Murder Trial Juror Jayne Ford | Part 1 of 2 | Tuesday June 8, 2021
Murder Trial Juror Jayne Ford | Part 2 of 2 | Thursday June 10, 2021
Ever wondered what it would be like to be a juror on a Capital Murder Case?
Wonder no more.
The Murder Police Podcast invites you to listen to a two-part interview with Juror Jayne Ford.
Jayne will take us through what the experience is like; from being called for jury duty through deciding the fate of another person.
We will here what it is like to carry the incredible wight of making such an important decision, as well as impressions that jurors like Jayne gain from watching participants in the trial process. Criminal attorneys may really want to take a listen to this.
For the die-hard True Crime fans, Jayne will talk about a program offered by police departments around the world that would feed the need of any real True Crime fan, and she learned about the program as a juror. What program is this we speak of? Episode 2. Yep. That is where you will find it.
So, for those that have always said “I would do it differently if I was on the jury”, this one is for you.
Show Transcripts
Part 1 of 2
Wendy Lyons:
Warning: the podcast you’re about to listen to may contain graphic descriptions of violent assaults, murder, and adult language. Listener discretion is advised.
Wendy Lyons:
Welcome to Season Three of The Murder Police Podcast. I am Wendy.
David Lyons:
And I’m David, and welcome everybody that we’ve moved away from Seasons One and Two and we’re into Season Three, and today we have a special treat on what’s releasing today. We said that in Season Three we’re going to start expanding a little bit and moving into different topics and different people that are part of the Murder Police system, and we’ve got a super treat for everybody today.
David Lyons:
I’ve heard a million times or seen people quoted when they see a trial go is they always say, “Well if I was on a jury, I’d do that,” or, “If I was on a jury, I’d say this,” or, “That person would’ve got this.” And that’s interesting, but the reality of it is not too many people get to serve on murder trial juries.
Wendy Lyons:
Yeah, and we were fortunate enough to have a capital murder juror with us, Ms. Jayne Ford. She came and shared a story on a case that took place in Lexington, Kentucky a few years back, and it was really interesting to hear what goes into that, the stress, the anxieties at some points that come along with it, and how jurors get along or don’t get along or agree or not. It was really eye-opening to hear that whole process, especially for me who’s never served on a jury.
David Lyons:
Well, and for me too because I’ve been on the other side of it. And one of the things I found, it was extremely educational because a lot of things I guessed when I was on the stand she kind of affirmed, and then I learned a lot by what goes on. But what’s really good is Jayne is very well-spoken about this, and it’s a lot like the investigators when they talk about a case, Jayne has all these details like it happened yesterday. It left an impression on her that great [inaudible 00:02:20] and a right to the amount of responsibility on this and the weight on those jurors’ shoulders is incredible.
David Lyons:
A capital case, by the way, is a case where the death penalty is on the table, so the crime was bad enough and had the aggravators in Kentucky to where the jury would consider the death penalty. And I can’t imagine on that level being called in, and Jayne said it great during the interview over here where she says, “We were supposed to make judgments about people we don’t know and have never met.” And I thought wow, that summed it up.
Wendy Lyons:
It really did, and they certainly had their work cut out for them because there was a lot of back and forth there with the attorneys. I encourage you to listen to that.
David Lyons:
People who are listening now, you’re getting the first episode is Watch Thursday, two days from now, and you’ll get the second episode. Now, I will say that as interesting as it is, and it is interesting, is the true crime fanatics that are out there begging for cases, those aren’t stopping. We’ve got some really neat stuff I’m not even going to hint to right now because what’s going to follow pretty shortly is another miniseries on incredible crime with a couple of incredible investigators, so don’t worry about that.
Wendy Lyons:
I think we should give the listeners a hint of the case of what they can look forward to.
David Lyons:
Okay.
Wendy Lyons:
So listeners, I’ll just go ahead and let you know that this case is so incredible. It’s sad, it’s horrible, but we did have two really awesome detectives in here who worked that case. One of them is a detective that has been on our show before that has worked a few cases that we’ve recorded, Detective Chris Schoonover, with another awesome detective that will be joining him, Detective Rob Wilson, and that is going to be on the 2013 murder of Alex Johnson. And that’s all I will say about that, so if you are one to look ahead, go ahead and look up that 2013 murder, Google it, and you will find on Mr. Alex Johnson. It was a crazy case, wasn’t it?
David Lyons:
It was. But you know what? Again, what we’re going to offer and people are going to find is hang on tight because these two are really going to take you into areas because it’s been covered in different venues before. One of them, quite frankly, that was done real well was done by Kristen Pflum, and she did a podcast series called Taking Alex. So when I research on this one, I would strongly recommend taking a peak and a listen at that one.
David Lyons:
Speaking of other podcasts, I’ve got to give a shout out to one of my favorite ones that I stumbled across called The 13th Floor. What that is, it’s actually done by a podcaster here in Kentucky who works with a couple in Atlanta. Your hosts on this one are Cece, Alex, and James, and they discuss the paranormal and the unusual. That’s why they call it The 13th Floor. And what’s really neat is they take suggestions from the audience, they spend a week researching those things and report out on them.
David Lyons:
And the two things I’ll tell you you’ll walk away from is you’ll feel smarter because of the details they bring to this stuff. And you’ll smile. It’s fantastic. So to find them, it’s just simply The 13th Floor Podcast. They’re at 13thfloorpodcast.com. And just to make sure you get it right, it’s the 13thfloorpodcast.com.
David Lyons:
With that, let’s go ahead and get into the show and listen to the interview with Jayne.
Wendy Lyons:
And always, thanks for listening to The Murder Police Podcast.
Wendy Lyons:
Hello listeners, thank you for joining us at The Murder Police Podcast. Today, we have Ms. Jayne Ford with us, and we are so excited to hear from Ms. Jayne. This is a first time interview like this we have done. Jayne served as a juror in a 2005 murder case that took place here in Lexington. So Jayne, thank you for joining David and I.
Jayne Ford:
Well thank you, I’m glad to be here. This is a great opportunity to be able to tell a different perspective of a murder case.
David Lyons:
I’m really excited. I’ve wanted to do this for a while because I think the audience needs to hear what it’s like to do that. A lot of people, when they see a murder case get put down in the news like when it’s done with trial, they may say things like, “The system failed,” or, “What about that jury?” And the most common thing you hear people say is, “Well, if I’d been on that jury.” Well, the reality is not that many people get the opportunity, and I’m call it an opportunity to be on a jury because it’s an obligation once you get called and we’ll talk about that some more.
David Lyons:
So I’m excited to have you. I want to hear more about what it’s like with a perspective you get from times when I testified. And I know it wasn’t the same case, but I’ve always been interested in how we affect juries when we’re up on the stand and whatnot, so we’ll get into that pretty deep. But thank you for coming today, I’m real excited.
Jayne Ford:
Thank you.
Wendy Lyons:
Well Jayne, why don’t you tell us a little bit about yourself?
Jayne Ford:
Well, I am originally from Atlanta. I grew up there, but I actually came up here to Kentucky, I went to college at EKU. I graduated with a degree in broadcasting, which at the time was not very common. Most schools had print journalism, and I was interested in broadcast journalism, so that’s why I came up here. And then I graduated and ironically ended up back in Atlanta with a job at CNN, Cable News Network, and I was one of the first thousand employees actually at CNN. My badge says Number 905, and I worked there for about 22 years.
David Lyons:
What did you do at CNN? Because that’s fascinating actually.
Jayne Ford:
Well being there in the early days, you started out, which they call your entry level position, and this shows you how long ago this was, you actually took physical video tape and you spliced it from when it got thin, you put it back together with a tape and rewound it so they could record more stories on it.
Jayne Ford:
Then from there, you kind of worked your way up where you floor directed, showed the anchors the cameras to look into. You ran a teleprompter, which again in those days was an actual conveyor belt where you stacked scripts on top of each other. And then you floor directed, which was where you tell the anchors which camera to look into if you’re going to break, coming out of a break, and stuff like that.
Jayne Ford:
After you do that for a while, you have an opportunity to go a technical or editorial, and I went the technical route, which again this was back in the ’80s so not very technical. But I worked as what was called the Character Generator, which is basically your words that you see below, the names, the cities, the sports scores, weather temperatures, and I did that for several years.
Jayne Ford:
And then I became the Graphics Coordinator. At that point, we were a little more technical if you can say, and we were getting a little more respect at CNN for doing big stories, big cases. Well, I just happened to be the Graphics Coordinator when the OJ Simpson came along, and we covered that case for almost 10 months. So I was the Graphics Coordinator for that, on the phone every day with a producer from LA. “This is our witnesses. This is who we’re going to have. These are our exhibits we’re going to have for graphics of evidence and stuff.”
Jayne Ford:
So I did things like that. You also are on the phone with the producers in the White House when you’re doing a press conference with the President or any type of Senate hearings, so you’re making sure the graphics information gets on air correctly.
David Lyons:
That’s a piece of American history right there.
Wendy Lyons:
Yeah, that is.
David Lyons:
That is kind of cool, especially with the technology as it was back then. There’s a lot of people listening probably don’t know what video tape is or how we-
Wendy Lyons:
Right, or splicing even.
David Lyons:
Well exactly, yeah.
Jayne Ford:
Yes, that does show my age.
David Lyons:
I always tell people when I teach on campus at colleges I can’t say things like the record skipped or put a quarter on a toe arm because they have no idea what that is. That’s fascinating and it’s pretty cool.
David Lyons:
So what we’re going to talk about today though is the opportunity that you eventually came to when you were here about getting seated on a jury for a murder trial, which again I think is going to be critical to the listenership as far as hearing how that works. But when this started, do you remember how you were selected to be on a jury? How did that work?
Jayne Ford:
Yes. Well one day, I just happened to get a notice in the mail that said I was being selected for jury duty, and I know everybody’s probably heard stories like, “Oh my gosh, jury duty. Well, I’ll get out of it. I know I’ll say this or this won’t happen.” And well actually, what kind of made it a little interesting was that at the time, I was about eight months pregnant with my daughter. So the date that I was supposed to report was the week of my due date, so I knew I couldn’t do it.
Jayne Ford:
So I called my doctor, called down at the courthouse and said, “Well, this is what’s happening. I’m not really trying to get out of this.” But they said, “Well, just send a note,” so we sent the note. That went through, and they sent me, “You don’t have to report. You’re not going to be in trouble.” And I thought okay, forget about that.
Jayne Ford:
Well, my daughter was about seven or eight months old, well I got the notice again, so I figure now I have to do it. So I went down there the first day, and as you know David that when you down there, you’re in this huge room with several hundred people. And you have a jury number, and you listen for the numbers to be called or not called. And if your numbers are not called, then you still sit there and you’re waiting, and then the crowd gets a little smaller and a little smaller. And then I guess the attorneys are talking with people and they whittle it down, whittle it down a little more.
Jayne Ford:
And then a couple hours more go by, and then it’s like, “Okay, it’s lunch. Well, you got to come back and we’re going to do some more.” This process went on for almost two days. And after about two days, there was about 30 of us left. And then at that point, they took us from the very large room we were in, and walked us through this labyrinth of hallways. I had no idea where I was because there’s no windows, there’s no frame of reference. And you sit in a smaller conference room, and then a bailiff comes to get you and they say, “Come with me.” You have no idea what’s going on, what’s next, where you’re going, or anything.
Jayne Ford:
So you walk through a door, and walk into the actual courtroom and you’re just kind of, “Oh my gosh.” And you see a judge sitting there and you see attorneys and attorneys on the other side and you’re like, “Oh my gosh. Wow.”
David Lyons:
It gets real.
Jayne Ford:
Yeah, it is really-
Wendy Lyons:
I imagine I would be thinking, “Oh my gosh, am I in trouble? They’ve brought me into this and there sits the judge.”
Jayne Ford:
Right, and everybody’s looking at you, and they’re looking at your forms that you filled out and they’re asking you questions based on that and looking at you. And the attorneys are looking at you and they’re writing notes and looking at you. And then I just happened to notice, I looked over to one side of the one table and I saw what ended up being the defendant because he was shackled at the ankles.
David Lyons:
We call that a clue.
Jayne Ford:
Yeah, I would say yeah. But you know, you don’t know that at first. You just see a guy who’s in a decent looking shirt and pants, and then you look at that. And then I noticed he was also shackled at the table with his wrists, so that was kind of scary.
David Lyons:
Yeah. Taking back just a couple of things I don’t want to glaze is first, thanks for serving on a jury. I think that obviously the first time you got called, you had what I’d say is a very legitimate excuse for not being there, and they don’t want to have somebody who has to stop in the process to do that, and you were close to that.
Jayne Ford:
Right.
David Lyons:
Because there are people who when they get those notices, they really get angry. And I’ve always said that that’s an obligation. One, you’re going to learn something. You probably learned a lot that we’re going to hear about in the next few minutes, starting just with those basic things. But it’s always aggravated me to see people try to duck out on that, or to come up with a feigned excuse. Do you remember anybody trying that when you were in there? Did anybody produce something to the judge and the judge decline them?
Jayne Ford:
Well, a couple people did say, “I can’t do this. I’ve got to work and my employer is not very generous with time off.” And I mean I know you get a very small stipend of jury, it’s like $12 a day, I can’t remember. But a lot of people were like, “I just can’t do it, and I can’t commit,” or they would ask other questions. Like I was saying when I went into the room with the judge, they ask you, “Can you commit to at least maybe a couple of weeks because this trial could last that long?” And they also ask you, “What are your feelings on the death penalty.”
David Lyons:
So, we’re at a capital case then, right?
Jayne Ford:
Yes.
David Lyons:
That adds quite a bit to it.
Jayne Ford:
Right. So a lot of people said, “I’m totally against it,” or, “I’m for it,” and people were making notes and things. So a lot of people were just like, “I can’t do it,” so I think some people got struck that way and that’s how we got down to about 20 maybe at that point.
David Lyons:
Yeah, that takes me back to people wonder how do you get on a list? And in Kentucky, I did a little bit of research before we sat down because it had been so long since I looked at it, but the Administrative Office of the Courts keeps a thing called a Master List, and they develop that based off of people who file individual tax returns and people who have drivers licenses and people that are registered voters. And several years ago, it was limited to drivers licenses and voter registration, which was probably excluding people because you couldn’t cull the list. You couldn’t clean it up and people didn’t update their material, their voter registration or their license.
David Lyons:
And about the time that you went into court is when they added the individual tax return, which was probably smart because I think if you’re going to get a jury of your peers, you got to have a big pool to go from. So that’s where that came from. And when you’re talking about the strikes, that’s what a lot of people don’t understand. And maybe they see it in TV, but when it comes to that, it’s called voir dire, which is French for, “Speak the truth,” and what it is is that’s how they whittle the jury down is questions about things like how you stand on it. I’ve always joked that if you want to get out of jury duty, just go in there like the old TV show and say, “Give them a fair trial and then convict them,” and then they may let you out.
David Lyons:
The other way to almost never get on a jury is to be a cop because I’ve been called too, and I remember I was in that big room and they were naming cases, they were naming people. And every time they named an officer that was involved, I put my hand up.
Jayne Ford:
You knew them.
David Lyons:
Yeah, exactly, and the judge finally stops and she goes, “You’ve put your hand up every time.” I said, “Well, they’ve all worked with me at some point.” So you don’t last long. As a matter of fact, I remember I had a sexual assault trial, and I came into the courtroom. I got sworn in, sat in the stand, turned my chair to the jury and looked, and there was an active sergeant from the police department sitting on the jury, Eric Garner. And I looked at him kind of like, and we can’t do this because there’s no visual, but I kind of furrowed my brow and kind of gave him that look like, “Why are you here?” And he kind of put his hands out and he goes, “I don’t know.” And went on with the trial. I think later they tried to challenge that, but the judge said, “You saw the form. You knew that he was an active cop.” But that’s so rare that they’ll have us in there.
David Lyons:
But on that voir dire, the way that works is that each side can challenge somebody on a jury. For a certain number they have to give a reason, and for a certain number they don’t. Do you remember some of the other questions that they asked you during voir dire? Because a lot of people don’t realize this goes on.
Jayne Ford:
Right. Well not only do they ask about your opinion on the death penalty, but one of the odd questions I thought why they asked this was, “What kind of bumper stickers do you have on your car?”
David Lyons:
Wow. Yeah, I guess they’re going-
Jayne Ford:
To see if you support some out there political group or some other rights group or something, but I thought that was a little strange.
David Lyons:
Yeah, trying to dig and see if you have some biases or something they can point to. That’s pretty interesting because I know their go-to is of course both sides are trying to get an impartial jury and they want that, but at the same time they’re already building a rapport with everybody in that box too, and they’re trying to develop a relationship. Also, it’s not uncommon for them to start laying out their case theory at that time very gently to kind of feel through to see how you respond to that.
David Lyons:
And there’s actually people, if people want to get involved in the justice system, there’s actually professional people that help select juries, which is unique. On high profile cases, you’ll see that where they’re contracted to come in and they do more of a study of the human psyche I think.
Jayne Ford:
Right. Wasn’t that what Dr. Phil did with Oprah when she was on trial for the Texas Meat Council or something?
David Lyons:
I think so. Yeah, exactly. You pay somebody that comes in, and just like having a marketing executive. So good stuff, but thanks for serving because that’s a big deal that people try to get away from.
Jayne Ford:
Yeah. And one other thing I wanted to add, you were talking about people that was trying to get out. There was one guy on the jury, he obviously didn’t make it, that they were asking him some of the basic questions and he said, “Well, I can tell you right now, I’m not going to do this and I aint interested.” I mean he was really kind of a smart aleck, and the judge said, “Oh really, why is that?” And he said, “Because I think you’re a jerk”-
David Lyons:
Yeah, that’ll get you excused.
Jayne Ford:
-To the judge.
David Lyons:
Oh, yeah.
Jayne Ford:
So yeah, they swiftly got him out of the room.
David Lyons:
He’s lucky he went home. You don’t play in those rooms. You do not play in those rooms. He’s lucky he went home. He could’ve done a night in the smokehouse at [inaudible 00:19:48] for that remark, and I’ve seen people stay overnight for less than that, so he was a very fortunate person. Did you have something that you were going to-
Wendy Lyons:
No. I was just going to say what you said, thank you for doing that. Serving on jury duty, as much as a crime enthusiast as I am, I’ve never been selected. And I always thought if I got selected, I would want to be those that would want to keep coming back, like can I get another turn?
David Lyons:
I think they make you wait a couple years.
Wendy Lyons:
I think they call that a job, don’t that.
David Lyons:
Yeah, probably a job. Yeah, exactly.
Wendy Lyons:
I think so. But thank you, that’s really interesting. And yeah, I agree. Like I just said before, I would’ve been nervous too. You walk in and you see the judge, my thought, I always err on the side of cautious thinking, nervous nelly if you will, I would’ve been thinking, “That was a ploy to get me in here. I’m in trouble for something.”
Jayne Ford:
Right, because they didn’t tell you where you were going and you just …
Wendy Lyons:
Yes, and there’s everyone when you walk in the room. I guess I would’ve had the same shock factor you had when you walk in and see the defendant sitting there shackled because like you, I would’ve probably thought it’s just lawyers sitting there doing the voir dire or whatever they’re in there to do. I wouldn’t have thought that this is right now they’re doing this, so yeah I can imagine the shock that must’ve been in your eyes. But thank you for serving on that.
David Lyons:
Did the defendant make a lot of eye contact with you or other people on the jury?
Jayne Ford:
Oh yes, that was something I was going to bring up, but I’m glad you asked that. He did, and I want to say there were five women on the jury. And we talked about this after the fact because you’re not allowed to talk about things before you go to deliberations, but a lot of the women felt, and I knew because he looked at me a lot and he winked and kind of gave you a little smile, and you were just totally creeped out by that.
David Lyons:
Yeah. I can’t say for sure, but I would imagine if I was a defense attorney, I would counsel and coach them on trying to build a rapport visually. That might’ve been excessive clearly if it offended you, but there’s so much that goes into this that people don’t know. Everything from the way they dress and everything, but part of that probably was that he might’ve just exceeded that boundary a little more and went a little further than they wanted, but I know I’d try that.
David Lyons:
Well good deal. We’ve interrupted you a little bit I think and taken you out of it, but so you’re in the room and you’re down to the 30 or so. Continue with how that went.
Jayne Ford:
From there, and we all went through that questioning process in the courtroom. They took us back to that conference room. We sat there for about 20 minutes, and then they said, “Okay, Jury Number,” and they called numbers. And they said, “If I called your number, come with me. If I didn’t, you’re free to go.” I’m like oh man, they called my number, so here I am, down to about the last 15.
Jayne Ford:
Then we went into this hallway, and the attorneys were there, and they were talking and looking at numbers, and they started crossing things off and kind of whispering. And then all of a sudden they said, “Okay, if we call your number, you will be on the jury. Here in this box over here on this table is a pad, pencil. You have 30 minutes to use the restroom, call your family, tell them you’ve been picked, and we’re going to start.” Like okay wow and, “I’m not going to get picked. I’m not going to get picked.” Second number they called was me. I’m like, “Well, I guess I know what I’m doing for the next couple of weeks.”
David Lyons:
Like waiting to get picked for dodge ball.
Wendy Lyons:
You’re the last kid standing.
David Lyons:
Exactly.
Jayne Ford:
Yeah, but I was very fortunate that I had my mother-in-law came and she helped to take care of my daughter because my husband was working, and so what are you going to do with an infant?
David Lyons:
And there you go, it’s moving. 30 minutes. And again, it’s not something where it’s like, “Okay, next Tuesday at noon we’ll start.” It’s like, “Okay, hang on tight. The ride’s getting going.” And I know from our perspective, yes they moved when they hit like a starter pistol and said, “We’re going,” they went.
Jayne Ford:
Right, so they picked the jury and the two alternates, and they let the other couple people go. And that’s what we did, restroom, phone, and they walk you in the courtroom and you’re sitting down and boom, we’re starting.
David Lyons:
Oh wow. Well, tell us about that. Tell us how it opened up and take us through what that’s like, what you hear and what you saw.
Jayne Ford:
Well, the prosecuting attorney started with a statement of saying, “This is a case that’s very serious, it’s a murder sodomy case. We want to show that this defendant is guilty, and we will show you why he is guilty.” And then the defense attorney got up and said, “This is someone who has been essentially identified wrongly, and we’re going to show why he is not guilty. And it is up to you to decide.”
David Lyons:
Pretty straightforward.
Jayne Ford:
Yeah.
David Lyons:
And again when we’re in those cases, we’re not allowed in the room at that time. We wait and we wait and we wait out in the hall, so we don’t see that part. We’re sequestered out.
Jayne Ford:
Right. And then the one thing that one of the attorneys did say for the prosecution, and that’s something I think that stuck with me and it sticks with me even when I watch other true crime stories or you hear about other things, “You have to use your common sense. You have to use your common sense. And as it says, you have to convict and look at the evidence beyond a reasonable doubt. And then you question what’s reasonable for some people? Is this reasonable to me but not to you? How are we going to come to an agreement one way or the other at the end of this trial?” And that stuff you really start thinking at that point.
David Lyons:
Yeah, because we hear that term all the time, right, and now it has meaning. They probably didn’t talk a lot about that term in the beginning though, did they? They waited til the-
Jayne Ford:
No, right.
David Lyons:
We’ll get to the end, and then-
Jayne Ford:
In closing, mm-hmm.
David Lyons:
Yeah, for sure, but that’s an interesting concept is beyond a reasonable doubt. And I like the way you threw in the word common sense because that gets lost in that as a lot of people think it’s the ultimate doubt, and some people’s minds will really go to strange places. Everything just short of an alien could’ve landed and did it and we’d have no proof of that, right, but circumstantially it happened. Common sense plays a big role in this, so I’m glad they talked about that because I’ve heard stories of what that’s like in a jury room if common sense takes a hike and goes on vacation for a while.
David Lyons:
So they do the opening, everybody’s pretty straightforward. They’re kind of laying where they’re going to take you and that.
Jayne Ford:
Yes. They’re talking about the evidence that they will present and that you’ll see why, say on the prosecution side, why he is guilty, we feel that we have enough evidence and exhibits to show you that this will result in a conviction.
David Lyons:
Great. And then, where does it go from there? Do you take lunch, or did they go right into it?
Jayne Ford:
No, they did at least two witnesses before we had a lunch break.
David Lyons:
Yeah. Who called the witnesses first, do you remember?
Jayne Ford:
Prosecution.
David Lyons:
Yep, good deal. So tell us about that when those witnesses sat down, your impressions on that. Were there things when you watched witnesses that either led to their credibility or were there things that detracted from their credibility? Did you get a row from listening to that?
Jayne Ford:
I’m trying to think. You’re putting yourself so focused on what they’re saying and are they presenting it in a way that you understand it, that’s it not too over your head. And what I took away from a lot of it when the police detectives came up to testify was that you realize how much time is spent on one case. When you’re watching the news at night, you may see 30 seconds of a crime scene and you see the tape up and people walking around, and that’s all you really see.
Jayne Ford:
But what they got into was once they were called initially and the detectives came and photographs were taken, evidence was taken, that it was almost two days of evidence gathering.
David Lyons:
Oh yeah. And when we summarize, it feels a lot faster than that.
Jayne Ford:
Right.
David Lyons:
And one thing you said to point out too is being able to understand them and to hear it in terms that you’d understand. So for our would-be people who are out there that are listening to this that might get into the business one day is take that to heart and don’t forget that, is communicate with people. Don’t talk down to them. Don’t use jargon. That was a thing that I never liked when people do, and some people I think just in the policing business do that as they start rolling things off their tongue that nobody in that room understands instead of just simply saying what you saw. So for people listening that are going to do this, that’s an important thing to communicate with these people clearly.
David Lyons:
So I guess the first witnesses were probably on the law enforcement side, right? Without naming anybody, did they bring any family members of the victim to talk about the victim at all in the beginning?
Jayne Ford:
Not really at the beginning, that was more at the end that the family of the victim and a family and friends of the defendant both came in to testify about their character.
David Lyons:
It was probably during sentencing, right, probably when it was-
Jayne Ford:
Yes, mm-hmm.
David Lyons:
Yeah probably, because we’ve talked about that on here how you have that sentencing phase.
Jayne Ford:
Right, so there wasn’t much family in the actual trial.
David Lyons:
Well once they got through with the police because we kind of generally know what to expect on them … Well, let’s go back on that. When the prosecution was done questioning, did the defense cross examine as we would say those police?
Jayne Ford:
Yes, definitely. As far as, “Why did you take this type of evidence but you didn’t look for this?”, or, “Well, are you sure that this is what this said just because it says it on this piece of paper, what does that really mean? This is just paper.” Like one of the facts in the case was that I guess the medical examiner had testified that the chances of the defendant’s DNA being there was a one in, a number I had never heard before, 16 quadrillion chance that it was him as opposed to somebody else. Well, the defense was like, “Well, that’s a number, but did you do this test?”, trying to get you to look at something else and say, “Well, they didn’t really do their job on this particular thing.”
David Lyons:
That’s a common tactic, right? You’ll see that for sure.
Wendy Lyons:
Well, they want to create that reasonable doubt we were talking about.
Jayne Ford:
Exactly.
David Lyons:
Well more than that too, to be honest with you, is they’re kind of hoping for unreasonable doubt. I mean there again, we talk about the common sense thing. If I can walk you down that road, because the trick is I only need one person in that jury room to bite on that and run with it and we’re back on another trial or a not guilty, so it’s pretty important.
Wendy Lyons:
Well, can we get into the premise of what this case even was without mentioning names or going into too many details? Did you know this was going to be a murder case when you went in?
Jayne Ford:
Absolutely not.
Wendy Lyons:
So you walk in and you see the defendant shackled, you don’t know if it’s a DUI or an unpaid car fine or whatever it could be. So at what point did you learn that this was in fact a murder case?
Jayne Ford:
Well, to backup a little bit, when we went into that room with the 20 or 30 of us and we all came in individually, that’s when we sat down and that’s when the judge looked at us and said, “I want you to realize this is at least a two week commitment and this is a death penalty case.” So she did say that at that point.
Wendy Lyons:
So you knew, so then I guess they start getting into the details of that case, of what happened that particular day or night?
Jayne Ford:
Mm-hmm.
Wendy Lyons:
Can you give us a little bit of what this case even was?
Jayne Ford:
It was a murder case that occurred here in Lexington in 2005. It was a woman that was murdered, the defendant was accused of strangling her and sodomizing her. She died, according to the medical examiner, of suffocation by strangulation. And then we also had a separate charge of sodomy. And she did have head injuries as well.
David Lyons:
When the judge mentioned not only it was a murder case, but a capital murder case, which in Kentucky means the death penalty could apply, what did that feel like to sit in that room and have that dropped in your lap? Did you get an emotional response to that?
Jayne Ford:
I did. I think it made my heart just race at that point because you’ve got all these strangers looking at you and thinking, “Is this person going to make the right decision for my client?” And then you also are thinking, and I thought about this a lot during the trial and even afterwards, you’re determining the future of this man’s life and you’re affecting not only him, his family, but the victim, her family, so there’s a lot of people’s lives at stake and their future, and there’s a lot riding on that decision. So that’s why you want to ultimately make sure obviously you’re doing the right thing based on the evidence that you get, that you are making the right decision.
David Lyons:
An incredible responsibility. Never been there, but I know that’s how I would look at it. And again, I love doing this because people from the outside that have never done it, I think they make assumptions, “Well, I would do this or I would do that,” and I think until you’ve been saddled with that responsibility and that accountability, I don’t think it’s fair for people to second guess. I’ve never liked second guessing juries anyway. Even when I didn’t really agree with what they did, that’s the system we have and you accept what they come up with.
Jayne Ford:
Right.
David Lyons:
Well good deal. Moving forward, so we’ve got the first witnesses, they crossed them. Let me ask you this. Did you start to get impressions on how you felt about the prosecuting attorney and the defense attorneys on how they handled people? I guess what I’m getting at, did their character make you want to believe them or not believe them or did you get frustrated with some of the tactics from time to time? How’d that feel from the jurors’ perspective?
Jayne Ford:
As far as the prosecution, I mean they were very calming in the way they spoke, presented things very methodically, did not say, “You have to see this. You need to see this.” It was, “This is what we have. This is how I present this,” etc. And then we felt, again in deliberations, that the defense attorney was very … Would just kind of jump on certain things and say, “Well, you need to look at this,” or, “You have to look at why they didn’t do this. They’re not doing their job. You need to see this because of my client.”
Jayne Ford:
And it was actually getting towards the end in closing arguments where we were allowed to know that the defendant had some prior misdemeanor convictions, but we were not allowed to know anything else about him, which turns out, we found out after the fact, that he actually had a pending rape arrest. The defense attorney came to us and said, “Well, you have to see that he is not a bad man. Yes, he’s had some shoplifting and he’s written a few bad checks, but that’s because he’s trying to provide for his family. He is not,” and this was something I do remember the defense attorney saying, “He is not a man who takes planes and crashes them into the side of buildings.”
David Lyons:
Yeah, that’s on the wake of 9/11.
Jayne Ford:
Yeah.
David Lyons:
That’s a stretch. Okay, I hadn’t heard that one. But I do like the thing about taking care of your family because I know when we wanted a boat, I just started shoplifting myself, and that way I figured whatever money I saved by shoplifting, we could apply to the boat.
Wendy Lyons:
It just goes in our pocket, yeah.
David Lyons:
I mean that’s a common thing, that’s just the way I look at it. So yeah, it’s … But again, their whole thing is they’ve got to be passionate. Did you ever get frustrated with that tactic? Did it ever look like it went over the edge?
Jayne Ford:
Yes, I would say we did. And again in deliberations, we talked about that was like, “Wow, it was really trying to drive that point of I know that’s their job to create that little bit of doubt,” but it was just so much and so much and there was so much testimony against him from the prosecution side that the evidence, you were seeing how this was going. And it felt uncomfortable to be, I don’t want to say … We weren’t bullied, but just the way they presented it from the defense point to just shove it down your throat.
David Lyons:
That’s an interesting perspective. So I guess if attorneys are listening, maybe take note on that.
Wendy Lyons:
Don’t do that, they don’t like it.
David Lyons:
Exactly. And I’ve always suspected that. I know from times when I’ve been crossed, is that if it ever left … Because we understand it was going to be aggressive, it had to be, and we understand if you didn’t have your material together, you had that coming. If you’re not ready, you don’t belong up there doing that, so you knew if you had something on there. But every now and then, I could pick up if they really went hard like that, and I was watching the jury, you could almost watch the heads start to shake, the eyes roll, the impatience come up. And I thought, “Man, I don’t think you’re doing your client any favors.” Yeah, I could really sense that if I could grab you by the ear right now, we’re not agreeing with what we’re doing today, I’d tell you, “hey, back off,” not because I’m having a rough day of it.
David Lyons:
But I think the best insult you can give an attorney is if they argue with you outside the courtroom is to look at one and say, “I think you’ve put more people in prison than I have,” because of the fact there’s a fine line. And being able to read the people in a jury, I think that’s important. But I can tell people that’s not always the case though, is that I’ve been in trial with some people who were fantastic attorneys, fantastic, and when they’re questioning you in their cross and you know exactly where they’re going and you’re like I would go the same way.
David Lyons:
Fran Root said in an episode not too ago-
Wendy Lyons:
That most of his friends were defense attorneys, I remember him saying that.
David Lyons:
Yeah, so I think TV and movies, once again, makes it look like everybody hates each other, but you grow an immense amount of respect for these. And even when they lean in hard, you’ve got to have an appreciation for that passion, is they’re advocating for those people. But the law of diminishing returns is in there somewhere too, so interesting stuff.
David Lyons:
Now again with these witnesses, was there anything that a witness could do that would start to, from a juror perspective, lose credibility? Is there anything they could say or the way they’d act?
Jayne Ford:
Not that I could think of because I remember when the police were testifying, that they had notebooks and notebooks of documentation. When they were asked a specific question they’d say, “Let me refer to my notes please.” They’d go through and look and look and look and find that answer, so you felt that they were very well-prepared. So there wasn’t really anything I can see that would dismiss credibility.
David Lyons:
Good deal. Who was the lead detective, do you remember?
Jayne Ford:
It was Bill Brislin.
David Lyons:
Oh, Bill? Yeah, great. We hope we get Bill back on again. Bill’s fantastic.
Wendy Lyons:
I just hope he didn’t cry.
David Lyons:
Yeah, exactly.
Wendy Lyons:
Sorry Bill.
Jayne Ford:
No, he was very professional.
David Lyons:
Yeah, he is. Yeah. I hope we get him back again, he was a joy to work with for sure.
Wendy Lyons:
Yeah, he was great. Sidebar here, he’s now gone back into policing as a patrolman after 20 years of policing, and now he’s gone back to be a patrolman, so he really loves policing and you can tell his heart’s in it.
Jayne Ford:
Oh yeah, and he’s a wonderful guy. We got to know him very well after the trial through what we’re going to have to talk about later.
David Lyons:
Yeah, definitely. And for our listeners without being too obscure on it, if you want to hear him, listen to the five episodes on the murder of Umi Southworth, and you’re in for a treat. Yeah, that was one of our favorite ones to put together because of the fact that two other detectives were in this studio and did that with him. That was fantastic stuff.
David Lyons:
Well, let’s move then from the police. Did the defense in themselves, did they start to put on witnesses when it switched over to their opportunity?
Wendy Lyons:
Hey, you know there’s more to this story, so go download the next episode like the true crime fan that you are.
David Lyons:
The Murder Police Podcast is hosted by Wendy and David Lyons, and was created to honor the lives of crime victims so their names are never forgotten. It is produced, recorded, and edited by David Lyons.
David Lyons:
The Murder Police Podcast can be found on your favorite Apple or Android podcast platform, as well as at murderpolicepodcast.com, which is our website, and it has show notes for imagery and audio and video files related to the cases you’re going to hear. We are also on Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, LinkedIn, and YouTube, which has closed caption available for those that are hearing impaired.
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David Lyons:
Lock it down Judy.
Part 2 of 2
Wendy Lyons:
Warning: The podcast you’re about to listen to may contain graphic descriptions of violent assaults, murder and adult language. Listener discretion is advised.
David Lyons:
Well, let’s move then from the police. Did the defense and themselves, did they start to put on witnesses when it switched over to their opportunity?
Jayne Ford:
They did. They had a few witnesses that were friends of the defendant. There were a couple people that testified that he was a very even-keeled guy, did not have a temper, was dependable.
Jayne Ford:
They did have one witness that, when he testified … I guess the attorneys, they interview people before trials. The defense attorney had interviewed him about saying that he saw the defendant do this or not do this. Then when he got up to testify, his statement was, “I don’t remember.” He kept saying, “I don’t remember. I don’t know.” The defense attorney got very angry with him, because she said, “You said that you would testify to this fact, and now you’re saying you don’t remember.” That was an awkward feeling, because you could sense the tension.
David Lyons:
Sure. Understandably. Again, the defense attorney’s got a job to do, and they think they’ve got that lined up, and somebody pulls that rug out at the last minute. I can understand that completely.
David Lyons:
Did the defendant testify?
Jayne Ford:
He did not.
David Lyons:
Yeah. That’s rare when they do. That’s rare when they do.
David Lyons:
Did they bring anybody on to try to alibi him, or anything that was actually direct testimony to work against the prosecution case?
Jayne Ford:
They did. They had, again, some more friends. They actually, I think it was his current girlfriend who was there and mentioned what a nice guy he was, and he would never do anything like this. But you were getting the sense that you didn’t really hear any concrete things. It was just, “Yeah. He’s a nice guy. He does this.”
Jayne Ford:
But then we also learned, one of the people who testified, I can’t remember who it was, that mentioned about he was a good dad. They followed it up with, the defense, about, “He’s a father. Can you tell us about his kids and stuff?” Apparently, he had, at the time, eight children by eight different women.
David Lyons:
Did the jury take a signal from that, do you think? Without going into too much detail, because we don’t want to talk about direct things said in the deliberation room. Did you have an impression that it affected his credibility?
Jayne Ford:
Well, of course that doesn’t say whether or not he did or didn’t. It has nothing to do with the actual did he murder this.
David Lyons:
Absolutely.
Jayne Ford:
That’s what you had to get past. But it sounded like, well, maybe he’s not very dependable, as other people were saying, because he’d had these other misdemeanor convictions. But you look at character, but of course, that doesn’t have anything to do with the murder, but you start thinking and looking and going …
David Lyons:
Did that testimony come out during a defense examination, or with the [inaudible 00:03:40].
Jayne Ford:
It was defense.
David Lyons:
Wow. Okay. Interesting. That’s a different tactic. I would just say that sounds risky, but I’m not them. Maybe they were trying to make it look like he had that much responsibility to take care of.
Jayne Ford:
Right, and that’s why he was a hard working person.
David Lyons:
There we go. Okay. That’s where they were headed. But I think that sometimes that’s a razor’s edge, because it can also lead to different impressions. Right, wrong, or indifferent, they’re there.
Jayne Ford:
Right.
David Lyons:
They’re there.
Wendy Lyons:
Yeah. I think that certainly … That wouldn’t have been a positive light had I heard that. Would just think … I don’t know that I would say great dad, that almost borderlines professional dad, if you’ve got kids by eight women. But yeah. I think that would’ve, for me, and this is just my opinion, that would’ve probably shown a very negative light for me. I would’ve thought, “Wow. That’s a lot.” But I guess that was their strategy with that.
Wendy Lyons:
You hear these different witnesses coming on and speaking. I’ve always wondered, and I’m not trying to jump ahead, at what point, when you all go back to the deliberating room, I guess it is, I’ve always wondered, when you watch shows and they go back to the jury room, or they say jury came out after four hours, three hours, two days, whatever it is, I always thought, do you just go back to this table and sit down and say, “Well, what do y’all think?”
Wendy Lyons:
I’ve always wondered, because I’ve not done it. Is there a method to it, or do you all just say, “Hi. My name’s Wendy. I think he’s guilty.” I’ve just wondered that. How does that happen?
David Lyons:
Well, before we get in the room, because I do want to get there too, and those are perfect. That’s exactly what … God, I can’t wait to get there. But couple of housekeeping things. Did you ever have that thing like people see on TV, where somebody yells, “I object”? Did that happen a lot down?
Jayne Ford:
Oh yes. A lot.
David Lyons:
Okay. Yeah. I know what happens is they go to the bench, usually, and talk about it.
Jayne Ford:
Yes.
David Lyons:
When they’re up or talking, how does that feel when they just yell that, and then you don’t hear what’s going on with them? Everybody gather, and it’s … It’s like a little whispery thing. From the jurors’ thing, what’s that feel like when they do that?
Jayne Ford:
Well, you wonder really what are they talking about first of all? What are they actually objecting to? Is it the statement? The question? What is it? Then it just gives you a second to readjust yourself in your chair. People are looking at each other, either rolling their eyes or …
David Lyons:
I love it. I love it. Yeah.
Jayne Ford:
Just stuff like that.
David Lyons:
Did they give you breaks frequently?
Jayne Ford:
We did.
David Lyons:
Yeah.
Jayne Ford:
Some. Yeah, but it was right at almost two weeks of testimony.
David Lyons:
That’s about right for here in town. California, the two weeks would be a preliminary hearing at OJ Simpson.
Jayne Ford:
Right.
David Lyons:
But here, that’s about right now. Did they ever sustain or look over and say, “Strike that,” or, “Disregard that last statement”?
Jayne Ford:
Yes.
Wendy Lyons:
You are going to take my question. We think too much alike.
David Lyons:
Well, okay. Well, you go ahead and ask it, if it would make you feel better.
Wendy Lyons:
Well, my question is, when they say, “Strike that,” and I’ve always wondered … You’re not me. “Forget that question.” You’re not going to forget that question.
Jayne Ford:
Right, right.
Wendy Lyons:
You’re just not.
Jayne Ford:
Or the answer. You’re not supposed to make that as part of your notes. If you’re writing something down, it’s like, well, you got to scratch that out. Then they walk over to the court reporter, and they go over there and have them delete whatever they’ve typed.
Wendy Lyons:
But I would have to think that part of that would still linger in your mind, even though you’re supposed to strike it.
Jayne Ford:
Right. You’re saying, “Well, why did you object to that?”
Wendy Lyons:
Yeah. Why did … Yes. I wouldn’t let it go. I’d keep thinking about it. Now, I’ll never get called.
David Lyons:
I’ve always, I’ve wondered the same thing. Even when I was on the stand and they did it … Again, I’m sitting there thinking, “What do they think over there about that?”
David Lyons:
We don’t know all the time. There was a couple times I knew what they were at the bench for, and especially if [inaudible 00:07:43] me on the stand, [inaudible 00:07:44] the other. But at the same time, you’re like, “What? Who could …”
David Lyons:
I’m not saying to do this, but who really could let that go? It’s a human nature thing. It adds some mystery to it. That’s always like, “That must have been good stuff if [inaudible 00:07:57]”
Wendy Lyons:
Exactly.
Jayne Ford:
Yeah. I’m definitely holding that in my brain.
David Lyons:
Yeah. That’s called a grudge. I’ve got that. I’ve got that. Yeah. I just barely drew over it with my pencil. [inaudible 00:08:06] Fascinating, because again, people have never sat in that room, to have that. On TV, we see it, but it’s real. They go to the bench frequently.
David Lyons:
They’re all trying to … We’ve talked before. They’re trying to protect the record. That’s what this is about is both sides are trying to protect the record.
David Lyons:
I can tell you that a frustration from policemen who are testifying is if the going gets tough, and you have somebody really working you over, a lot of police will get frustrated with the prosecutor, because the prosecutor will not intervene. After a while, you’re almost like, “Hey. Jump in. Any time you want to jump in …”
David Lyons:
I think Ray, the DA, even talked one time before that you don’t always run in and rush into that aid and everything, for a couple reasons. I think one is if they’re being excessively brutal, the jury probably needs to see that. I think the other thing too is, with Ray Larson and his staff, is you’re learning the whole time you’re up there. Trust me. They really cared enough for let you experience that.
David Lyons:
But boy, there were a couple times early on in my career that I was like, “Any time y’all want to start saying, ‘Object,’ and get them off my back, I’ll go along with it.” But that’s not the reality for us.
David Lyons:
I’m glad you talked about that, and I’m glad you asked, Wendy, because that’s exactly what people were thinking. Because they’re like, “The hell I’m going to disregard that. That was hot stuff.”
Wendy Lyons:
Oh yeah.
Jayne Ford:
Right.
David Lyons:
The truth is if it’s really messed up, it’s a mistrial. But the reality of it is …
David Lyons:
That’s another thing too. For example, if you’re testifying, and they’re like, ‘Well, how did you encounter Wendy [inaudible 00:09:35]” I’m like, “Well, I recognized her as having a … She was currently wanted for …” Boom. Hammer goes. Somebody yells. That’s a mistrial, because I can’t talk about the fact that she was wanted. It’s a mine field that way. But that’s good stuff.
Jayne Ford:
Right. Like you said, because you’re not allowed to know, on a jury, other than misdemeanor convictions, anything about their past, so we didn’t know until, like I mentioned, afterwards that there was not only the one rape indictment he had, but we found out just a couple of weeks later, it was a second one.
David Lyons:
Yeah. When we circle around back to the verdict, let’s bring that up again.
Jayne Ford:
Okay.
David Lyons:
Because for me, that would be a validator probably, even though it’s not part of the thing, but for the emotional part of what you carry.
David Lyons:
Well, that said, Wendy’s sitting here strapped into her time machine, ready to take us back in a deliberation room. How do you wind up back there? What do they do before you go back to deliberate? Is it, I guess, the closing arguments, all the witness statements and everything?
Jayne Ford:
Right. We had that. That’s when we had the family statements from both sides. Then they gave just a synopsis, both sides. Both were saying, “This is why. Because this was presented this way, this is why you should find them guilty.” Or, “This was presented like this. And because the police were ineffective in doing this and this and this, then you can’t convict.”
David Lyons:
Right. We’re fair game. I’ll be the first … I’ve said it before. We’re fair game. That’s a strategy that can work. You only need one. That’s what people don’t realize. You just need one.
Jayne Ford:
Right.
David Lyons:
I guess now, before they send you back, we talked a little bit about this, and I really want to hit it pretty hard, the instructions. Did they send you back with a mission statement? Tell me what that sounded like, and what that was, and what you thought of it when you got it.
Jayne Ford:
Right. We reached given a few pieces of paper that were stapled that had, “If you find this defendant guilty of murder one, this is what the criteria is for murder one, or murder two, wanton murder.” It went down the list. Then with the sodomy charge too.
Jayne Ford:
When you look at that, each charge, all the wording in that is very, I guess you would call it legalese, very wordy. It was almost a full page on each thing, what qualifies as murder one.
Jayne Ford:
When we got in there, it was very … To try to interpret it, does this qualify as this, that’s where we got into … Not getting too far ahead, that’s where we got into some of our discussions and deliberations.
David Lyons:
Exactly. They’re confusing. When you said legalese, it is. That’s the pinnacle right there is that you’re reading from the statutes, the laws themselves on what the things are to have that.
David Lyons:
I do know that there’s a limit on how much they can explain that to you. Like with the whole thing with reasonable doubt is that if either side goes too far, is it starts to become interpretive and whatever. So that’s a challenge. Again, those elements of those offenses are so specific, right?
Jayne Ford:
Right.
David Lyons:
That it takes that. Because you’ll see people, to this day say, “Well, they should have got murder one. They should have blah, blah, blah.” It’s like, “Well, no.” There’s a thing called elements. Your conversation … If you’re not in that range of elements to even be considered, it’s not even a possibility.
Jayne Ford:
Right. And if we had questions, there were only certain things we could ask, because we would come to a point, we needed the bailiff, who was our communicator, to take the questions to the judge. They would come back and say, “We can’t really answer that. You need to refer to these two paragraphs.”
David Lyons:
There we go. There we go. They send them back to you to school.
David Lyons:
So they charge you with those things. Let’s take it from where Wendy left off. You go to the room that we all see on TV and the movies.
Jayne Ford:
Mm-hmm.
David Lyons:
What happens back there?
Jayne Ford:
Well, it’s a conference room, at least in the courthouse we were in, a conference room. It did have the male, female bathrooms. That was about it. You had new pads and pencils.
Jayne Ford:
Before we actually started deliberations, because I believe the closing arguments ended at about 4:00 on an afternoon, they said, “Well, it’s going to be a long night, so we’re going to order dinner. What do you all want?” So everybody, we actually voted on that. We had two or three choices on dinner, and everybody came up with Parquette.
David Lyons:
Good choice. Randy Kaplan. Yeah, exactly.
Wendy Lyons:
Go, Randy!
David Lyons:
He’s a good friend of mine.
Wendy Lyons:
Po’ boys.
Jayne Ford:
So we had Parquette.
David Lyons:
Yeah, exactly. Good choice. I guess they were warming you up to working together, to come up with a decision.
Jayne Ford:
Right.
David Lyons:
What a way to start. What a way to start.
David Lyons:
Did you have to pick a spokesperson or a leader or anything like that?
Jayne Ford:
They did have a foreperson that we selected. He was a retired teacher. Of course, nobody really wanted to do it, because you’re the one that’s going to … When they say, “Has the jury reached the verdict,” you’re the one … “I don’t want anybody coming after me or anything.” So we let him ….
Jayne Ford:
Being a teacher, I don’t know, he had of a little more of a presence of standing up in front of everybody, and talking and getting questions. “What do you think? What do you think?”
David Lyons:
Good. That’s a good, natural team dynamic going on.
Wendy Lyons:
Or controlling the crowd when they don’t listen.
Jayne Ford:
Yeah.
Wendy Lyons:
“Sit down.”
David Lyons:
Exactly. Too good. Well, that fell together wonderfully then.
Jayne Ford:
Mm-hmm.
David Lyons:
Because sometimes, you hear stories of how that gets to be an issue.
Jayne Ford:
Right.
David Lyons:
But yeah. Somebody to naturally fill in that role. That’s pretty good. That’s pretty good.
Jayne Ford:
Right.
David Lyons:
So you get your po’ boys and whatever you got. The chicken’s really good [inaudible 00:15:11] We’ll plug we’ll plug Parquette thoroughly for …
David Lyons:
Yeah. Just to let people know, the owner is a former police officer that I worked with for years.
Wendy Lyons:
Maybe he’ll give us a free meal for giving a shout out to him.
David Lyons:
No, not Randy.
Wendy Lyons:
We love Parquette, and he’s a great singer.
Jayne Ford:
I’ll take the fries.
David Lyons:
Yeah. You may get a … You said he sings good. We’ll probably get some chicken.
Wendy Lyons:
He was a good singer.
David Lyons:
No, he is.
Wendy Lyons:
He plays guitar and he sings in different places. He’s a great singer.
David Lyons:
He was a great detective too.
David Lyons:
So you get back and you select-
Wendy Lyons:
Well, I have to ask. I like to break things down by piece and piece. While you’re waiting on the dinner, is it just casual, or do we just go right on and start digging in to why we’re here?
Jayne Ford:
Well, we decided how to approach it first. Which charge do we take first? Then trying to saying, we need to really interpret these instructions, because everybody was really confused by it. Everybody …
Jayne Ford:
Some people got up and went to the bathroom. They said, “I just need to clear my head. I just need some quiet time,” in the corner of the room, because there was really no place you could go. Because we knew it was coming down to this. That’s how it all started.
Jayne Ford:
Then as we were eating is when we started talking about, “Okay. We’re going to take this one first. Let’s interpret it. Do we have a vote?”
Jayne Ford:
We discussed … We all recap[ed the case to make sure that we all agreed on this is what we heard, or you didn’t hear this, or you know about this part of the investigation was, right, they did this, they did not do this, this is this evidence. How do you … So everybody agreed on the timeline and what happened. Then we discussed it a little bit. That’s when we took our first vote.
David Lyons:
Did it feel like it … Was there a consensus starting to come together on the first vote, do you think?
Jayne Ford:
Yes.
David Lyons:
Again, we can’t get into too much detail back there, because I really think that we got to walk carefully. But did you get a sense that there were dominant personalities coming out in a room, or did you have people that were maybe slower coming to that consensus?
Jayne Ford:
A little bit of both, actually. There were a couple people who were very adamant one way, and then some other people saying, “Well, now we need to look at this. Now, let’s look at this, but let’s back up and let’s do this,” and kind of start over. So brought those people that were just like, “This. This is how I feel,” down to a little more even keel so we could look at everything and every aspect.
David Lyons:
Now, on, I guess, that first straw vote, you said it felt like a consensus was coming in. I liked the idea that they actually started to challenge information a little bit, step back. That’s a healthy thing. I’d be worried if that didn’t happen really.
David Lyons:
About how long were y’all in before you actually came to a conclusion? How long were you in that room? Did you work through the night? Did you come back in the morning?
Jayne Ford:
We did stay till very late that night. We had initial verdict. After that, we had to send a note to the bailiff. Then they wanted us to work on the sentencing, which was another set of rules and papers.
David Lyons:
Yeah, for sure. Well, let’s walk through those pieces a little bit. So late in the night, you send a note saying that you’ve reached a verdict.
Jayne Ford:
Mm-hmm.
David Lyons:
What verdict did the jury unanimously come up with?
Jayne Ford:
We came up with guilty of wanton murder, and guilty of first degree sodomy.
David Lyons:
Gotcha. So they march you all back out in the courtroom, I guess.
Jayne Ford:
Yes.
David Lyons:
The foreperson, that sounds like an incredible person to step up and do that too, by the way, goes ahead and announces that verdict.
Jayne Ford:
Right.
David Lyons:
Was there much of a response in the courtroom when that was read?
Jayne Ford:
Just from the mother of the victim. I guess, obviously, probably relief that there was some quote justice for her daughter. There was no reaction from the defendant, but his sister was quite boisterous. They had to actually take her out of the courtroom.
David Lyons:
It’s a supercharged moment, understandably, on both sides. I could never really be too critical of that myself, because the emotional charging is incredible. Because both those families waited all night.
David Lyons:
I used to … Myself, I would wait with them. I didn’t care how late it went. Sometimes it went to the early hours of the morning. But that anticipation of that wait is horrible on both sides.
David Lyons:
Speaking for the suspect’s family, they love that person. That’s family. That’s a friend. They’re in their camp. That’s terrifying. They’re losing somebody. They’re watching them go through that.
David Lyons:
That’s why I ask. Sometimes you get reactions out of the crowd, and sometimes you don’t.
David Lyons:
So you announce that. What happens next?
Jayne Ford:
Then the judge asked each one of us, “Is that your true verdict?” Went through all of us. Then they filled out some papers and did some stuff.
Jayne Ford:
She turned to us and says, “Now, you have the sentencing phase of the trial. You have two different things to decide, the sentence on the wanton murder, and the sentence on the sodomy.” Of course, as you know, they talk about the mitigating and aggravating circumstances, to consider that.
Jayne Ford:
So we went back into the room. That was probably another, I want to say, three hours maybe.
David Lyons:
What time in the morning are we talking about wrapping up then?
Jayne Ford:
It was around midnight maybe.
David Lyons:
Gotcha. Okay.
Jayne Ford:
Did you get more food?
David Lyons:
Yeah, they brought in-
Wendy Lyons:
Because I’m thinking it’s time to eat again.
Jayne Ford:
Mm-hmm. They actually brought us some … Is it Baskin Robbins? I’m trying to think. They had to get it before they closed, but it was cold.
David Lyons:
Yeah. Get you sugared up. [inaudible 00:21:00]
Jayne Ford:
Right.
Wendy Lyons:
Because it might be a long night.
Jayne Ford:
Right, right.
David Lyons:
On the sentencing part, did they produce witnesses and statements and stuff before you went back to deliberate sentencing? Did anyone …
Jayne Ford:
No.
David Lyons:
Nobody did?
Jayne Ford:
They did not.
David Lyons:
Even on the defense?
Jayne Ford:
No.
David Lyons:
Yeah? Usually, somebody comes in, like what you saw before, to kind of pinch hit on character and stuff like that.
Jayne Ford:
Right.
Wendy Lyons:
Do you recall, on that wanton, what are the parameters of that? What is that defined? It’s obviously not a murder one. What is that?
Jayne Ford:
Gosh, if I can remember. A lot of it is did they intentionally harm the victim knowing that it could cause death, I think.
David Lyons:
It’s a mental state issue. You summed it up pretty well. Is that it’s basically that I’m going to carry on with a conduct that I know could cause serious physical injury or death, and I go forward anyway. It’s below intentional, to where I’m focusing on doing this, but for whatever reason, I’m going to go down this path and do that.
David Lyons:
A lot of times, if the jury isn’t comfortable with intentional, if they didn’t feel like that was put across real good, they’ll fall back to that one. Because it’s still a degree of murder. So yeah. You still remember it well.
Jayne Ford:
It’s been a long time.
David Lyons:
Exactly. Good deal.
David Lyons:
So you go back in the room. Just in general, how was … Was everybody tired?
Jayne Ford:
Oh yes. Obviously physically, mentally, of course, because it’s been a long two weeks. We were not sequestered, but we were not allowed to talk about it with our families. Now of course, how are you going to really control that when you go home every night? You don’t know.
Jayne Ford:
But I did not discuss that with my husband. I think he eventually figured it out, because what I learned later was that the media locally was covering the story. Actually, when we left the courtroom, the media trucks were outside reporting on it. At that point, I figured, wow, this must have been a pretty big case. Of course, we didn’t know.
David Lyons:
Sure. As far as being tired, because I guess the emotional pin pulled on that, they did let you go home and rest before you came back and deliberated.
Jayne Ford:
Right.
David Lyons:
That would probably give you a fresh battery start on that. So you’re back in early the next morning, I guess. Did people have a pretty good idea where …
David Lyons:
Here’s where I want to go too. Was the death penalty now off the table?
Jayne Ford:
It was.
David Lyons:
Okay. That’s what I figured.
Jayne Ford:
That was a big part of the deliberations at first, because a lot of people went back and forth with it, because we knew that was a possibility. But we felt that it met the parameters more of wanton murder.
David Lyons:
Good. Yeah.
Jayne Ford:
So that took that off the table.
David Lyons:
That’s what juries are for. They’re the ones that assess that.
David Lyons:
So you come back the next morning. How was the atmosphere when you came in, as far as did people have an idea where they wanted to go on sentencing and punishment?
Jayne Ford:
I think. We still were a couple more hours, again, going through each charge, because the judge had given us, it can be life without parole, it could be life with a possibility of parole after 25 years. Then the sodomy charge was another, I believe, 20 years to serve concurrently, I believe. So we had to make that decision. So those three right there.
David Lyons:
In the end, did they come back and do those two concurrently [inaudible 00:24:25]
Jayne Ford:
Yes, mm-hmm.
David Lyons:
Gotcha. That means they serve them at the same time, is pretty much what that means, instead of one after the other. That’s what that comes down to.
Wendy Lyons:
So really, you’re kind of only serving one.
David Lyons:
Right. Yeah. It’s a concurrent. It depend upon how the jury feels about it. Sometimes they’ll lay it out as consecutive, where you’ll actually do that kind of calendar time, that it’ll add up. I think the most calendar years I got on somebody was 180 of consecutive sentencing. Be probably eligible for parole in two years, but that’s a whole ‘nother topic.
David Lyons:
I guess you make that final vote and come out. Any reaction on the sentencing? Did anybody in the courtroom, when they finally announced a sentence?
Jayne Ford:
No.
David Lyons:
Yeah. I guess the initial shock is that guilty thing then.
Jayne Ford:
Right.
David Lyons:
Anything else about it that struck you when you were going through this? Let me ask you this. Did any of the attorneys interview any of you all after the trial, to poll you, to ask any questions or anything like that?
Jayne Ford:
Not the attorneys, but the judge did come back and talk to us.
David Lyons:
Okay. Yeah. Tell me about that then.
Jayne Ford:
The judge came back to us, and wanted to thank us for serving, and just ask us in general, “Do you look at things a little differently now that you’ve gone through the process, as opposed to watching it on TV?” Like you said, evidence is collected, convicted, and everything’s done in an hour. Well, that’s obviously not the way it goes.
Jayne Ford:
She asked us about it, and also asked us how we were feeling as far as psychologically, because it was traumatic in a point that there were several graphic photos that we had to look at for the autopsy. They were pretty compelling. She asked us if we felt that any of us needed a type of counseling to help sleep, because she said a lot of times juries in murder trials have problems sleeping. “Did I make the right decision? Did I not?” Thinking of the families, thinking of a lot of things.
Jayne Ford:
So she offered us counseling, and just wanted to know, did we have any different opinions about the system and the process at this point?
David Lyons:
Pretty interesting. Yeah. Who was the judge?
Jayne Ford:
Her name was Pamela Goodwine.
David Lyons:
Yeah. Fantastic. One of my favorites. We’ll give a shout out to her. She’s fantastic. I really like Judge Goodwine.
David Lyons:
That’s neat that they took the time to come out and actually talk to you about that, and then offer something. Because again, you just get a summons in the mail. You go, and you’re propelled into all that violence, and all the graphic imagery and stuff like that.
Jayne Ford:
Right. And you’re asked to believe people you don’t know. They’re strangers to you all. So they got to be pretty convincing to convince you of their evidence.
David Lyons:
People make a lot of assumptions on that, I’m sure.
Jayne Ford:
Mm-hmm.
Wendy Lyons:
Did you or anybody take the judge up on that offer for counseling? Or did you personally not feel it affected you bad enough that you needed to?
Jayne Ford:
I know a couple of people did.
David Lyons:
Good.
Jayne Ford:
We also agreed that after we were free, so to speak, to go, that we could talk about the case amongst each other. Those of us on the jury, we actually got together after a couple of weeks, after decompressing, and we met at … the person who was the foreperson … We met at his house and had a potluck dinner.
David Lyons:
That is awesome.
Wendy Lyons:
That’s [inaudible 00:27:46]. Do you all still stay in touch to this day?
Jayne Ford:
Not as much. Unfortunately, I know some of the people that were on the jury have passed away. They were elderly, and this was 2006. But a lot of us did stay in touch for quite a while. We did get together once every couple of months just to kind of …
Jayne Ford:
That first potluck was really about the, “God. Can you believe this happened? Can you believe they said this?” Because we could now say that, where we couldn’t do that before. “How did that make you feel? Did it sway you this way or that way? Did it make you feel stronger, or did it change your mind about something?” So we really had a lot of round table discussions in a sense.
David Lyons:
That was probably pretty cathartic to handle the rough piece too.
Jayne Ford:
Mm-hmm.
Wendy Lyons:
Well, how about when you hear judges say that they don’t want you to watch the news or talk about it? I know you said you didn’t talk about it with your husband.
Jayne Ford:
Right.
Wendy Lyons:
But did you just not turn on the TV, because if you have the TV on and it pops up, do you just turn it back off?
Jayne Ford:
Right. I just walked out of the room when I knew they were doing local news. I guess that’s me, kind of that journalist in me. I knew I had an ethical …
Wendy Lyons:
Obligation.
Jayne Ford:
Right. To not do that. I wasn’t going to risk it. So I didn’t do it. Like I said, when my husband figured out the case, he was like, “Wow. I can see how you would’ve been feeling,” because this was pretty heavy.
David Lyons:
Absolutely. It’s a lot to be deciding and whatever.
David Lyons:
One thing too that I wanted to talk about. Before we started recording, we brought this up. And I thought it was interesting, and I’ll just tell the listeners. I know Jayne’s been involved with the Citizens Police Academy and the Citizens Police Academy alumni association. We’re going to dig deep, because those are critical, fantastic programs.
David Lyons:
I would say that if somebody out there really is interested in crime, and has that interest, that your local Citizens Police Academy is the first place to beeline to. If you want an experience to take you closer to that and start to develop a relationship with people that do that.
David Lyons:
I’d asked Jayne before we started if you were with the CPA when you went back in the jury room, because I’ve always wondered how that affects people, knowing more about the system.
David Lyons:
What was neat is … Tell me … You weren’t, but this took me off guard, and we got to talk about this. Tell everybody how you learned of the CPA. This is a fantastic story.
Jayne Ford:
Well, it was actually from Judge Goodwine. After she talked to us about if any of us felt we needed counseling, she also asked us, “Did this change your mind about seeing the process of a crime scene investigation and how thorough it is?” A lot of people were saying yes, and it’s like, “Wow. It’s a lot of work.” You didn’t realize that. Because it is more than just the 30 seconds you see on TV.
Jayne Ford:
She said, “Well, if you’re interested in learning more, there is a program here in Lexington. It is called the Citizens Police Academy. It’s,” at the time, I think, “10, 12 weeks, where actual police officers, detectives come in, and they teach you different aspects of the police department and their departments. It’s presented to local citizens. You can learn a lot about it.”
Jayne Ford:
I thought, “Well, that sounds really appealing to me,” because I’ve always been, even in my youth, a closet want to be crime person. Because when I was a kid, I used to love to watch … Now, this gives my age away. But I used to watch a show called The FBI, and I loved detective shows, and I loved Quincy and things like that. I just thought that, “That sounds really cool.”
Jayne Ford:
She had a contact person of the name of Debbie Wagner.
David Lyons:
We have to … Yeah. Debbie is a force in and of herself. Exactly.
Jayne Ford:
She is … There is no one like her. You can’t say that about many people, but there’s nobody like Debbie. She was the coordinator of the program. She said, “If you want to learn more about this, you can call her, and she’ll tell you more.”
Jayne Ford:
I called. There was a class coming up in a couple of weeks, so I signed up, went through the background check and started it. That’s led to my, now, almost 15 year involvement with the CPA and the alumni association.
David Lyons:
Fantastic. I just love the idea that the judge came back and offered that. I just didn’t know that even happened. It’s a good thing.
David Lyons:
I know over my career, first of all, the CPA alumni association is a like group of friends to all of us. It was an amazing support base that was always there. As a matter of fact, me and Wendy just did a online interview back a while back with the CPA. I guess it was an in session class when we did it, I think, because a lot of people listen to the podcast. But to meet up with them.
David Lyons:
Again, the insight that you gain into what the policing is all about, because the exercises … I can tell people that they take you and let you experience what it’s like to do a building search, which is an eye opener, or what it’s like when you conduct a traffic stop. Then the ride alongs, which are incredible.
David Lyons:
I’m glad we brought that up, because it’s an organization that deserves a lot of support. It’s national. I’m going to have to say international. Would I be wrong in saying it’s international?
Jayne Ford:
No. It is international. We had actually … There’s a representative on the NCPAA that we have. She’s from Canada.
David Lyons:
Okay, great. But I would recommend people to seek that out. Now, that we’re thawing out of COVID, as I would imagine more of them are going to start going back to in person, which will be much more enjoyable, especially with the exercises.
David Lyons:
Thanks for participating. And thanks for leading it for as long as you did too. That was pretty impressive. It helped … It made a communication.
David Lyons:
See. Here’s the value again, is that what people need to understand is Jayne had no problem with reaching out and saying, “Hey. I’ve done this.” As soon as you told me you had been a juror on a murder trial, I was like, “This is on. It’s exactly where I want to take this podcast from time to time.” So excellent stuff.
David Lyons:
People out there listening should do the CPA, and then stay involved with the alumni association, because that’s a strong support base.
Jayne Ford:
Right. It’s such a wonderful thing. Because the first night of the class, you meet the chief and the assistant chiefs, how much they support the program. Then like you said, you break down. You learn about drugs and vice and financial crimes and other things. It’s fascinating stuff.
Jayne Ford:
Sometimes the classes would just go on, because everybody’s asking so many questions. Again, to give a shout out to Bill Brislin and Chris Schoonover, on the nights they presented some cases, we’d be there till 11:00 at night. They’d keep going, because the questions kept coming. It was like a great novel. You couldn’t put it down.
David Lyons:
Yeah, exactly. You’ll get information there you won’t get anywhere else.
Jayne Ford:
Right.
David Lyons:
No matter whether it’s on international TV or not.
Jayne Ford:
Right. You got to do … I’m sorry. We got to do things like, when you’re riding along in the car, how they go on the track, and you’re going side to side. That was Kevin Kidd’s specialty. People love that. They love meeting the K9s, the mounted unit.
David Lyons:
Yeah. I think chiropractors pay Kevin to drive that car, because of the neck adjustments that people need after that.
Jayne Ford:
Right.
Wendy Lyons:
I think also it’s great because people get to see the ins and outs. Most people who have not taken that CPA class don’t realize such things that are involved with the police, like you said, as mounted or K9, or the thing that goes into the defensive driving, or the chief all the way down to the patrolmen and the detectives.
Wendy Lyons:
I think they just think you go in, and you ride patrol and you take calls. There’s so much more to it. That class is such an eyeopener, because you don’t think of all the little intricate details that go together to comprise an entire department.
Wendy Lyons:
I’ve taken that as well. You just learn so much that you think, “Wow. I didn’t know they did that.” So yeah. I’m glad you did it as well.
Jayne Ford:
Right. That’s why you stay with the organization. There are people that just take the class and they’re like, “Okay. That was interesting, but I’m not really interested in pursuing it.” But I didn’t want to leave. I felt so strongly about the officers and what they do. You wanted to support them. That’s where the alumni comes in to help raise money for things, and to support the officers in so many ways.
Jayne Ford:
That’s why I then … Well, Debbie, again. After I’d been there a few months, she’s like, “Well, I think you need to run for office.” “Well, I was just going to take the class.” She’s like, “No. You’d be great vice president.” Then I was vice president of the alumni association, then moved up to be president of the alumni association for a couple years.
Jayne Ford:
I should add, tooting the horn of the Lexington CPAA, that we’re the only organization in the nation that has won best Citizens Police Academy four times.
David Lyons:
That’s impressive.
Wendy Lyons:
That is
David Lyons:
That’s impressive.
Jayne Ford:
And Debbie’s won the coordinator of the year.
David Lyons:
No surprise there.
Jayne Ford:
Right.
David Lyons:
Well, for what it’s worth, just remember that the appreciation that we all have, and the people left behind, is incredible. It’s immeasurable. Just for the times that you all have been there when we needed you, for sure. And then coming out of a joint roll call, and seeing tables full of food. That’s how you talk to a cop [inaudible 00:37:08]
Wendy Lyons:
You love those cookouts at the range. I do recall.
David Lyons:
Exactly.
Jayne Ford:
Yeah.
David Lyons:
Yeah. Those are a blast.
Jayne Ford:
Well, that’s where we had some of the best chefs. We had Rick Willoughby.
David Lyons:
Amen. Amen. Yeah, absolutely. Some of the best stuff in the world.
Jayne Ford:
Yes.
David Lyons:
Thank you for coming and doing this. I’m glad you got to meet Wendy, and you met the miniature horses. That’s a big thing here at the Murder Police Podcast studio is out back, the miniature horses.
Jayne Ford:
And the wonder cat.
David Lyons:
Yeah. The wonder cat, Figaro.
Wendy Lyons:
Yeah, the wonder cat.
David Lyons:
Yeah, he is the wonder cat.
David Lyons:
I’ll let Wendy close us out. Thanks again. Appreciate it.
Jayne Ford:
Sure.
Wendy Lyons:
Well, Jayne, thank you so much for coming to join us, and sharing your story with us on your two long weeks serving on the 2005 murder case here in Lexington. I know that was such a sacrifice for you, long days, long nights away from your family. So thank you for doing that and putting so much heart and soul into it. Thank you also for coming to speak with us and share your story. I got to ask all those questions that I’ve wondered. So thank you.
Jayne Ford:
Well, you’re welcome. I’m glad I could do it.
David Lyons:
The Murder Police Podcast is hosted by Wendy and David Lyons, and was created to honor the lives of crime victims so their names are never forgotten. It is produced, recorded and edited by David Lyons.
David Lyons:
The Murder Police Podcast can be found on your favorite Apple or Android podcast platform, as well as murderpolicepodcast.com, which is our website. It has show notes for imagery and audio and video files related to the cases you’re going to hear. We are also on Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, LinkedIn and YouTube, which has closed caption available for those that are hearing impaired.
David Lyons:
If you’ve enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe for more, and give us a five star review on Apple Podcast, or wherever you download your podcasts from. Subscribe to Murder Police Podcast, and set your player to automatically download new episodes so you get the new ones as soon as they drop. Please tell your friends.
David Lyons:
Lock it down, Judy.