Judge Mudd Refuses Sequester Plea: Westerfield Jury Verdict In Sep? (Aug. 16th Verdict Watch)

Union Trib ^ | August 15, 2002 | Jeff Dillion/Steve Perez

[FresnoDA]

Judge denies defense motion to sequester jury

By Jeff Dillon and Steve Perez
SIGNONSANDIEGO

August 15, 2002

Arguing that media coverage was creating a "lynch mob mentality" that could pressure jurors to return a guilty verdict, the defense attorney for David Westerfield today asked the judge yet again to sequester the jury.

While the jury completed its first week of deliberations without a verdict, Superior Court Judge William Mudd denied the request and a related motion to "pull the plug" on television and radio coverage of the courtroom proceedings, but agreed to set aside a private room for jurors to take breaks. Defense attorney Steven Feldman had argued that reports suggested jurors felt like they were under siege, unable to leave their deliberating room, go to lunch or walk home without being watched or followed.

"We have no assurance that they are not be intimidated ... by the presence of the media," Feldman told Mudd during a morning hearing. "We can think of only one fair resolution to that: Get the jury out of harm's way."

 

'Broccoli heads'

He cited an incident earlier in the week in which radio talk show hosts from KFI-AM 640 in Los Angeles broadcast from outside the courthouse, waving stalks of broccoli around and reportedly calling jurors "broccoli heads" for being unable to return a quick guilty verdict.

Westerfield, 50, could face the death penalty if convicted of kidnapping 7-year-old Danielle van Dam from her family's Sabre Springs home on Feb. 2 and killing her. Jurors are in their sixth day of deliberations.

Lead prosecutor Jeff Dusek disagreed with Feldman's interpretations of the jury's complaints.

"Whether or not any guilty verdict in this case would be based on a siege mentality or the meida I think is pure speculation and utterly false in this case," Dusek said.

What the jurors had complained about was being watched all the time, he said.

"That hardly equates to being under siege," he said.

 

Trust in the jury

Mudd dismissed most of Feldman's concerns, saying that the jurors had only asked a bailiff to keep reporters a little bit farther away, though an alternate juror reported that he or she had been followed to his car.

Media coverage has diminished since the jurors began deliberating, the judge said.

"The synopsis programs on the two local TV networks are not in place," he said. "The talking heads are doing nothing but speculating about what the jury may or may not be thinking."

Mudd said there were no signs that jurors were being harassed by the public, especially since their names and faces haven't been publicized.

"We've all sat here and picked this jury, know their makeup and know their dedication to this cause," Mudd said. "I would prefer to think that any verdict they make in this case would be based upon the evidence."

Sequestering the jury also wouldn't protect them from any public reaction to the verdict, Mudd said.

 

'The activities of a few'

"The tragedy is, the majority of the people in this courtroom are abiding by the court's orders and working very hard to insure they, meaning the media, do not cause something to occur that is going to cause a mistrial," Mudd said. "Not all of them feel that way as is very apparent with the activities of a few."

Mudd took aim at two radio program hosts from Los Angeles who he previously described as "idiots."

"I suppose it's entertainment out of LA. I hope it stays in LA," he said. "The shows those two gentlemen put on made the court incredulous as to what they were attempting to do."

Mudd also announced:

 

• The jury asked to review the recall testimony of prosecution witness Jennifer Shen, a criminalist with the San Diego Police Department.

  On July 9, Shen's testimony interrupted presentation of defense witnesses. Shen, a San Diego police criminalist, testified about re-examining a group of fibers she had collected from Westerfield's 4Runner in February.

  The orange acrylic fibers, found in various places inside the SUV, were the same color and fabric as a fiber tangled in a plastic necklace that Danielle was wearing when authorities found her body in a hollow off Dehesa Road, Shen testified at the time.

  All the fibers looked identical under a microscope and appeared to have the same chemical makeup when tested using infrared technology, she said.

  Shen said the fibers seem "most likely to have come from something that was very loosely knit," such as a sweater or blanket.

   

• Reporters will no longer be allowed to ask questions of the court's bailiff and clerk.

  "You folks are going to deal with my PR person. You're going to leave my bailiff and my clerk alone," Mudd told reporters in the courtroom. "One statement leads to 60 questions that they're not going to answer and neither am I."

  Mudd decided to turn the daily updates over to the court's public information officer after deciding that an informal system set up to have a bailiff or court clerk provide updates had failed.

  "There was a simple note that they started at 9, they left at 4 left you chomping on bit to get copies," He said. "You're welcome to them, they'll be available as soon as we gett the minute order."

  Reporters and members of the public will not be informed immediately about notes passed by the jury, Mudd said. The judge said he had procedure to follow, that includes notifying the attorneys involved in the case about the note and determining the appropriate response.

  "This is a capital case and you go by steps," Mudd said.

   

[MizSterious]

It does in some circles...you know, the ones knitting little hangman's nooses?

[pinz-n-needlez]

Hey, be nice to knitters! We know dw is innocent!

:-)

Nooses are knotted (the things we post on these threads. lol)

[BARLF]

Check mail?

[FresnoDA]

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And if you act now, there is a VD Swingers Special, Free Stirrups??

And that is weird, because I thought the VD's were into Mountain Biking, not Horseback Riding....

FDA/frr

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[spectre]

What is wrong with Dusek? Standing there in closing arguments playing with a ROPE?!

Geeze, it wasn't even subliminal.

sw

[BigBobber]

I've always wondered about this photo. If the fibers were taken on a neutral background, how come the background on the right is more pink than the one on the left? Was the color altered to make the fibers look the same?

Also, notice how nicely the diameters and angle of the fiber have been matched up. Yet, the fibers appear to have variable diameters. Look at the one on the left. These fibers are very long, yet the police just happen to match up a place where the diameters are similar? Looks good for the prosecution's case - but is this objective? Is it good science? If this is the "best case" of matching, how close are the "large number of orange fibers" that the jury doesn't get to see.

Personally, I think all of this fiber evidence is garbage. Why didn't they tell us what fibers were/weren't on Danielle's bed sheets? If she were truely snatched from her bed by DW, you would expect to see all the fibers in her bed that were found in DW's environnment, like all the Layla hair.

[MizSterious]

All he's missing is his pillowcase with the eye-holes in it.

[FresnoDA]

Swing to the left, Swing to the right....

[pinz-n-needlez]

back atcha

[MizSterious]

My feelings exactly. If those pics are the same scale, then that's just another example of misrepresented evidence. Our justice system is going to heck in a handbasket, and all the lynch mob can do is cheer it on. One of these days, it could happen to one of them. They forget that.

[spectre]

LOL! And he should be riding a horse, carrying a flaming torch.

sw

[ArneFufkin]

This case doesn't provide me ongoing entertainment. It must give you ghouls the shakes to think that this trial is almost over, depriving you of your daily discussions of parental debauchery, bodily decay and of course, those always fun Freeper wagering pools. Thank God Samantha Runnion was murdered and Avila's trial will be coming on line soon, eh?

[Green]

Just out of curiousity...why are you on this thread?

[spectre]

Tsk, tsk, Kimmie...did you pull that picture up from your Male Hooters porno collection?

sw

[MizSterious]

No, actually I'm delighted that it's nearly over. For one thing, I won't have to put up with whiners and crybabies as much on other threads (these Westerfield threads seem to draw them like blowflies). For another--yes, I have been very interested in it, and you should be too, if you value your civil liberties. Watching this trial has been an education in what law enforcement should and should not do. And finally, if this is such a horrible subject, what on earth are you doing here?

[shezza]

Ping! Summons for "jury duty" in five minutes.

[pinz-n-needlez]

All these socked or missing left feet are giving me the willies.

Damon living near-by makes my hair stand on end!

[Green]

curiousity = Curiosity