MINNEAPOLIS — Jury selection resumes Monday at 9 a.m. There are currently 13 jurors seated for the State vs. Derek Chauvin trial.
Selection for 14 jurors, two of them alternates, began Tuesday, March 9.
At the close of court on Friday, Judge Peter Cahill said the court would try to find two additional jurors putting the total count at 15.
KARE 11 confirmed through sources that the reason for that is in case they lose a juror for some unforeseen reason prior to opening statements beginning March 29.
"In this time frame until next week and throughout the trial, people will be looking at their social media posts to see whether jurors are actually following or at least not posting about this," said Mary Moriarty, former chief public defender for Hennepin County. "I had a trial once where we became aware during deliberations that one of the jurors had gone out to the scene, it was a murder trial, and he had gone out to the scene to do some investigation, which is not allowed. So you never know. The judge orders jurors to not do any investigation, to stay away from media attention. In this case, as we've seen, it's really hard."
Last Wednesday, Cahill dismissed two jurors after they said the city's $27 million civil settlement with George Floyd's family influenced their impartiality.
On Friday, the judge ruled that Chauvin's trial will not be delayed or moved to another venue — a request from the defense after the city's settlement announcement.
"I agree with the judge. Where would you find some place in Minnesota where you could find people who hadn't heard of this case?" Moriarty said.
Moriarty added, "The question for each... prospective juror has been, 'Even though you are aware of that, can you set that information aside and base your decision just on what you hear that's evidence in this case?' And every person who is on the jury panel has said that they could do that. Whether they can, who knows."
Also on Friday, Cahill ruled that some officer body camera footage from George Floyd's May 2019 arrest will be allowed.
"The judge is really going to limit that and really not allow the defense to argue anything about George Floyd's character. He is just going to allow that to be used to go to the relevance, if any, of cause of death," Moriarty said.
The judge is also not allowing testimony from a forensic psychiatrist for the prosecution.
The jury currently consists of five white women, two white men, two multiracial women, one Black woman and three Black men.
"It's remarkably diverse," Moriarty said. "We typically do not have jurors with that much diversity."
While that may be the case, Moriarty said the livestream of the trial has brought up some conversations around suggested reforms to the jury selection process.
For example, potential juror #76 is a Black man who lives near the area of 38th and Chicago — the location of Floyd's death — and who had some lived experienced with the Minneapolis Police Department. According to this man, after a Black man was killed, MPD drove by playing "Another One Bites the Dust."
He was dismissed after the defense used a strike against him.
"If we say that you cannot remove a juror from race but we're trying to separate the idea of race from lived experience, I think that that's problematic. So people have been able to see issues like that come up and they've been able to see for themselves who is considered to be a fair juror or an impartial juror," Moriarty said.
While Moriarty still has some concerns about the trial being livestreamed, ultimately, she believes it's allowing the public exposure to a part of the trial that most people never see.
Jury selection resumes Monday at 9 a.m. Even if all jurors are selected early this week, opening statements will not begin until March 29.