3.Venire Qualification and Panel Assignment

THE COURT: All right, ladies and gentlemen of the jury panel or venire, the State has called its case to be presented for trial. Mr. Jones has asked for a trial, we are going to proceed with selection of a jury for that trial as we go forward. Now, I am going to read the indictments for the record. I want to explain several things to you as we go. The indictments have been presented to the Lexington County Grand Jury and first and foremost, indictments are noticed documents. When a person is accused of a crime they have got to be provided notice of exactly what they are being accused of. The indictment process is that notice to a person accused. Now, I am going to publish the indictments, I am going to introduce the lawyers and I am going to go over a few questions with you as we go forward and then later on we will divide up into little smaller groups to go forward from there to ask more specific questions as to your knowledge of the facts of the case and such as that.

First indictment is 188, 2015-GS-32-188. The State alleges that Timothy Ray Jones in Lexington County between the dates of August 28th and 29th of 2014 did unlawfully, willfully, feloniously with malice aforethought kill the victim, Merah Gracie Jones by means of strangulation or other violent means or instruments. The victim died as a result between August 28th and 29th of '14 in Lexington County as approximate result thereof in violation 16-3-10 of the South Carolina Code of Laws. Indictment 15-GS-32-189. The State of South Carolina alleges that Timothy Ray Jones, Jr. did in Lexington County on or between August 28th and 29th of 2014 did unlawfully, willfully, feloniously with malice aforethought kill the victim, Elias Jones by means of strangulation and or violent means or instruments and the victim died between, on or between August 28th and 29th of '14 in Lexington County as approximate result thereof in violation of section 16-3-10 of the South Carolina Code of Laws.

Indictment 15-GS-32-, indictment 190. The indictment alleges that Timothy Ray Jones, Jr. did in Lexington County on or between August 28th and 29th of '14 unlawfully, willfully, feloniously and with malice aforethought kill the victim, Abigail Jones by means of strangulation and or other violent means or instruments and the victim died on or between August 28th and 29th of 2014 in Lexington County as approximate result thereof in violation of section 16-3-10 of the South Carolina Code of Laws. Indictment 15-GS-32-, indictment 191. Timothy Ray Jones, Jr., it is alleged that in Lexington County on or between August 28th and 29th of '14, he did unlawfully, willfully, feloniously and with malice aforethought kill the victim, Gabriel Jones by means of strangulation and or other violent means or instruments and the victim died on or between August 28th and 29th of '14 in Lexington County as approximate result thereof in violation of section 16-3-10 of the South Carolina Code of Laws.

And lastly, indictment 15-GS-32-, indictment 195. It is alleged by the State that Timothy Ray Jones, Jr. did in Lexington County, on or between August 28th and 29th of 2014, did unlawfully, willfully, feloniously and with malice aforethought kill the victim, Nahthan Jones by hitting or striking the victim or by causing physical exhaustion by mortally injuring or causing injuries to the victim by means of instruments unknown and or by unknown means of wanton, reckless disregard for human life and the victim died as a result on or between August 28th and 29th of 2014 in Lexington County as approximate result thereof in violation of section 16-3-10 of the Code of Laws of South Carolina. Those are the indictments presented by the State to the Court for the trial to be called. Mr. Jones has asked for a jury trial. We are ready to proceed with that. The State in every criminal case has the burden of proving the allegations made by it to the legal standard called beyond a reasonable doubt.

We will explain that more as we go. Now, it is important, there were questionaries sent out by the Court and the Clerk of Court to which you responded. That is information gathering for all parties to be assisted and kind of understanding more about you as jurors. Those responses will be utilized in the selection process of the jurors. I am going to ask a few questions today, right now and the end result questions always going to be notwithstanding my friendship, my relationship too, if there is a potential witness you may be connected to, one of the lawyers you may or may not be connected to, somebody's family you may be connected to in some fashion by friendship or by kinship. The end result question is, can you be a fair and impartial Juror in light of those facts or that relationship. And if you can you can, if you can't it is okay too. But that is how my questions are going to go to that end, can you be fair and impartial.

And so the end result, I want a jury selected from your number, you as a group who can sit fairly and impartially, give a fair trial to both the State of South Carolina and to Mr. Timothy Ray Jones, Jr. seated here in the courtroom. That is our intent and that is my job here today and later as we go this week. So I am going to ask a few questions and I may ask that question a time or two today but the majority of the questions are going to be more focused in more smaller groups. So we will get to that organization in a moment. First and foremost, I am going to let the lawyers from the State, I am going to let Solicitor Hubbard introduce his table and then I am going to let Mr. Madsen introduce his table or Mr. Young, whichever. So, Solicitor, introduce your table.

THE COURT: All right, folks. We are trying to lay out the game plan. As y'all know, you have been summoned here for jury selection in this case. Some of you heard about it earlier through news media and whatnot, we will address that later. My primary goal, my ultimate goal is to select a fair and impartial jury as best I can with the assistance of the attorneys on both sides. This case is a little bit different, some aspects, it is a Capital case. So the selection process and the questions, it is called voir dire in Latin, that is Latin for asking jurors questions why they may be fair or unfair, can they be fair or unfair, things of that nature. In a Capital case that is done individually. And the Court ask questions and the attorneys are allowed to ask certain questions to determine whether or not either side believes there is an impartiality of anything of that nature. So what I intend to do is to divide you up into smaller groups to call you back in. And this process is going to take a while.

Unfortunately the inconvenience to you and for that I say I am going to try to minimize the inconvenience to you. I am well aware that serving on jury service is an inconvenience because you are here, you are not working, you are away from your family and your responsibility to your home, I am fully aware of that and I will try to minimize that. But in our State a trial by jury is a right everyone has and when someone asked for a jury trial the jury's come from the community where that person lives. So we have got to delve into certain issues but it is much easier and manageable for me, rather than asking the next question, what did you see and hear. Now, I am going to divide you up in smaller groups and Ms.

Frick and I and the Deputy Clerk of Court, they are going to help me, they are part of the Lexington County Clerk of Court staff, they are going to help me arrange y'all into smaller groups and the attorneys are going to be there and we are going to try to manage y'all in smaller groups the best we can. This is important, this is very important. From this point forward I, y'all took an oath earlier, on your oath, you are going to give truthful answers. It took a lot of effort to coordinate getting y'all in here today by Lexington County Clerk of Court's office. It is important that this trial be conducted by a fair jury and a jury who considers testimony, evidence, most also instructions on the law. I don't need jurors who are going to be influenced by something outside the courtroom. And whether that be a neighbor, someone you see in the grocery store, something you read on the internet, newspaper, television. I can't control anything outside the courtroom as a Judge.

Inside the courtroom there can be steady presentation of testimony and evidence to a jury. Outside of the courtroom I have no control on what is said, how it is said and the impact has on you as a jury. That is not fair to anyone for the State or the Defense. So part of your oath and I am going to ask you to reaffirm is that you will not discuss the case with anyone, tonight, tomorrow, during the trial if you are so selected, you will not seek out, conduct research, look on the internet. I don't want outside influencing on you. Now I am well aware there is a lot of influences and certainly it can happen unintentionally but my primary focus is to conduct a fair trial for the State and for Mr. Jones and I can't do that if you will not follow my instructions. And understanding under your oath you are not to do these things. It really create problems for you. Is anyone, a member of this panel, not going to be able to accept the oath, reaffirmation.

We have already given you your oath, if you are not going to be able to live up to it I need to know now because this process is going to take several days. And if you are going to leave here and go get on Facebook and say, guess what. That is a violation of the oath you have been given. There is a lot of time and effort and huge amount of organization put in by both sides to get this case to where it is right now and we don't need it undone by someone who is going to be carelessly accepting an oath, a responsibility to this case and in being a fair and impartial Juror. Is there any member of this jury panel not going to be able to accept the instructions by the Court to not communicate or communicating to by someone or someone tries to approach and says, I would like to tell you something about that case you may not know. You may not do so, I don't want to hear it. Please do not talk to me about the case, I am told not to talk about the case. Is there any member of the jury panel not going to be able to accept and reaffirm their oath that they are going to follow the instructions of the Court and not communicate with anyone about this case. If so please stand if you are not going to be able to follow the oath.

THE COURT: Additions, there is going to be newsprint, television and the television and news, they have a right to know, they are going to report certain things. I don't have any control over what they report. If a news report comes on and you notice them discussing something about this trial please change the channel, do not listen to it, do something different. You will be amazed that the trials that I have, the jurors say, I have no idea this was the system, this is how things work. I have learned so much. The fact is, we can't conduct a fair trial here if you don't follow my instructions because I tell jurors all the time, what you need to decide this case, every case I have presented before now, you don't need anything to decide this case other than what you hear in the courtroom. Everything else is not relevant, not to be discussed, not to be considered. That is your oath. Another thing, the lawyers, I am not working from a script, I am working with experience in this big of a crowd.

If someone tries to communicate with you. If you overhear a conversation, if you watch a news account, part of your oath is to let the Court know, Clerk of Courts know and then we can go froward from there. Let me reassure you, the news media, the reporters and whatnot, they are not going to be asking you any questions whatsoever, they know to stay away. Other people potentially around the Court House coming to and from the courtroom may not know you are a potential Juror. You know you are a potential Juror, minimize those conversations. All right. Now, y'all bear with us a moment. We are going to randomly generate a list from your number. So your number is going to be selected in random orders so we may get Juror 184, 415, something like that. Randomly your names are going to be placed in certain panels. The panels, I decided on panels of eight, we are going to start with the first panel of eight in the morning, the second one about midday and the last one about mid-late afternoon.

So bear with me and I am about to notify of which panels y'all fall into. Here is what we are going to do. We are going to pick the first several panels and y'all will know right now, in a moment what time tomorrow to come back in. The other panels that are going to come in Wednesday and Thursday, y'all will be given the card momentarily. You are going to be given the card momentarily that is going to allow you to check a website to find out when your panel is and what time you will be reporting to come in for additional voir dire. Any member of the jury panel not utilized the internet and get on a website, like the County website. Anybody cannot use a website, please stand.

THE COURT: Everybody is going to be able to get on the website if I give you the web address. That is amazing. All right, folks, I am going to make certain that we are clear. What is going to happen next, the Clerk of Court's office is assigning you to the first three panels so we will know who those 24 people are shortly. And maybe I didn't explain it as well as I should but we are going to voir dire those panels, eight people at a time but one person at a time, ask them questions and whatnot, take down the information. Until we go through all of you and make determinations of qualified as jurors for this case and there is no reason to excuse you for whatever reason, that may take several days. So as you come up in panels and report to the Court House and answer the questions proposed by the Court and the lawyers you will be given further instructions on where to check back with or when to find out where to report back after that. I am not certain I did a good job of explaining that.

But the second group of panels starting on Wednesday, I am likely to say report back at 9:00, that is going to be the information on the website. If you are panel number four which will be the first panel Wednesday morning, you will report. And I should have told you this, we are not going to be back here, we are going over to the new Court House and we will be upstairs on the fourth floor. I am certain I have not told you that. So we will be over there and as you come in through the security, the security will direct you to the elevator which is right there by the elevator and you will go up to the fourth floor and we have got a room for you up there where you will be placed, there is water, coffee, bathrooms, whatnot while you wait your turn to be brought into the courtroom.

The no communication about the facts of the case, the allegations and even something as innocent to someone, yeah, I am in that big jury panel as a potential Juror, innocently you may be inviting a conversation to start with someone and that person starts a conversation with you and who knows what they say. I don't and I can't control that so please understand when I am vigorously admonishing you to, don't talk about the case, don't tell somebody you are a potential Juror. Certainly you have got to tell your family that you are doing that but don't discuss the case any further than that. And for heavens sake, don't go on Facebook or Twitter and put something like that because you certainly will get a response from somebody. And there is no way that I can assure both parties in this case that I am doing the job as the Judge in giving a fair trial to both sides if I can't have that assurance from you, potential jurors.

Communication about investigation, web search, news paper articles, barber shop, beauty shop, I don't need you investigating or seeing what has been written about this case. That is not important, what is important is it, if you are qualified as a Juror that nothing has influenced you in making a decision before you come to court. There is going to be plenty for you to consider at at the appropriate time from the witnesses and evidence which will be presented. So on your oath, when we leave here today, communication about the case is prohibited. If someone tries to communicate with you terminate the conversation and when we call you in individually on your panel please let me know at that time. If you see a news report inadvertently I want to know about it then also. You are not going to be in trouble, but I can't measure the, what you have heard or what you have seen unless I know about it.

And so, again, my primary goal, I am going to be very diligent about it, is to find and seek out a fair jury that can listen appropriately to what is presented and make a determination. Now here is what you don't know also is, a lot of what is done in the courtroom, jurors listen and they answer questions of fact. But particularly a lot of those questions of fact are given parameters by the instructions of what the law actually is. And that is my job, is to instruct you on the law and right now one of the instructions is, don't talk about the case, don't let anyone communicate with you about the case, don't go investigate the case. What you need to decide the case you will be given in the courtroom by either witnesses, evidence or instructions of the Court. That is how it works. If you can't follow that oath you are going to be harmful to the jury rather than helpful to the jury system. Are we ready to go with the panels?