Tuffree Murder Trial Jury Selection May Drag Into Next Week

Officially, Monday marked the 18th day of the Daniel Allen Tuffree murder trial.

And for the 18th consecutive court day, no testimony was heard, no evidence submitted and the usual big trial courtroom crowd was nowhere to be found.

Instead the day was again consumed by questioning of prospective jurors, a process that will probably last into next week.

It is a tedious and sometimes too-intimate process. One juror Monday was excused after confiding that she suffers from irritable bowel syndrome and could not comfortably sit on a panel for long stretches.

But lawyers for both sides agree that the special care given to selecting this jury is necessary to ensure a proper trial.

Defense attorney Richard Holly has often said that jury selection is the most important aspect of this trial.

Tuffree is charged with murdering Simi Valley Police Officer Michael Clark last August. Tuffree has pleaded not guilty and maintains that Clark and his colleagues share responsibility for the fatal shooting.

The glacial pace of jury selection, though slower than expected, is proceeding quicker than most capital cases brought in Los Angeles courthouses.

And even compared to other death penalty cases in Ventura County, the Tuffree trial is moving swiftly, mostly because the jailed high school teacher has demanded at every turn his constitutional guarantee to a speedy trial.

The Mark Scott Thornton murder case, for instance, took nearly two years to complete and ended when a jury recommended in May 1995 that Thornton be put to death for the kidnap and slaying of Westlake nurse Kellie O’Sullivan.

Tuffree’s case is expected to last half that long, with testimony now scheduled to start in the middle of July.

Still, the lawyers and judge in the Tuffree case have fallen two weeks behind a schedule set earlier this year as they take extraordinary pains to seat responsible jurors who can afford to put their lives on hold for the estimated six months the trial is expected to last.

Monday was originally scheduled to be the final day of jury instructions. But summer vacations, daily court business and the painstaking Hovey process--in which more than 500 prospective jurors will be questioned individually about their views on the death penalty and other issues--have conspired to slow the trial.

Even the start of another day of interviewing was delayed Monday, when the morning calendar of routine criminal matters took longer than expected and the mother of prospective juror No. 437 called the court to say her son would be unable to participate in the day’s proceedings because of “medical stress.”

For 30 minutes the telephone call and the juror’s reluctance to answer his summons were discussed until a frustrated Superior Court Judge Allan L. Steele decided the matter.

“Tell him to honor his summons or I will send a sheriff to arrest him and bring him here,” Steele told his assistant.

With that, the first prospective juror of the day was called into the courtroom at about 10:30 a.m. and spent 30 minutes on the witness stand answering questions about his political views of criminal justice and the death penalty.

All the while, a jury consultant hired by Tuffree’s public defenders jotted notes on yellow Post-It notes and passed them on to the lawyers.

Five more prospective jurors were added to a pool that will total more than 100 by July 8, when final jury selection is scheduled to begin. Best-guess estimates by lawyers put opening statements in the third week of July. Four months of testimony is expected to follow.

If the jury unanimously agrees with prosecutors that Tuffree planned to kill Clark before pulling the trigger and that Clark was performing lawfully as a police officer, then a second phase of the trial will begin a month later.

During the second, penalty phase, jurors would be asked to decide if Tuffree should spend the rest of his life in prison or be sentenced to death.

Individual interviews with prospective jurors resume today.