On Friday, Judge George O’Toole denied the third attempt by alleged Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokar Tsarnaev to relocate his trial out of Boston. In his ruling, Judge O’Toole stated that the latest attempt “to change venue has even less, not more, merit than the prior ones.”
Most recently, the defense cited how local social media scoured the Internet to find the man that shoveled out the Boston Marathon finish line in the middle of a blizzard. The digital search eventually went viral and the hashtag #whoshoveledthefinishline began trending on Twitter.
The defense tried to use that as an exemplification of “the impossible task of unmasking juror bias in the very community where ‘everyone owns the Marathon.'”
Further, the voir dire processes has proven thus far that a majority of prospective jurors have already predetermined a guilty verdict for Tsarnaev and the principle of presumed innocence is nonexistent in Boston, as so argued by the defense.
But Judge O’Toole seemed confident in his ruling that he and the ongoing legal processes will adequately seat jurors that’ll allow for an impartial and fair trial.
“We have made substantial progress toward achieving the goal of the ongoing voir dire process,” wrote Judge O’Tool. “There is no reason to expect that such progress will cease, and there is no reason to halt a process that is doing what it is intended to do.”
Despite the fact that the defense turned to statistical evidence to back up their argument – that two out of three potential jurors consider Tsarnaev guilty – Judge O’Toole stated that the methodology is flawed in that potential jurors were only allowed to answer questions with options provided for them.
In the case of voir dire, the dialogue is verbal, which allows for more interpretation and context.
“Checking a box may result in answers that appear more clear and unambiguous than the juror may have intended or than is actually true,” added Judge O’Toole.
Despite the recent inclement weather delays and elongated voir dire, the U.S. District Court of Massachusetts announced that “barring further weather delays, it is reasonable to think that the voir dire process may be completed by the end of next week” which is Friday, Feb. 13.
