The Connecticut home invasion murder trial was nearly scuttled today by a flirty female alternate juror who got caught trying to pass a napkin “mash” note to a male court officer.
“Pardon my French, but this was a god-d—ed dumb thing to do,” New Haven Superior Court Judge Jon Blue told the red-faced alternate first thing this morning, scolding her genially but keeping her on the panel, according to the Hartford Courant.
The alternate — who is the only alternate remaining after a series of juror dismissals over the past three months — had scrawled the words “Sunday 5pm. Side Street Grill. Hamden” on a napkin.
On Friday, she attempted to pass it to another juror who would forward it to a court officer, according to the Courant — only to have a clerk step in and intercept it.
The note incident was revealed today at the start of Day 9 of testimony to determine whether Steven Hayes should get the death penalty for murdering Connecticut nurse Jennifer Hawke-Petit and her daughters Hayley, 17, and Michaela, 11.
Defense lawyers immediately seized on the napkin as reason to dismiss the alternate entirely — leaving no fallback should any of the 12 jurors be unable to continue through closing arguments and deliberations this week.
Defense lawyer Thomas Ullmann complained the alternate’s “emotional attachment” to the officer clearly demonstrated she “was obviously not focusing her attention on the case. “She is as good a juror as one would want,” countered prosecutor Michael Dearington, arguing she’d always appeared to pay attention.
The judge did agree the note was a “spectacular” display of poor judgement. But once the alternate insisted under the judge’s questioning she has been, and will remain, impartial, the judge ruled he’d keep her — though he said he might revisit the issue should she become an actual juror.
“Frankly, we need you,” the judge told her.
The unnamed officer — court officers are called “marshals” in Connecticut — has been reassigned.
“All of us are fully persuaded that the marshal is a fully innocent,” the judge said.
Hayes was convicted October 5 of strangling and raping the mom, and of joining with co-defendant Joshua Komisarjevski in tying the two girls to their beds, dousing them with gasoline and burning them alive.
Closings in the three-week-long death penalty phase are expected Thursday. Jurors must weigh mitigating and aggravating factors in deciding whether to send Hayes to the death chamber under Connecticut’s capital punishment law.