Jurors spent the morning deliberating the fate of accused murderer George Huguely V without reaching a verdict.
About an hour into their deliberations, jurors buzzed with their first question. They asked the judge to clarify the meaning of the word “reason” in a legal sense, but the judge told them it had the same meaning as in their everday lives.
Evidence, including Yeardley Love‘s bedroom door with a hole in it, were moved into the jury room earlier as well as a TV monitor, presumably for them to watch Huguely’s video-taped statement to police.
The jurors elected to work through lunch instead of taking a break. Lunches were delivered to the jury room.
The Charlottesville, Va. jury is made up of five women and seven men. Two female alternate jurors were dismissed this morning after being chosen at random.
The alternates were permitted to leave, but remain under oath until the conclusion of the case.
Huguely, 24, faces six charges, including first-degree murder, in the death of former girlfriend Yeardley Love. He pleaded not guilty to all of the charges.
Over 10 days in court, jurors listened to testimony from nearly 60 witnesses and saw a video of Huguely’s police statement, graphic photos of Love’s battered body, and read text and email correspondence between the two.
Though charged with first-degree murder, the judge gave jurors a menu of lesser charges they can choose from: second-degree murder, voluntary manslaughter and involuntary manslaughter. He could also be found not guilty.
Neither the prosecution nor the defense denies that Huguely was in Yeardley’s room the night of her death and was involved in an altercation with her. They differ on the severity of the encounter and whether Huguely was directly and intentionally responsible for Love’s death.
Over the course of the trial, prosecutors painted a portrait of Huguely as a violent and enraged man who savagely beat Love in her bedroom and left her there to die. Prosecutors claimed that Love died from blunt force trauma to the head.
The defense depicted Huguely as a troubled young man whose problems with alcohol spiraled out of control. They described Huguely and Love’s relationship as mutually tempestuous, with both of them jilting and betraying each other. They maintained that Huguely went to Love’s bedroom with the intention to talk to her and that, while things got heated and he pushed her around a bit, he did not do anything severe enough to kill her.
During deliberations, jurors will have the option of looking at evidence from the trial again, including Huguely’s video-taped statement to the police hours after Love’s death. Huguely said he and Love had wrestled on the floor, but that he never struck her.
Before finding out Love was dead, Huguely told police in his video-taped statement that when he went to see his former girlfriend the night of her death he told her to “chill out” and “shook her a little.”
“We were just going to talk,” Huguely told the officer in the video. “It was not at all a good conversation.”
Another key piece of evidence from the trial was an email from Huguely to Love in which he wrote to her, “I should have killed you,” referring to when he found out that she had been with another man. The prosecution used the email to show how angry Huguely was and as an example of his violent nature.
Depending on the jury’s verdict, Huguely could be sentenced to anywhere from one day to life in prison.
Huguely has been in jail for about 21 months and could get credit for time served, so a sentencing of anywhere up to roughly 21 months could allow him to go free.
Two legal experts in Virginia told ABCNews.com that it is possible that Huguely could be free by the end of the week, depending on the jury’s verdict.
“If he were to be convicted for manslaughter, it is a possibility that he would be given a sentence that would mean he was out,” Anne Coughlin, a professor of law at the University of Virginia, told ABCNews.com. “It’s a very significantly reduced penalty when we compare it to the penalty for murder.”
After closely following the trial, Coughlin believes that all four charges are “still on the table.”
Charlottesville attorney Scott Goodman said it is nearly impossible to predict what the jurors will decide since they are the only ones who have seen all of the evidence, which includes emails, text messages and video that the public was not allowed to see.
“They saw the emails, the texts, the video,” Goodman said. “Only those 12 people have seen it.”
The judge has said he hopes to finish this case today. If the verdict is guilty, the jurors will reconvene as early as later today for a sentencing hearing.
Jurors Deliberating George Huguely’s Fate
During a sentencing hearing, Huguely’s parents will likely testify. They have stayed out of court for the duration of the trial so that they would be able to testify at the sentencing. An exception was made for the Love family, who can testify at sentencing, and were allowed inside court during trial.
The defense could also potentially call psych experts or other medical experts to testify on Huguely’s behalf.
Following any final testimony, closing arguments will once again be delivered with prosecutors pleading for how much time they believe Huguely should served based on the convictions he receives.
The jury will then go back into deliberations to decide on a sentence to suggest to the judge. Virginia is one of only a handful of states in the U.S. that allows jurors to deliberate on the sentencing. The jurors will give their suggestion to the judge, who will ultimately have the final say.
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