Citing stress, jurors in Stevens trial exit early

With Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens’ fate and possibly the outcome of his reelection race in the balance, jurors in his Washington corruption trial declared themselves stressed out after a few hours of deliberations Wednesday and went home early.

Four hours after U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan declared, “The case is yours,” the eight women and four men passed the judge a note.

Things had become “kind of stressful,” jurors said, and they asked to go home for some “clarity.”

They left without reaching a verdict.

Stevens, 84, is charged with lying on Senate financial disclosure forms about $250,000 in home renovations and other gifts he allegedly received from his friend Bill Allen, a millionaire oil contractor.

Stevens, the longest-serving Senate Republican, is locked in an unusually tight race with Anchorage Mayor Mark Begich.

Democrats are trying to capture a filibuster-proof Senate majority, and they have jumped at the chance to wrest control of a seat Stevens has held for almost 40 years.

Republicans, meanwhile, have handled the situation delicately.

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the GOP vice presidential nominee, has refused to endorse Stevens. And Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.), chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, has said the election and trial are linked.

“If the trial comes to a conclusion and, as he believes, that he is found innocent, I think that he will win that election up there,” Ensign said Tuesday.

“If it goes the other way, obviously it really won’t matter what happens in the election.”

Indicted in July, just three months before the election, Stevens gambled and asked for a speedy trial, hoping he’d be exonerated in time to win his seat. But the monthlong trial has been hard on Stevens’ image.

Testimony revealed that employees of oil services company VECO Corp. transformed the senator’s house from a small mountain A-frame into a handsome, two-story house with wraparound porches.

Prosecutors mocked the legendary Senate figure as a phony who for years has had his hand out for favors.

Stevens has said he paid every bill he received for the renovation and believed that all the work was included.