The Jurors Speak

Both the Times Leader and Citizen's Voice have major Harlow Cuadra trial juror interview stories today. Fascinating stuff! Various myths propagated by online Harlow apologists in recent days are put to pasture, and the recent self-congratulatory statements by the Cuadra defense team are shown to have been a bit premature.

Anyways, here are the highlights, plus commentary:

1) Amazingly, four jurors actually held out for a bit on finding Harlow guilty in the guilt phase:

“There were four jurors who thought it could have been Joe,” Scutt said. “You had no direct evidence, no DNA linking (Cuadra) to the murder. There was so much circumstantial evidence. There were several that couldn’t put the knife in his hand.”

A smoking break, of all things, quickly broke the logjam, however:

“The jurors went out for a smoke, and when they returned, one of them told us she thought about the case when she was outside for a cigarette and came to agree (Cuadra) was guilty,” Stavitzski said. “The other jurors who had doubt then came around.”

Smoking was defintely hazardous to Harlow's health in jury deliberations.

2) It looks like my earlier doubts as to the wisdom of Harlow taking the stand were right on the money, because according to these jurors, THATS what convicted him:

Stavitzski and Scutt said they also had doubt Cuadra actually killed Kocis until Cuadra testified in his own defense. “To me, he solidified the whole case,” Scutt said.

“Harlow wasn’t answering the direct questions,” Stavitzski said. “In my mind, the evidence was circumstantial; he turned it into hard evidence. He was talking in circles.”

and

“He basically looked like a kid sitting there at the table,” Stavitzski said. “But as soon as he took the stand, he took off the glasses and he sounded like Hulk Hogan giving a wrestling interview. He had more holes in his testimony than Swiss cheese.”

and

Matulis and fellow juror Daniel Austin said the person who sealed Cuadra’s fate was Cuadra himself when he took the witness stand.

“He shot himself in the foot with the different lies,” said Austin, 58, a retired postal worker from Harveys Lake. “In my eyes, Harlow definitely was the one who did the actual killing.”

“He placed himself in the house, he described it. All reasonable doubt, as far as him being an accomplice, went out the window when he opened his mouth,” Matulis added.

and

Stavitzski said testimony from forensic pathologist Dr. Mary Pascucci, who performed Kocis’ autopsy, was powerful in explaining Kocis suffered a single swipe from a knife that nearly decapitated him.

“She explained it was one swipe that ended Bryan’s life,” Stavitzski said. “Harlow’s description of Joe storming in and fighting with Bryan, and slashing his neck twice and Bryan is still talking was just unbelievable.”

The two jurors said that if Kerekes and Kocis fought the way that Cuadra claimed the fight occurred, there would have been defensive wounds on Kocis’ arms.

“If someone is coming at you with a knife, what’s the first thing you do, you put up your arms,” Stavitzski said.

“Bryan didn’t have any injuries or stab wounds on his arms,” Scutt said.

3) The recently fabricated "Stockholm Syndrome" theory Team Harlow tried to pitch, both online and in the court room, fizzled with most of the jury:

“Their relationship was brought up a lot in deliberations,” Stavitzski said. “Joe was more muscle but Harlow was the brains.”

“As far as Joe being dominant and Harlow acting as the housewife, I found that hard to believe,” Scutt said.

Note juror Stavitzski coming to exactly the same conclusion I did yesterday on PC's comment thread:

Joe was more the emotional, flighty type. Do first, think later.

Harlow was the cold, calculating type. He was the brains (such as they were). He would think for the both of them, and reign Joe in whenever Joe was about to do something particularly stupid.

4) The Harlowites have recently been spreading a pair of essentially contradictory talking points regarding the Joe Disaster. This first one is: the Joe Disaster was bad. Had Joe not evilly betrayed them, Harlow would be a free man today.

But not so, say the jurors:

Kerekes briefly appeared during the trial under a subpoena issued by Cuadra’s lawyers. When he took the witness stand, Kerekes opted not to testify on Cuadra’s behalf.

“Harlow gave (Kerekes) a look to kill,” Stavitzski said. Had Kerekes testified, Stavitzski and Scutt said it wouldn’t have mattered.

“I would have taken into consideration his credibility,” Stavitzski said.

The other talking point is: The Joe Disaster was good! It showed the jury Joe's dishonest and controlling nature, still trying to "dominate" Harlow from his jail cell.

And the jury shoots that one down as well:

“What did he have to lose, he had nothing to gain. For what he did, I have to respect him for telling the truth.”

Kerekes said from the witness stand on March 10: “I’ve been thinking a lot about my parents. I think it will destroy them to say something that I didn’t do. What I told you (D’Andrea) is untrue.”

D’Andrea informed the jury that he met Kerekes several times before Kerekes’ appearance during the trial.

“I think Joe told the truth on the witness stand,” Scutt said.

It looks like Team Harlow needs to come up with new talking points. Do they have any left? I could be wrong, but at this point, I don't think they do.

5) Sean and Grant and the CCTs and BBTs played a noteworthy role:

Stavitzski said the relationship between Cuadra and Kerekes was solidified when assistant district attorneys Michael Melnick, Shannon Crake and Allyson Kacmarski played to the jury recorded conversations of the two men with Lockhart and Grant Roy.

Roy, a producer of gay pornographic films based in San Diego, Calif., wore a body wire on two consecutive days when he met with Cuadra and Kerekes in late April 2007.

“Those tapes that were played, I got to know their mannerisms, I got to know what this whole case is about,” Stavitzski said. “Harlow did a lot of talking on those tapes; it showed me he was at the house.”

6) Interesting tidbits about how the jury interacted:

The jury deliberated for nearly three hours and 30 minutes before they reached a verdict convicting Cuadra. Scutt said the jury convicted Cuadra in three hours, and allowed 30 minutes for jurors to express their thoughts and opinions before they notified the court that a verdict had been reached.

and

“I’d be a liar if I said voices weren’t raised. Obviously, if you got people who want a death penalty, it gets tense,” she said. “We carried a person’s life in our hands.”

and

Images presented as evidence by the prosecution about the brutal murder will be seared in jurors’ minds forever, Matulis said.

“The shock of actually seeing some of this, it was mind boggling — seeing a burnt corpse, a heart cut with stab wounds …” Matulis said. “My life was changed and I wasn’t the criminal.”

7) The jurors also talked about their 8-4 deadlock in the penalty phase, which PC has previously covered here.