Assistant DA McCullough has a thing for cake. In his questioning of prospective jurors the Assn't DA today took a pass three times in a row when three (all black) folks answered one of his questions the wrong way.
The question had to do with whether the prospective juror could convict someone on "circumstantial" evidence or would they need "direct" evidence in order to convict. The example of "direct" evidence he used was that of an eyewitness (he didn't mention how unreliable eyewitnesses can be).
The example of "circumstantial evidence" was a rather comical spiel that went like this: "You've just baked a cake with your child. You leave it on the kitchen table. You go out of the room and when you come back there is a piece taken out of it. Your child is standing there with frosting all over his/her lips". He asks if, under those circumstances, could you find your way to convicting someone even though there was no "direct" evidence?
Well, three black folks in a row said similar things. One said that he would have to look around and see if the frosting on the kid's lips was the same color or if he had eaten a doughnut in the interim. That guy was dismissed. One lady asked: "Is this a trick question?" and then said she'd have to take ALL the evidence, both direct and circumstantial into account. She was given the boot. The other person said something similar and was summarily dismissed as well.
I mention that they were black because it was apparent that whenever a white person got on the stand to be interrogated they couldn't say anything wrong. Right after these three were dismissed a white guy got up on the stand and the Assn't DA didn't even ask him the "cake" question and then said he was acceptable to the State. The Defense attorney rejected him, thank goodness.
It must have been very important to the Assn't DA to get rid of those folks who insisted on considering ALL the evidence because he used his last three "preemptive" votes (i.e. dismissals for no reason).
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