Trial Journal Entries Dear Journal,

¶ … Trial

Journal Entries

Dear Journal,

This will be my first entry. I have begun to visit the Union County Courthouse in New Jersey to follow a murder trial that is taking place there.

The trial was regarding a man who had allegedly murdered his wife. This was my first time on jury duty and as it turned out, I got to sit in on a murder trial. As I sat in the court room, I tried to remember if I had heard anything about the case on the news, but I hadn't. The truth is, I don't keep up with the news as much as I should. I'm not much of a newspaper reader and if someone I know doesn't tell me about it, I likely won't hear about it.

It seems that the victim went missing several months ago. The police suspected the man who was on trial, but had no body. Her body had just recently been discovered and her death was no accident. The couple lived not far from here in a nice neighborhood. They had a 10-year-old daughter and were living a relatively modest life. The Prosecutor made claims that the wife had been murdered over a life insurance policy, labeling the husband as a cold-hearted, calculating man who had a history of mental disturbances.

The Prosecutor's was a young man, sharply dressed, who seemed to have his stuff together. I don't remember the defense attorney's name, but he was an older man with thinning hair and thick glasses. Even across the court room, I could see the deep lines etched in his forehead. There was something about him that made me want to believe him.

The Prosecutor's opening statement was strong. He made me want to believe that the husband was guilty. Equally so, the defense attorney was also very convincing. I can see how this trial is going to be difficult. I noted that the defense attorney doesn't seem to have the same confidence that the Prosecutor has, though I would consider neither opening statement to be weak.

December 31, 1991

I know that there is going to be a lot of interesting stuff, but it comes with a lot of boring stuff too and sometimes the attorneys were hard to follow and pay attention to. I tried to listen closely, because it occurred to me that a man's life was on trial here.

Today I heard a lot about the couple's personal life. The wife, who is now dead, was a teacher in the area (right now I can't remember where). To hear it from the Prosecutor, she was loved by everyone, a well-respected local who all the kids knew and loved. I guess she taught fifth grade. Hearing about her teaching life made me think of being in fifth grade. I'm going off subject again. Today the prosecutor was dressed in a sharp black suit. The defense attorney was dressed in a gray suit. I don't know why I noted this, but I did. Today I was looking at everyone. The juror next to me was dressed in red, bright red, which I thought was odd. Everyone on the jury seemed bored and I wondered if we would all come to a decision in the end.

I wondered how many of these trials the judge had sat and listened to. I still didn't understand the concept of a judge sitting and listening to a trial, but not making the final decision. This had always bothered me about jury trials. The husband was also considered to be an upstanding citizen in the community, but the prosecutor describes him as having a dark past. That's all I have to write today, but I'll be interested in hearing more about the husband's "dark past" later on in the trial.

January 1, 1992

There wasn't a lot that I remember about the trial today. I spent a lot of time watching the defendant. I thought about his 10-year-old daughter, and wondered how she was fairing with both her parents currently gone. I tried not to identify with their family too much, because I wanted to hear everything through the trial and make up my mind at the end.

The husband looked bored today, I noted, which I thought was odd for someone who was on trial for murder. I wondered if he was as bored as I felt. It took me two days to get up the nerve to even look at him. I wanted to make a point of doing so, so that I could determine more about him from looking at him, but I felt ashamed at the idea of staring at him and something about it made me feel self-conscious. I never enjoyed making eye contact with people and sitting on the jury meant a lot of people were constantly staring at me, so in a sense, I felt on trial too.

My mind drifted today and I must admit that I am not overly familiar with all of the "technical" terms associated with a trial. Whoever is reading this, if anyone ever does, must ignore my lack of legal terminology and simply bare with me.

I've also come to realize that I probably won't be able to write every day. I'm handwriting everything and transferring it to my laptop later; when the trial is over. I'm already getting tired of sitting here. With the interesting stuff, comes the really boring stuff and the lawyer mumbo-jumbo and to be honest, it gets boring. So much so that sometimes I stop listening and then tune back in only to realize that they suddenly are talking about something that I do find extremely interesting.

January 2, 1992

We're almost to the end of the week and I'm wondering how many times I'm going to change my mind about the defendant. Today the prosecutor talked more about the dark side of the husband. I was appalled at some of the information that was presented. I told myself that some of it couldn't be true and I realized that the prosecutor was simply trying to establish him as a negative influence that could have easily killed his wife.

In 1989, a neighbor claimed that her cat had disappeared and that the defendant was to blame. Apparently the cat was constantly defecating in the couple's flower garden and it was something the neighbors argued about constantly. After months of complaints, the cat simply disappeared. The neighbor swore up and down that the husband was behind the disappearance of her cat.

Another witness on the stand was the cousin of the murder victim. It occurred to me that this may not be a good witness because of the fact that her cousin was dead. The two had grown up together and it seems they were close, best friends. She talked about the daughter, and the things she had seen.

Their child was 10, as I mentioned before. The murder victim's cousin had played an active role in the child's life. Their kids played together after school every day and they all lived just a few streets away from each other. It was a relatively safe neighborhood, one of the nicer areas around. The cousin claimed that the defendant was volatile and angry, always brooding. She talked about one time in particular when the daughter didn't make it home from school when the defendant thought she should. He was "raging" mad, as the cousin of the murder victim described. There was a lot of yelling and she hadn't seen him specifically do anything to the girl, but she felt he had to be abusing the child behind closed doors and sometimes suspect of him abusing his wife as well. There was no proof of this legally, or none that I had been shown as of yet.

January 6, 1992

Today we heard more about the murder. It was interesting. I will be the first to admit that I spend hours in front of the TV watching lawyer shows. This murder trial was a little different than how I thought it would be. There was a lot of information about how her body was recovered and what they found. As I mentioned, the victim had disappeared months before; 10 months, to be exact. Sometime in March of 1991, she left school and allegedly never made it home. The prosecutor argued that she did make it home, but that her husband had murdered her, and had disposed of the body .

Of course, the defendant had reported his wife missing that night, but the police could do nothing until she had been gone for at least 24 hours and only then could a missing report be filed. Police exhausted every avenue, including the idea that an unhappy wife had simply run away from home, but the defendant and his family continued to claim that that would never have happened and that something terrible must have happened to the beloved teacher.

Her body had been discovered by a small body of water. A family had been walking along the water front when the mother noticed some animals running away from a brush pile next to the water. Upon further investigation, they saw what appeared to be a human hand sticking out of the pile. The family ran away and phoned the police.

It had been months since the wife, mother and teacher had disappeared and it looked like she had been dead since the night she first went missing. Since she had disappeared last winter, it looked like someone may have stored her body in some type of freezer and had then moved her to the water hore in the hopes that no one would discover her body until spring. This was one idea that the police had, at least.

Her body was remarkably intact, but it was clear that she had been murdered. The evidence showed that sexual intercourse had recently taken place just before her death. DNA samples were inconclusive and the defense argued that it was not common for the couple to be using condoms as a form of birth control, because the wife had been taking birth control pills. It stood to reason that if she had been having sex with her husband, his DNA would have been present. I could see where this theory was going next. The defense attorney held strong to the idea that the murder victim had been sleeping around on her husband. This made him even more of a suspect in her death, but it also meant that someone else could have been responsible for killing her.

The evidence also showed that she had been hit in the head at least three or four times with a blunt object, which the police had yet to figure out and then shot twice, once in the chest and once in the forehead. From what the police could tell, she had been stashed away in a freezer and had been moved this past winter. I'm getting tired, so I'm going to end this journal entry, but today, I'm siding with the prosecution.

January 9, 1992

Today we heard from some sort of police expert who talked a lot about the victim's injuries. He talked about the bullet that entered her brain. Even after the first bullet, which entered her chest, and the repeated blows to her head, she hadn't been dead. This second bullet hadn't killed her either, but it must have appeared to the attacker that it had, or whoever did it, simply didn't care. She died after being stuffed into the freezer, but I'm unclear as to how long she lived in there for.

It was rough for me hearing about her death today. I had heard details before earlier in the trial, but the way this man described her death made it more real for me. By now, I wasn't sure what to believe. I was aware of the fact that the defendant would be speaking on his own behalf soon and I looked forward to hearing about it. The prosecution did a good job making the defendant look bad, but the defense attorney did an equally good job in his arguments. At first, the information that was presented to me closer to the beginning of the trial seemed to do a good job at depicting the husband as a crazy, dark and brooding father who was abusive to both his wife and his daughter. The defense did a good job in explaining a lot of it away and I found myself seeing both sides.

January 14, 1992

Today, the defendant took the stand and I know we are nearing the end of the trial. I will need to make a decision and so will all of the other jurors. After hearing the evidence up until his interview, I felt like there was the possibility that he may not have committed the crime. Today, after hearing him speak, I wasn't so sure. I do know that this trial is going on longer than anticipated. I know it's a murder trial, but I thought it would be over sooner. I think attorneys will be wrapping up the trial soon, from what I can tell. They keep saying things like, "as we come to the close of the trial" and things of that nature.

The defendant is an interesting character. He is very believable. I considered the fact that it must be difficult taking the stand at your wife's murder trial. If you show too much emotion, people might think that you are playing it up in an attempt to sway the jury your way and make people think that you are not a murderer. On the other hand, if you show no emotion whatsoever, people will question this and assume that you are guilty.

Other Impressions Important to the Case

The defendant is an attractive man, I noted and he appears to have loved his wife. As he sat there talking about their life together, I found it hard to believe that he was a murderer is sitting before me. He rarely looked at the jury and it occurred to me that he hardly ever does in general. If I were standing on trial, I think I would want to occasionally make eye contact with the people who could free me or put my away.

I wanted to believe that he didn't do it, but something he said while he was on trial bothered me. I've been struggling with it all day and wondered if it bothered the other jurors as well. He said that his marriage was simple. What an odd thing to say. Still, not enough to prove that the man is a murderer. My mind is pushing me to believe that he is a murderer and that he did it, but I intend to listen closely to the end of the trial and will write again when it is over.

Evaluation of the Direct Examination

The direct examination was interesting. My observation of the defendant was that he was confident and much to relaxed; this bothered me. This is where the other witness statements and interviews came into play and a lot of questions were answered by the defendant. The prosecution went first, asking questions in an attempt to make his case stronger. He did a good job and his questions made me consider the prosecution seriously. By the time the prosecutor was done, I felt I had a clear understanding of the defendant and questions were raised in my mind regarding whether or not he truly had killed his wife.