1. Where do you get your news?
2. Do you remember anything from the news about Kohring or Veco, Bill Allen, Rick Smith?
If they did, then
3. What do you know, have you formed an opinion, could you give a fair hearing. One question he asked along these lines to one or two jurors was, "If you were the defendant, would you want someone like you on the jury?"

Most of the jurors said they don't pay much attention to politics and don't know much or anything about the case. My sense this time round - I stayed for the first 29 jurors and the lunch break - was that even when they said they knew nothing, they tended not to be as oblivious as that suggested. When pressed they often knew something

Two jurors, while I was there, were dismissed. One because she had a back problem and sitting for long times caused her pain. Another, a full time student who works full time hadn't asked to be dismissed. The judge asked if this would affect his studies. He said he'd miss some midterms. The judge asked why he hadn't asked to get out. "Several people told me it wouldn't do any good." The judge said, "Well this court is a little friendlier. A two day trial would be ok, but a two week trial would really affect your studies. I'm going to excuse you."

One juror met Rick Smith, a likely witness, smoking outside Reilly's Bar several times. Another juror who works at Cal Worthington Ford, met Bill Allen there. A third juror had been at meetings of his Community Council when Vic Kohring attended. Alaska is a small place.

Jury Composition

The jury looked different from the Anderson and Kott jury pools. The most striking difference was the relative balance of genders. The Kott trial ended up with ten women and two men. But today, in the first 29 jurors questioned, 15 were men, 14 were women. There were two African Americans, a person from Bethel and one from Unalaska, if I understood right. The ages of the jurors seemed more evenly distributed than the prior two jurors - the Anderson jury being particularly young looking. And there was even one gentleman who had on a tie!

John Henry Browne

For me the big unknown was the defense attorney. When I walked in, I saw him from behind and thought he was younger until he turned and faced the gallery. He was wearing what looked like an expensive light grey suit with just a touch of green. His shirt was just barely pink. The prosecutors, in comparison, were in dark, dark grey to black suits with white shirts, except for Mr. Goeke who had a beige shirt. Even Agent Mary Beth Kepner [Thanks, Steve, I was getting tired when I did that] had on a grey suit. And Mr. Browne's hair also looked expensive - basically brown with what would have been called surfer blond streaks where I grew up near Venice Beach. OK, I know what some of you are thinking. But this is not intended as a fashion evaluation of the attorneys. I do think, however, that the dress does tell us something about people. Browne very definitely pays attention to how he looks. He also has trouble talking without moving. If his arms aren't moving, or his hands, then his fingers are moving. A few times I could even see the muscles in his back moving through his jacket. And this was just very low key questions to the jury.

His voice is radio quality deep and his intonation is precise, more articulated than most American speakers naturally talk. Perhaps he's done some acting or had other voice coaching.

When he asked questions of the jurors, or even when he didn't, he would say, "Good morning" in the same exact tone which sounded warm and interested the first time, but after hearing it repeated precisely many times, it began to sound canned. For two jurors, he said something like, "Your comments were much more extensive than the other jurors" which I thought sounded like calculated flattery, and which caused Prosecutor Botinni to object to the "unnecessary editorial comments" about juror performance. The judge concurred.

He also addressed the court twice, between jurors, with two questions that I thought seemed inappropriate. The first time he wanted to know about jurors who came from outside of Anchorage - who paid for them? (The court pays their airfare and hotel, but they don't go back for weekends the judge replied.) The second question was whether the jurors came from all of Alaska. The judge explained that they only came from the Anchorage district, which was a large district, stretching from Cordova to the Aleutians. It just seemed to me that these were curiosity items, that I would have written down and checked on later. Or, as the Outside defense attorney, I would have found out before the trial. And being an Outside attorney - the local attorney Wayne Anthony Ross was not there today - he wouldn't understand the implications of what local talk show hosts the jurors said they listened to.

Overall, his behavior reinforced the impression I've gotten in the pretrial press coverage. This is the Seattle attorney who is coming to the boondocks to try a case. If that really is the way he's thinking, I suspect he's in for a big surprise. Judge Sedwick has run very tight, but fair, trials. His excusing of the full time student today is an example of his practical understanding of what makes sense and what doesn't. The prosecution has done an overwhelming amount of work and have been extremely well prepared. The teams at the previous two trials were one local attorney and one from the DC based Public Integrity Section. These guys do their homework. The pairing for this trial is Joe Botinni, whose been in the Anchorage US Attorney Office for many years, and Edward P. Sullivan from DC. On the other hand, it does seem that the taped evidence is likely to be not as damaging as in the other cases, and that Kohring might appear to have been less calculating than Kott or Anderson in working out ways to get paid. We will see.