Called for jury duty in a county far away? It’s happened before

If that happens, jurors are likely to be kept sequestered in a hotel and given meals and the standard $20-a-day juror compensation for the expected three-week trial.

Instead, the judge may decide to move the whole trial to another county, transporting the judge, court staff, prosecutors, defendant, defense attorneys and witnesses to that location while the local jury there hears the case.

The issue arose after defense attorneys for Colin Gray filed a motion requesting a change of venue, citing Barrow County as a community where a feeling is “strongly set against him.”

Gray is facing 29 charges, including two counts of second-degree murder, two counts of involuntary manslaughter, five counts of reckless conduct and 20 counts of child cruelty after prosecutors say he knowingly allowed his 14-year-old son, Colt Gray, to possess a gun.

Attorneys for Colt Gray have filed a similar motion in his case.

Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez

Credit: Miguel Martinez-Jimenez

Judge Primm granted the change of venue motion but hasn’t yet determined whether the trial will be exported or a jury imported.

Prosecutors, Gray and his attorneys would have to agree to the choice of venue. The Georgia Supreme Court has previously ruled that a presiding judge has final discretion to reject any county agreed upon and could select a county the judge feels will allow a fair and impartial jury to be picked.

That state high court ruling was made after Kenneth Hardwick, accused in the death of his 7-month-old daughter in Gwinnett County, had been granted a change of venue but the judge did not agree with moving the case to Chatham County. Instead, the case was to be tried in Bibb County. Hardwick took a plea deal before the trial started.

If the judge decides to import a jury, it raises questions about the burden on those selected to be away from their homes and families for weeks. If the case is exported, the county that receives the trial will face an influx of lawyers, court staff and press covering the event.

Importing a jury

The suggestion to import the jury was made by Barrow County District Attorney Brad Smith. However, instead of housing jurors in a Barrow County hotel, he suggested selecting a jury from nearby Walton County and allowing them to go home every night.

Keeping the trial itself in Barrow would prevent witnesses, some who are minors, from having to travel long distances to testify in the trial, Smith said in the hearing.

The impact on witnesses is just one factor Primm is required to consider under Georgia law. He must also look at the hardship on jurors who are sequestered far from home, the availability of hotel accommodations and meals for jurors in the county, and the cost to conduct the trial in each place, among other factors.

Jury consultant Denise de La Rue has experience helping import jurors for trials in South Carolina and Tennessee but said she hasn’t done one in the Peach State yet. De La Rue said importing a jury could impact the pool of eligible jurors, who might be more able to serve at their local courthouse than hours away, for the three-week trial expected in September.

“You can imagine the imposition that is on jurors, so I think it really cuts into the eligible jurors and could systematically exclude certain types of jurors,” she said.

De La Rue said some jurors will have children or elderly parents to take care of or their own health issues, which might prevent them from being selected, cutting a large number of potential jurors out of the pool.

Former Judicial Qualifications Commission chair Lester Tate, who is now a defense attorney, said that jurors who are brought into town for the trial might start to feel like locals themselves. Jurors can sometimes feel pressure to make a certain decision, even if that pressure is unintended, he said.

“The closer you are to that county, the more likely there is that somebody in that county still feels that sort of societal pressure to convict. When you go further away, you get rid of that pressure,” Tate said.

Defense attorney Angela D’Williams said it would depend where the jury is imported from, but she thinks it would simply be easier and cheaper to export the trial. She would worry about jurors having to spend weeks in a hotel, how they might hold it against a defendant and how the community might treat the jurors.

“Even though they say, ’Don’t talk about the case,’ people are going to know who’s on the jury in that town,” she said.

Exporting the trial

Defense attorneys for Gray objected to importing a jury, suggesting instead that the whole case be moved to another county, preferably somewhere either in coastal or South Georgia, where the media attention was not as widespread as metro Atlanta.

“The only way that I see would be the best way to handle it is to pick a county, one that is far enough away, has similar demographics, and we can try it there,” attorney Jim Berry said.

Recent high-profile cases in Georgia have taken both paths.

The trial against Justin Ross Harris was moved to Glynn County because the judge ruled that Harris couldn’t get a fair trial in Cobb County. Harris was convicted in the death of his 22-month-old son after leaving him in the back of a hot SUV in June 2014, but his conviction was later overturned.

Chuck Boring, who was the lead prosecutor in that case, said picking a Glynn County jury was easier, but moving the lengthy trial was logistically difficult. Cobb County agreed to pay thousands to relocate the case.

“Logistically with the witnesses, but also just moving and being away from your family and your support system and everyone for that long was very difficult,” Boring, who is now a defense attorney, said. “It’s hard enough to prosecute a case that’s high profile and serious in nature when you’re at home and in your own office. Having to basically move up and move to a completely different area was, personally and I think for the team, the most difficult.”

Boring said both parties had input on suggesting possible venues to Cobb County Superior Court Judge Mary Staley, who ultimately made the decision. Witnesses, prosecutors, defense counsel, evidence and Harris himself all had to be transported hours away to try the case.

The 2002 trial of former DeKalb County Sheriff Sidney Dorsey was held in Albany due to intense publicity. Dorsey was convicted of killing the man who defeated him in the 2000 election. A judge had considered moving Dorsey’s trial to Savannah, Augusta or Columbus but found those cities didn’t have the courtroom space or their racial demographics didn’t match DeKalb’s.

Credit: HYOSUB SHIN / AJC

Credit: HYOSUB SHIN / AJC

The murder trial against confessed killer Stephen McDaniel was moved from Bibb County to Henry County by a judge, due to pre-trial publicity. However, McDaniel pleaded guilty before a jury was selected.

A Glynn County jury was brought in to Putman County for the death penalty case against Ricky Dubose, who was found guilty and later sentenced to death for the 2017 murders of two corrections officers. A jury was also imported for the death penalty trial against Dubose’s co-defendant Donnie Rowe.

In Rowe’s trial, the jury was picked from Grady County and transported about 200 miles north to Eatonton, where they were sequestered in a hotel and heard the case at the Putnam County courthouse.

In 2015, a jury made up of residents of Elbert County were transported and sequestered under guard at a hotel in Athens for the death penalty trial against Jamie Hood, who was convicted in the murder of an Athens-Clarke County police officer.

Factors to consider

Pete Skandalakis, executive director of the Prosecuting Attorneys’ Council of Georgia, said any decision Primm makes will be difficult, considering the nature of the case and the pre-trial publicity. News of the shooting would have traveled far, he said.

“This is not going to be easy to find jurors who haven’t heard about this case, particularly jurors who have kids that are about the same age, that’s going to make it difficult,” Skandalakis said. “I have a lot of empathy for the judge and the prosecutor and the defense attorney in this case. It’s going to be difficult but it’s not impossible.”

Judge Primm would have to take into account demographics similar to Barrow County before picking a county, Skandalakis said, although DA Smith claimed demographics are not an issue in this case.

Primm said he was planning to reach out to some judicial circuits to see if they can accommodate them before issuing a ruling.