Yet another Peterson juror dropped from deliberations

REDWOOD CITY, Calif. – The judge in the Scott Peterson trial took the rare step Wednesday of dismissing yet another juror in the middle of deliberations, replacing the foreman with an alternate who had a connection to the accused.

Judge Alfred Delucchi did not indicate why Juror 5, a doctor and lawyer, was replaced, but said Alternate Juror 3 would fill that seat and once again deliberations would begin anew.

It was unclear whether Juror 5, Gregory Jackson, asked to be relieved or was removed for acting inappropriately. Delucchi noted the removal came over the objections of the defense in an hour-long private hearing this morning.

In a note to Delucchi that was shared with the media pool, Jackson did request that reporters leave him alone. He is under a court’s gag order barring him from talking about the case.

The new juror is a retired man who said during jury selection that his future son-in-law once worked at the same San Luis Obispo, Calif., restaurant Peterson once owned. He was unclear at the time whether the man had had anything more than a passing relationship with Peterson and said it would not enter into his deliberations.

The jury foreman will now be Juror 6, a Half Moon Bay, Calif., firefighter who appeared throughout much of the trial to be disinterested in evidence and testimony. He took few notes, a stark contrast to the former foreman whose note taking gobbled up some 20 notebooks.

“Frankly, I am very surprised,” said James Hammer a former prosecutor evaluating the case for Fox News. “Anything short of a nice, quiet, boring deliberation is bad for the prosecution.”

Hammer said it was rare to lose two jurors during deliberations.

On Tuesday, Delucchi replaced Juror 7, Frances Gorman, with an alternate juror.

While he did not offer an explanation, Delucchi hinted at what courthouse sources had reported earlier – that Gorman was booted for independently researching the case and using the information in deliberations.

Delucchi instructed jurors to decide whether Peterson killed his pregnant wife, Laci, and unborn son using only evidence and testimony presented during the five-month trial.

Gorman is barred from talking about the case until its conclusion.

Alternate Juror 2 filled Gorman’s seat. Known to reporters as “Strawberry Shortcake” for her red hair, she has been an emotional presence on the panel of six women and six men.

She has cried during the display of grisly autopsy photos and laughed at defense jokes.

A mother of four boys, she said during jury selection that she listens to all sides of an argument before making a decision and never takes sides from the get-go. She loves debating hot topics, she said, and said she planned to quit her bank job if picked for jury duty.

Legal analysts pegged her as a defense witness because she has seemed responsive to Los Angeles lawyer Mark Geragos during the trial. She smiles at him and sits at the edge of her seat during his questioning.

But lawyers following the case also cautioned that she could just be hiding her true feelings.

“By all accounts, she was enamored by Mark Geragos,” said Chuck Smith, a former San Mateo County, Calif., prosecutor evaluating the case. “But one could look at this and say, if she’s an emotional person, it could help the prosecution.”

San Mateo lawyer Paula Canny said larger problems could be looming given that the new jury foreman was selected before the Alternate Juror 3 joined the panel. Delucchi indicated that Juror 6 had become the foreman before the new juror was seated.

Canny said all 12 jurors must be allowed to elect the foreman.

Additionally, she said, deliberations seem to have run amok despite Delucchi’s efforts to keep everything on track.

“This is unbelievable,” she said. “The whole purpose of sequestering the jury was to avoid freaky stuff like this. It’s very rare to have a juror excused for doing something improper.”

Jackson is the third juror to be dismissed since the trial began. Jackson was an alternate and replaced the original Juror 5, Justin Falconer, on June 23. Falconer was dismissed for allegedly speaking to Laci Peterson’s brother. Three alternates remain.