U.S. District Judge James Zagel denied a defense request to quiz jurors in the Family Secrets case after they took a week off from deliberations.
And Zagel shed some light on why they jury took that time in the first place.
The jurors were given the court's schedule for this month back in August. And the schedule noted the days the judge wouldn't be sitting.
So Zagel suggested that the jurors did not meet for the past four days because they saw the court was not sitting then.
Zagel previously speculated that the issue could be work-related. In other words, jurors saw a month in advance that the court wouldn't be sitting for a few days in September and told their respective employers that they would be in to work those days.
Zagel also praised the jury as hard-working.
Defense attorneys wanted the jury polled in private to find out if jurors had been affected by any of the media coverage of the case in the last few days.
But the judge said he reviewed the coverage and found nothing extraordinary that would have influenced them.
The judge also noted that he has to rely on the jury that it will obey his instruction to ignore media converage. And he has to take action when he has some evidence or indication that it hasn't listened to him.
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