Journal on "Observation of the Trial"

Journal 10 pages (3175 words) Sources: 0

[EXCERPT] . . . .

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.… READ MORE

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