The Manhattan judge made the decision after one of the jurors expressed doubt about his ability to be fair and impartial and the other over concerns that some of his answers in court may not have been accurate.
Two jurors in the hush money trial initiated against former United States of America, Donald Trump were dismissed by the court on Thursday.
The Manhattan judge made the decision after one of the jurors expressed doubt about his ability to be fair and impartial and the other over concerns that some of his answers in court may not have been accurate.
The dismissals lowered the number of jurors seated in the first criminal prosecution of a former president to five.
The setbacks in the selection process occurred during a frantic morning in which prosecutors also requested that Trump be held in contempt for a series of social media remarks this week, and the judge in the case prevented reporters from identifying jurors' employers after voicing privacy concerns.
The full jury's seating, whenever it occurs, will be a watershed moment in the case, laying the groundwork for a trial that will centre on the former president's legal woes in the campaign against Democrat Joe Biden, as well as weeks of testimony about Trump's private life before becoming president.
The jury selection process gained speed Tuesday with the selection of seven members. However, on Thursday, Judge Juan Merchan disclosed in court that one of the seven, a cancer nurse, "conveyed that after sleeping on it overnight she had concerns about her ability to be fair and impartial in this case."
Though the names of jurors are kept hidden, the woman stated that her relatives and friends questioned her.
A second seated juror was dismissed after prosecutors raised concerns that may not have been honest in answering a jury selection question by saying that he had never been accused or convicted of a crime.
The IT professional was summoned to court to answer questions after prosecutors said they found an article about a person with the same name who had been arrested in the 1990s for tearing down political posters pertaining to the political right in suburban Westchester County.
A prosecutor had also disclosed that a relative of the man may have been involved in a deferred prosecution agreement in the 1990s with the Manhattan district attorney’s office, which is prosecuting Trump’s case.
Because the juror was questioned Thursday at the judge’s bench, off-microphone and out of earshot of reports, it was not known whether the man confirmed or denied either instance was connected to him.
Twelve jurors and six alternates must be seated to hear the trial. Merchan said Tuesday that opening statements could begin as soon as Monday.
The process of picking a jury is a critical phase of any criminal trial but especially so when the defendant is a former president and the presumptive Republican nominee. Prospective jurors have been grilled on their social media posts, personal lives and political views as the lawyers and judge search for biases that would prevent them from being impartial.
Inside the court, there’s broad acknowledgment of the futility in trying to find jurors without knowledge of Trump. A prosecutor this week said that lawyers were not looking for people who had been “living under a rock for the past eight years.”
But Thursday's events laid bare the inherent challenges of selecting a jury for such a landmark, high-publicity case. More than half the members of a group of 96 prospective jurors brought into the courtroom were dismissed Thursday, most after saying they doubted their ability to be fair and impartial.