Day 12: Potential juror disqualified from jury pool for lying

COBB COUNTY, Ga. — Lawyers in the Ross Harris trial may be just a day or two away from having enough jurors to begin the trial.

Harris is accused of intentionally leaving his 2-year-old son, Cooper, to die in a hot car for more than seven hours in June 2014. %

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Thursday morning, Judge Staley had approved 38 jurors of the 42 needed to begin the trial. But they took a step back in the afternoon when Staley kicked one juror, who had already been qualified, out of the jury pool because he allegedly lied on his juror questionnaire. The number of qualified jurors now sits at 37.

Jury selection has been going on for two weeks as lawyers question potential jurors about whether they can be fair and impartial, something that has been difficult to find because of the high profile nature of the case.

“I guess it’s something, I haven’t been in this situation before. You hope that you can do that, but you have no idea if that’s what you can do,” one juror told lawyers.

If the schedule holds true, the potential jurors questioned Thursday should be among the last few individually questioned before a jury pool is finalized.

After the pool is finalized, both the defense and prosecutors get nine strikes to remove jurors they don’t believe will be a good fit for the trial.

“You have to decide who is the worst out of the worst,” said attorney Ashleigh Merchant, who is not involved in the case. “It’s really a process of deselection where you’re deciding who can I not live with on this jury and that’s who you use your nine strikes on.”

Merchant says the defense has a steeper hill to climb because the majority of the potential jurors questioned already indicated one way or another that Harris is at fault for his son’s death.

“In this case they already have decided guilt it sounds like and so they’re having to work against that,” Merchant said.

Jury selection will continue Friday morning.

Cox Media Group