BOISE, Idaho — Jury selection continued in the Chad Daybell trial on Tuesday with more potential jurors being selected, before the judge called for an early dismissal for the day at 1 p.m.
Day two of the Daybell trial resulted in an additional four jurors being chosen to serve in Daybell's criminal trial - bringing the total number of prospective jurors to 20 of the 50 that District Judge Steven Boyce must assemble to then choose from.
Due to it being a high-profile death penalty case, the jury selection process is all the more grueling and time-consuming, as jurors are to be impartial to the case prior to testimony, evidence review and deliberation.
Therefore, the meticulous process of selecting such a jury panel includes a personal review of each individual and in-depth questionnaires, among other methods.
After the 50 prospective jurors are selected, preemptory challenges then occur. In this step, both the prosecution and the defense select which jurors may proceed and which may not. Each party gets 16 preemptory challenges, totaling 32 challenges.
Of the 50 prospective jurors, 18 will remain after the 32 preemptory challenges. Those 18 jurors then sit on trial.
Twelve of those 18 individuals will be official jurors, leaving six to be alternates. The alternates will only find out if they're alternates closer to deliberation.
On the first day of trial, Judge Boyce called two panels of jurors, both totaling 16 each. After voir dire, or questioning of the jurors, only half got selected to move forward. The other half was excused for a variety of reasons. One of the main lines of questioning that came up on the first day of jury selection was the time of the trial, an estimated 10 weeks. For some of the jurors that were excused, that length of time was simply too hard to do.
Wednesday's goal will be to get as close to the 50-juror mark as possible. However, it doesn't need to be done in one day. The court will take up to two weeks to select an adequate jury pool.
Jury selection is scheduled to reconvene at 9 a.m. Wednesday, April 3.
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