Separate Juries Will Hear Trial of 2 Accused of Slaying Officer

When testimony begins this week in Van Nuys Superior Court in the trial of two men accused of gunning down a Los Angeles police detective, attorneys and witnesses will be speaking to two juries at the same time--one for each defendant.

In a cumbersome and fairly uncommon procedure, one panel will be seated in the jury box while the other will be cordoned off in an area normally reserved for spectators. They will change places each week.

One panel will deliberate in the jury room, the other in a lounge behind the cafeteria. Sometimes, testimony intended for the ears of only one jury will force the other jury to leave the courtroom.

Keeping track of which panel hears which testimony creates confusion, say defense attorneys, who requested both juries. But, they say, it is better than having only one jury hear a complicated murder that involves the death penalty--especially when one defendant appears more at fault than the other.

“There can be guilt by association,” said attorney Michael V. White, who is defending Ruben A. (Tony) Moss, 26, on charges of murder and conspiracy to commit murder in the October, 1985, ambush slaying of Detective Thomas C. Williams.

Moss’ co-defendant in the trial is Daniel S. Jenkins, 32, who also is charged with murder and conspiracy to commit murder.

A trial will be held later for three other men--Duane Moody, 30, Voltaire Williams, 25, and Reecy Cooper, 33--accused in Williams’ murder. Prosecutors said they are not seeking the death penalty against those three, who also are charged with murder and conspiracy to commit murder.

A sixth man arrested in the Williams murder, David Bentley, was granted immunity for his testimony, prosecutors said.

Saves Time, Money

Although impaneling two juries for a single trial is not precedent-setting, it is unusual and done primarily in multiple-defendant, death-penalty cases. It saves time and money and allows witnesses needed for both trials to make fewer court appearances, prosecutors and other legal experts said.

“In the last five years, several trials have been conducted this way, but that’s from zero to several,” UCLA law professor Peter Arenella said. “It’s gone from never having been done before to a few judges willing to do it in some judicial districts throughout the country.”

Last year two juries were impaneled in Los Angeles for a murder trial that stemmed from the 1984 robbery and shoot-out at Jin Hing jewelry store in Chinatown that left one police officer and two robbers dead. That trial is continuing. Sang Nam Chinh and Hau Cheong (Peter) Chan, defendants in the case, could face the death penalty.

There also were two San Fernando Superior Court juries in the 1984 murder trial of Manghit Singh Jandu and Kelly Lee Morgan, who were accused of killing real estate broker Ronald Colton in October, 1982. One jury convicted Morgan of first-degree murder. The second jury split 9 to 3 in favor of acquitting Jandu.

Jandu was tried again and convicted of second-degree murder. A third defendant, Herman Parrish, was convicted of first-degree murder in a 1983 trial.

Opening statements in the trial of Jenkins and Moss are scheduled to begin today. Both defendants face the death penalty if they are convicted of killing Williams, 42, who worked in the Los Angeles Police Department’s North Hollywood Division.

Williams was hit seven times by machine-pistol fire outside the Faith Baptist Church and day-care center in Canoga Park as he picked up his 6-year-old son from school. The boy was not injured.

The slaying occurred several hours after Williams had testified against Jenkins at his trial for the October, 1984, holdup of theater manager George Carpenter. Police said revenge was the motive for the slaying. Jenkins was convicted of armed robbery in that case and sentenced to eight years in prison.

It has taken more than three months to impanel juries for the murder trial of Jenkins and Moss. Between 700 and 800 men and women were screened before the 12 jurors and six alternates for each panel were selected. The remainder of the trial is expected to last an additional six months.

Defense attorneys initially sought to have Moss and Jenkins tried separately but Superior Court Judge Judith M. Ashmann refused. However, she granted each defendant his own jury because there were some differences, including an additional charge against Jenkins for the attempted murder of Carpenter.

Carpenter was shot in the face in July, 1985, after he identified Jenkins as the man who robbed him in October, 1984.

“We want our jury to decide based on evidence involving Mr. Moss,” defense attorney White said. “Our fear is they may not feel the case against Mr. Moss is strong, but that the case against Jenkins is--that he is a bad guy, therefore Moss must be a bad guy.”

sh Jury Asked to Leave

The Moss jury will be asked to leave the courtroom during some testimony that involves only Jenkins, but there are risks that jurors will hear something they shouldn’t or draw conclusions about why they are being asked to leave the room, attorneys said.

“They understand this is very unusual,” Arenella said. “They know there’s something going on they’re not supposed to hear. The really appropriate way of handling prejudice is to have separate trials. What’s being done here is an awkward compromise. It saves resources, but it is an awkward compromise.”

Attorney Howard R. Price, who is defending Jenkins, said the two-jury compromise will help keep the lawyer for one defendant from blaming the other defendant for the crime.

He said it also will ensure that the fate of each defendant is individually considered and will prevent jurors from facing the prospect of putting more than one man to death.

“That is too much of a burden for the average person,” Price said.

But prosecutors contend that a defendant’s constitutional right to individualized consideration by a jury does not mean they have a right to individual juries.

“The jury must decide separately whether each of the defendants is guilty or not,” Deputy Dist. Atty. William Gravlin argued in court documents. “The court may instruct the jury that evidence has been admitted against one defendant and not the other, or a statement by one defendant is not evidence against the co-defendant.”

Noting that both men are charged with conspiracy, Gravlin added: “It would be naive not to concede that the jury will realize on its own that not all of the conspirators were equally involved. It will be obvious to the jury that defendant Jenkins, in comparison to the other conspirators, including Moss, was the most culpable. The evidence, in fact, will show that defendant Jenkins was at the hub of the conspiracy. He was the ringleader.”

Times staff writer Gabe Fuentes contributed to this story.