Tedious Court Process Probes Minds of Jurors : Citizens who will try accused Night Stalker represent a cross-section of a community that felt the terror of the alleged crimes.

During the last six weeks, 1,581 Los Angeles County residents have filed into a windowless courtroom downtown to be considered for a central role in what Superior Court Judge Michael A. Tynan says may be “a significant, if not an indelible, event” in their lives.

Ultimately, 24 of them will be selected to serve as jurors and alternates in the proceeding known as People vs. Richard Ramirez--the Night Stalker case.

In keeping with the much-delayed case, now entering its fourth year, the multiphase jury selection process is not expected to be completed before early next year. But with little notice, it is progressing at a faster pace than first expected, and the initial stage ended last week.

Once the 24 jurors and alternates are sworn in, prosecutors will deliver their opening statements and the first witness will take the stand.

The defendant, a 28-year-old drifter from El Paso, is charged with murdering 13 Southern California residents in a series of nighttime attacks that also left many others injured. If convicted, he could get the death penalty.

It was on a hot Saturday morning of Labor Day Weekend in 1985 that a panic-stricken Ramirez was captured by East Los Angeles residents as he tried to commandeer a getaway car.

Last week, the lanky, pale Ramirez, his feet shackled, sat through yet another court appearance at the defense table, looking bored in Tynan’s near-empty courtroom as the judge, the prosecutors and his defense lawyer questioned prospective jurors singly, probing for hidden prejudices. Lately, Ramirez has taken to wearing sunglasses, along with his customary all-black outfit.

Seeking Truth

Known as voir dire (French for “to speak the truth”), the process may seem tedious, yet the long hours of repetitive questioning have yielded fascinating insights into the psychology of a community that was gripped by fear three summers ago.

Or was it?

No one has kept a precise tally, but a surprisingly large number of prospective jurors who lived in the county at the time have said they do not remember talking to co-workers, friends, neighbors or family members about the killings--and that they did not bother to lock their doors or windows at night. (The Night Stalker typically entered his victims’ homes through an unlocked door or window.)

One woman, for instance, said she and her husband took no security precautions whatsoever and added that she knew of no one who did.

This may seem all the more surprising since gun sales in Los Angeles County that August doubled and many hardware stores and home repair outlets reported runs on locks and window bars. But many on the jury panel have said they rarely read a newspaper or watch television news.

Too Well Informed

It is the well-informed prospective jurors who represent the clearest problems for the judge and the lawyers. Take the very first person to be interviewed July 21. She was a resident of the San Gabriel Valley, where several crimes were attributed to the Night Stalker.

She said she has a friend who lived on the same street as one of the victims, as well as another friend who knows the Stalker’s two Orange County victims.

It would be “difficult” for her to sit as an impartial juror in the case, she admitted, saying she believed strongly that Ramirez is guilty of the crimes with which he is charged. The woman was excused.

A Burbank man said he began locking his windows at night during the crimes. But he said he had formed “no opinion” as to Ramirez’s guilt or innocence, adding that his windows are “still closed.” He passed the first hurdle.

As Tynan told the prospective jurors last week: “Some people have come through here and . . . have felt that Mr. Ramirez is guilty, but they’ve been a little reluctant to admit that. We must know the truth. And if you have already made up your mind in this case, you must tell us, and that is just part of your oath of being a juror. You are not letting us down and you are not letting yourselves down and you are not letting the system down if you tell us what the truth is and that’s all we are asking.”

During the first phase of voir dire, which ended Thursday afternoon, up to 80 prospective jurors were brought in daily. The jocular Tynan first briefly described the case, and then asked people to step forward one at a time to state why they might not be able to serve for up to two years, the projected outer limit of the trial’s duration.

‘Hardship’ Factor

The most frequently cited “hardship” was financial. Many employers pay only a few weeks of a worker’s salary during jury service. Some pay for more, but few pay for unlimited time periods. Los Angeles County pays jurors $5 a day.

Health was another reason for being excused.

Vacations? “We can probably schedule around that,” he said. Full-time students were also excused. So was a health-care worker who said her patients would suffer from her prolonged absence.

One woman told the judge that it would be a hardship for her to serve because she cares for both an elderly mother and a toddler at home. Either reason would do, Tynan told her with a grin, adding: “Which one do you want to use?”

Those who survive past the hardship test were then questioned--one at a time--by Tynan and the lawyers as to whether they have already made up their minds about Ramirez’s guilt or innocence, given the intense publicity surrounding the case.

Time Limit Imposed

One Tynan decision that sped things along in the first phase was a 10-minute limit on each side for interviewing a prospective juror. San Jose lawyer Daniel Hernandez, who is representing Ramirez, has protested that restriction, but to no avail. And by the time Hernandez was done questioning a prospective juror, he pretty much had exhaustively probed the issues, leaving co-prosecutors Phil Halpin and Alan Yochelson for the most part with nothing left to ask.

The prospective jurors were admonished or cajoled by the judge not to discuss their potential involvement in the case with anyone--even at home.

By the end of last week, 296 prospective jurors were set to go on to the next step, the so-called Hovey phase, which is named after a case in which the state Supreme Court required the individual questioning of prospective jurors about their views on the death penalty.

The 296 represent a “good cross-section of the community--whites, blacks, Chicanos and Asians,” said Hernandez, who is being assisted by Pasadena jury consultant Jo-Ellan Huebner-Dimitrius. Among them are many civil servants and some retirees, he said.

These jurors have filled out a 16-page questionnaire, prepared by both sides and the judge, that seeks detailed personal information and views on a variety of subjects in addition to capital punishment. Such information is to be used as guidance in the selection process.

High ‘Yield’ Noted

Early on, Tynan was telling the jury panels that the Hovey portion of jury selection probably would not begin until late October or early November. But given the high “yield” of prospective jurors who have passed the hardship and publicity hurdles, Tynan now has scheduled the first death penalty interviews for Sept. 26.

The final phase is the so-called general voir dire, during which the attorneys can be expected to question jurors in great detail. This phase may begin in December.

The meticulous procedure, Tynan conceded, is “time consuming and exacting.” But there also have been moments of levity bordering on the hilarious.

Courtroom personnel are still chuckling over one prospective juror who appeared last week. She was a rather large and exuberant archeologist who bounded into court on Tuesday to announce that, when she got home the previous day, there was a $10,000 check in the mail--from a publisher to write a book. But that undertaking would require extensive travel, making her participation in the trial a hardship, she rued.

“Don’t take this as an insult, and I don’t mean it as a insult,” Tynan said with a disarming smile. “But you’re the last person I would think would be publishing a book on archeology or antiquities or anything else.”

The woman didn’t miss a beat.

“It’s because of the size of me? If I got down in some of those little spaces they’d have to have a derrick to pull this part out,” she said, patting her formidable backside. “And then as they pull this part out, you know what they would get out? There’d be this big lady’s ass--pardon me, rear--standing in one of these tombs and one of these poor kings in the Valley of the Kings is going to roll over in his crypt and say: ‘I’m coming out for that?!’ ”

The woman was excused.