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[ceebeegee]

The Peterson jury has reached a verdict--they'll announce it at 4:00 pm.

Personally, I think the guy's guilty--but I also think he'll get off. The white O.J. OTOH, the fact that they had to start deliberations again today, and they reached one so quickly gives hope--quick verdicts I believe usually indicate a guilty verdict.

Comments

[ceebeegee.livejournal.com]

They had to replace two jurors during deliberations,w hich meant they had to start deliberating all over again, I'm very interested to know why. Since they technically started deliberations from point zero again today (the second juror was tossed on Wednesday, I believe), they reached a guilty verdict very quickly. My guess is that the holdouts were being unreasonable--not sure what the legal standard for that is but I've heard jurors accused of that before, when they can't quantify their argument for a particular verdict.

[mysticblaze.livejournal.com]

One juror was tossed for doing research on the case in violation of the jury instructions (since they are only supposed to consider the evidence that was presented at trial and admitted properly). The judge has not released the reason for dismissing the foreman, who had degrees in law and medicine.

Any deliberation that contained a disqualified juror is deemed tainted, and the new juror would not have been present for it. As such, it was necessary to start deliberations over with each new juror that was brought in. It would not have had anything to do with a holdout juror- if a unanimous verdict is necessary and there is a holdout, a mistrial would have been declared and the case would be tried again.

[ceebeegee.livejournal.com]

Oh, I know all that. My guess had to do with why the second juror was tossed, not why they reached a verdict so quickly. Although when they reach a new verdict so quickly with the third round of deliberations, it's certainly reasonable to assume most of the the old jurors have pretty much decided on a verdict, regardless of whether they're supposed to start at point zero every time they begin again.