The 911 Call

We read along from copies of the transcript as the tape was played.

"911. What’s your emergency?"

Then Alan Simon's voice explaining that someone had been pounding on his door, very aggressive, yelling something about Kathy.

The operator asking him his address and whether the person was still there.

The sound of Alan opening his front door, saying something, then the "pop," Alan cursing in surprise, the door slamming, then the rapid "pop-pop-pop-pop-pop-pop-pop-pop-pop."

Alan’s shocked voice saying, "He SHOT me"" The operator inquiring as to his injuries, asking if the man was still there.

Alan asking where the sheriffs were, couldn't they please hurry, maybe call the Westport fire department and get them to turn the fire siren on to scare the shooter away, just in case he was still there.

Her patient voice explaining it would take at least 20 minutes for the sheriffs to get from Fort Bragg to Westport, that the Westport fire department couldn't come yet because it might not be safe – the shooter might still be in the area.

The call lasted probably 15 minutes, ending when a sheriff arrived at the door and identified himself and the operator verified that it was indeed a sheriff, and not the shooter.

There was something visceral about Alan's shock, and about hearing first the adrenaline in his voice and then hearing his speech slow down as the jolt began to wear off.

Everyone on the jury agreed, the operator had done a wonderful job calming him down and staying with him, although he still must have felt very alone. Not a job any of us wanted, we all said.

The Red Dog

During his trial for the shooting of Alan Simon, Richard Peacock got an anonymous note at the jail. It said in part, "I will get the Red Dog to your kid." Richard Peacock burst out in open court with "Red Dog is a gun! They're gonna kill my daughter!" The prosecution's contention was that Richard Peacock was correct. The defense of course had something else in mind.

On about the third day of the trial, we entered the courtroom to face a 5-foot stuffed replica of Clifford the Big Red Dog. I knew things were about to get very interesting.

The defendant's wife testified that day that Kenny Rogers had won the big toy at Great America by climbing a rope ladder. The dog had spent some time with other prizes he'd won -- a unicorn and an octopus -- in their kids' bedrooms, in a storage space and in the office of their Sacramento auto body shop. She testified that because she had "fallen in love with" Richard Peacock's baby daughter, she and her husband had talked over the years about giving her the Red Dog. (This was the same daughter, it turned out, who was present at Kenny Rogers' property during pot harvest season.)

So, the Red Dog was either a gun with a red handle that had a dog logo on it (prosecution) or a giant stuffed animal (defense). The Red Dog took up residence in the jury deliberation room, the goofy tongue-out grin presiding as the twelve of us discussed. In some ways it was inconsistencies about the giant dog that decided the case. Here is some of what was said:

"That's not just any red dog, that's Clifford. Anyone who has a kid at home would call this thing 'Clifford.'"

"If this was in a kid's room for any length of time, it wouldn't look this clean."

"It sells musty, like it's been in storage longer than they said."

"If it had been stored in an auto detailing shop, even in the office, it would have grime and dust on it."

To us it was unlikely that the Red Dog was this toy.

Reluctant witness: The shooter's brother

A witness for the prosecution, Michael Peacock had been granted immunity in exchange for his testimony. Thin and jumpy, he looked like he could have used a shower.

From the moment he took the stand, I felt like Mr. Spock in the old Star Trek episode when he mind-melded with a rock (which was actually a sentient being) and when his hand touched it he wailed, "Pain!" This man was frightened, he spoke in many unique phrases, and he seem accustomed to being trapped:

"Is this the car owned by your brother's girlfriend?"

"I'm not for sure she owns it. She was driving it, but whether it's her car or not I can't say."

"Did you testify on Friday that you saw your brother on the day before the shooting, and that he told you he was bringing a gun to Westport, just in case?"

By the end of the long complex questions the ADA asked, Michael Peacock forgot what the question was and vamped with a bunch of filler: "I'm not for sure, uh, that is, it might have happened that way, but I don't recall exactly."

The prosecutor began to get impatient, raising his voice and repeating the questions with exactly the same confusing clauses.

Defense attorney: "How did you feel when Kenny kicked you off his property?"

Michael Peacock: "I felt unjusted by the whole thing."


ADA: "What was the relationship of your brother and Miss ___ ?"

Michael Peacock: "I'm not for sure what you mean?"

ADA: "What was Miss ____ to him?"

Michael Peacock: "One night stand."


Although I can't recall the context now, a phrase he used many times was "That's a horse of a different color." During deliberations, we had many examples of "on the one hand, on the other hand," and several times a few of us said in unison, "Now that's a horse of a different color!"


About six weeks after the verdict, Michael Peacock was found dead in this Placer County travel trailer. Homicide is suspected.

The 3-hour "45-minute break"

I felt exhausted from paying such close attention -- every detail seemed vital because I couldn't tell what would be important in the long run.

Each piece of evidence followed a similar pattern. "Do you recognize this?"

("Yes.")

"What is it?"

("Front door, Ruger, shell casings, bullet fragments.")

"How did you first encounter this piece of evidence?"

("Night of the shooting, processed it according to protocol.")

Glacially, the narrative crept along, slowly, gradually building into a coherent story.


Several times the jury was "excused" (read: invited to leave the courtroom) while legal maneuverings were carried out. The most memorable of these was when the shooter himself was called to testify.

Already convicted and serving a sentence of 70 years to life, Richard Peacock (all the "Clue" jokes have already been made) was wheeled into the courtroom handcuffed and shackled to a wheelchair. He wore an orange jumpsuit with a black-and-white striped vest over it. He looked many pounds more gaunt than the man in the photo glaring balefully from the back of a sheriff's car.

He nodded to the jury. "Hiya. How's it going?" As the lawyers conferred with the judge, the bailiff unlocked one cuff and applied a band-aid to a bloody scrape on Mr. Peacock's wrist.

Conference finished, the shooter was sworn in and declared that he wanted an attorney and an hour to meet with him so as not to do or say anything to jeopardize his appeal. A female public defender's name was read out, and Mr. Peacock went ballistic. "Nah, nah, nah, nah!" he bellowed. "I wouldn't take that broad for all the tea in China!"

The judge told him to keep a civil tone, and then said to us, "Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, we'll need to conclude some legal business, so take a 45-minute break."

That break stretched to three hours, and the only other time I saw Richard Peacock was when he was being wheeled into the elevator by a deputy. He was laughing and cheerful.

That night on Yahoo! News I saw a local headline, "Alleged Mendocino Hit Man Refuses to Testify." I recalled the judge's daily admonitions about avoiding media coverage of the trial, and I forced myself not to read the article.

Three generations in the courtroom

For several days I saw an elderly couple in the front row of the gallery. The woman listened to the proceedings with an audio-enhancing device provided by the court. The man wore the scowl of bewilderment I have seen on many old faces. These were the parents of the defendant. Like his son, the father was lean and probably extremely handsome in his younger days. Now he looked tired and pugnacious, sported the same sneer at times, a certain curl of the lip.

Watching that couple and the two young men sitting with the defendant's wife, I thought about how families' philosophies are passed down wordlessly, a strange amalgam of parents' actions and their interpretation by immature minds. I wondered whether Dad had, unwittingly or otherwise, taught the defendant a "might-makes-right" view of the world, and also whether the defendant's two sons had inferred it from their father's behavior.

The majority of jurors said they spent some time sleepless over the effect of the verdict on the defendant's parents.

After we rendered the verdict and had been dismissed, we read in the Santa Rosa Press Democrat an exact answer to my musings about fathers and sons: After we left the courtroom, the defendant's first-born let loose a string of obscenities at the lead detective, the dominant theme being, "You were out to get my dad. If it hadn't been for you - " Another generation learns to lay blame and take no responsibility.

"Jury will disregard"

We heard from Alan Simon, the man whose front door, bookshelf, scalp and wrist had felt the effects of 9 nine-millimeter bullets.

At one point the DA apologized for a delay springing from technical issues with an overhead projector. "No problem," said Alan. "I've waited 4 years, what's another 10 minutes?"

He described how the defendant had come to his home and asked Alan to remove his name from the recall petition. Alan refused.

"What happened then?" asked the DA.

"You want to know what happened next?" Pause. He looked genuinely uncomfortable, took a deep breath.

"Mr. Rogers said, 'Do you want a nigger running this town? Do you want this town run by VB, who's sucked the c***k of every man up and down the coast?'"

Defense counsel, in a bored voice, said, "Objection. Hearsay."

Judge: "Sustained. Jury will disregard."

DA: "Tell the jury what happened after that."

Simon: "I said to him, 'You don't know how I was raised. You don't know what I believe. It's not what you believe. Now get out of my house.'"

I admit I've never understood how exactly a jury manages to disregard something they've already heard, and it didn't get any clearer for me in this case. Alan Simon's words stuck with me, wormed their way into my psyche. The contrast between the defendant's cordial courtroom demeanor and that reported spew of racism and misogyny shook me to my core. I admit it stayed in my consciousness as we deliberated. A few other jurors said the same thing. Later I came back to Alan Simon's testimony as a confirmation that we had made the right call.

(My recollection of this exchange is different from that of the reporter in the summary here. The reporter recalls that the defense counsel was questioning Alan Simon when he told of the racist and sexist comments. I remember it as the ADA doing the questioning.)

So, what exactly is "a piece of junk"?

They passed around the 9mm Ruger that was used in the shooting. Each of us got to heft and inspect it through the saran wrap as it nestled in its cardboard bed. It was shiny and seemingly well-cared-for. So it surprised me to hear three witnesses refer to it as "a piece of junk."

One described staying in a trailer on the defendant's property and being wakened from a sound sleep with the muzzle of that gun in his face. "He didn't like my snoring, told me to sleep outside. So I went and slept in the bushes that night."

"Describe the gun."

"It was a piece of junk, that one there."

I figured he was just saying what the prosecution wanted, and it was a different gun he'd seen. But a tall sad-faced man in prison orange, a defense witness serving time for felony drunk driving, referred to the gun the same way, and so did Michael Peacock.

It wasn't until we were deliberating that a young buzz-cut Mexican-American man, "C," said, "I'd call it piece of junk too."

Middle-aged and illiterate in firearms, the majority of us hung on his words. "Why is a piece of junk?"

"It's old," he replied. "What is it, 1980s or something? It's heavy, and the barrel is long. Now they make 'em this big" (he spread the fingers of one hand to demonstrate) "and way lighter. Yep, definitely a piece of junk."

The front door

They brought the front door of the shooting victim's house into the courtroom. The burly detective and a bailiff lugged it to a spot near the witness stand and leaned it against the wall. Painted a deep purplish-blue, it had a small window in the upper center with a beveled-glass diamond shape surrounded by smoky-looking glass. Nine bullet holes marred the surface -- one at head-level had shattered the viewing glass, the rest formed a downward arc from right to left. The small bullets had pierced the front metal and left inverted pockmarks on the back.
We were impressed.
But what made even more of an impact (pun intended) was the photo and testimony about the shelf of cookbooks - one bullet pierced first the front door, then the side of a wooden bookshelf, then went through several paperbacks and one hardcover and came to rest in a space on the shelf between books. Tiny bullet (9mm), deadly force.

The charges

Kenny Rogers was charged with attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder.

The ADA took pains to impress upon us that a person could be convicted based on only circumstantial evidence -- it is just as valid as direct evidence -- and also that a defendant has the absolute right not to testify on his own behalf. The defendant, he told us, got into a murderous rage because he felt he had been disrespected, and had arranged with an employee who was also a felon, to kill the person who had humiliated him. The ADA's intro to the whole matter was appropriately dramatic and black-and-white -- the defendant is a bad guy and we should find him guilty. The defense attorney's presentation was perfunctory and delivered in a monotone, the gist being that there were multiple misunderstandings and that we would see that his client was not guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

Reasonable doubt was a big topic. We heard several times that "beyond a reasonable doubt" is not beyond a shadow of a doubt, or beyond a minor doubt, but doubt that a reasonable person would draw from hearing the facts. I both liked this angle and felt some anxiety about it. Remember, daily the judge reminded us that we were not allowed to discuss anything with other jurors until the deliberation phase, and that we were not to discuss the trial with ANYone -- spouses, friends, religious advisers, therapists -- so my self-doubt and basic insecurity went undiluted for two and a half weeks, long enough for the inner voices to get pretty loud.

Hyperbole: It's our job

The assistant district attorney painted the events in Westport as an epic encounter between forces of good and evil. It's what Shakespeare plays, soap operas and novels are made of: ambition, pride, perceived humiliation, revenge. The fact that the battle took place in a town of about 300 residents, that several of the main characters were habitual criminals, that one was the head of the rural county's Republican party, are mere details.

Those details also provide some insight into the fickle nature of the American media. When the shooting first happened, in 2005, and the murder-for-hire charges were filed, several news outlets picked it up, including the Associated Press and Reuters, under their "Odd News" heading. Four years later, when he was finally tried and convicted, there was not a word of follow-up. Westport was just the punch line to a big-city media joke.

A good summary of all the drama can be found here.

The ladies and gentlemen of the jury will be seated

Each time we filed into the courtroom and entered the jury box, everyone stood. The attorneys kept their eyes on their notes or on the floor; the lead detective was always smiling, like this was something he really enjoyed; and the defendant smiled and looked each of us in the eye, greeting whoever would meet his gaze. As one of the jurors put it, "It's like he's welcoming us to his backyard barbecue!"

I recalled something I'd read (or seen on a crime drama) that members of a jury would not look at a defendant if they were inclined to find him guilty. Perhaps this was some sort of reverse psychology -- "If they look me in the eye, they won't convict me."

Filing into the jury box ended up an elaborate dance. We were assigned to our numbered seats and invariably the people seated at the far ends of the two rows were the last to enter the courtroom, so those of us at the near ends of the rows would lean against the bullet-proof window that separated us from the gallery. Each time I stood there, the thought crossed my mind, "Does this jury box make my butt look big?" For the verdict, I wanted us to file into the jury box in order, so no one had to wait, but others didn't share my enthusiasm for choreography, so we did the daily do-si-do to the end.

Diverse jury, with stairs and trees

We turned out to be quite a diverse jury: Six middle-aged Caucasian women, one Mexican-American man, one pacific islander man, one Fillipina woman, one Asian man, one Caucasian man, and one Latina woman. The alternates were a Latina, and two Caucasians -- a man and a woman.

We noticed immediately that only people who were securely employed (salaried with paid jury leave), unemployed or retired could afford to be on a jury, wondering what that meant for "jury of one's peers." We had diverse employment among us too -- home care worker, printer of wine labels, construction worker, gardener, grocery store cashier, bank publicity expert, stay-at-home mom. In addition, two were retired and two were County workers.

We spent all day together, from about 9 am to 4 pm. We listened to testimony, we heard strange and awful things, and we couldn't talk about any of it with one another until deliberations. This made for some interesting social interactions. I noted that the male jurors clumped together on breaks without saying much of anything.

The two youngest women were smokers who raced outside at every break to get the nicotine flowing and check on partners and children via cell phone.

That left the rest of the women together or in smaller groups, and we found out a lot about each other. "L" had had back surgery 6 months or so ago and was ecstatic to be able to walk up and down stairs, of which there were four flights in the courthouse. "S" was a thin, pale, vocal Christian who wore long-sleeved, high-collared lace blouses in the 90-plus-degree heat. "V" was a consultant in disability and independent living, and was looking to change careers. "M" did gardening for the family of a famous movie director, recently deceased. "F" showed us a cell phone photo of her two-year-old daughter getting her nails done, looking bored.

The first few days of the trial, the weather was kind to us, with clear skies and temperatures in the high 70s and low 80s, soft breezes. The section of Ukiah that the courthouse is in has pleasant shaded streets with a small downtown shopping district -- funky boutiques and a cool bookstore. We non-smokers walked around outside on every break.

As the second week of the trial started, the weather became more characteristic of Ukiah -- temperatures soared into the high 90s and low 100s. Walks outside became almost painful, especially for those of us who, like me, were used to the natural air conditioning of the Coast. So, we counter-acted the sedentary nature of jury duty by developing an indoor circuit of stairs that we traipsed up and down on every break. "Just like a stair master," one of us puffed, "except you end up somewhere else."

On the third floor we could look out at the twin four-story magnolia trees, likely planted when the foundation was laid in the late 1800s. As the weeks passed, and we heard about more and more antisocial behavior, I grew to love those trees.

Jury Selection: the next phase

The following Sunday evening, I called the jury line as instructed and heard that we were all required to come back on Monday. Oh, well, another day off work.

Once again the jury room was packed, and after waiting about an hour we were all herded into Courtroom B, a place we would get to know well in the next weeks. Eighteen of us were directed to sit in the jury box, and the rest sat in the gallery along the side of the room. I got my first look at the defendant, Kenny Rogers, who was watching each of us carefully. He was wearing what would become a familiar outfit -- khaki pants, a button-down oxford shirt with the sleeves rolled up, loafers.

Then the questions began.

Both Tim Stoen, the assistant district attorney, and David Markham, the defense attorney, had copies of our questionnaires in ring binders. Tim Stoen also had a sticky note corresponding to each person in the jury box, arranged, as we were, in two rows of nine. The two men alternated questions. At the end of each round of questions, one of the attorneys could ask for the potential juror to be excused.

One man was asked if his notation on the questionnaire that he "did not feel qualified to judge another human being" meant that he could not be a fair and impartial juror. (He said he could not.) A woman was queried about her family member who worked as a sheriff's deputy. (She said she knew she would be thinking of the situation from a sheriff's point of view.) As a potential juror was excused, Tim Stoen moved his yellow sticky notes around to remind himself who was left. Each time a person was not objected to, the judge asked him or her to move to a certain numbered chair. A fast game of legal musical chairs.

David Markham asked me about my response that I had read the story in our local paper, The Fort Bragg Advocate-News. Had I discussed the story with other people? (Yes, I had, it was an unusual occurrence on the coast, and everyone had talked about it.) Did I recall any facts about the case? (Yes.) Did I feel like I could be a fair and impartial juror? (I believe so, yes.)

The judge asked me to move to seat number eight.

A while later, after some more eliminations and musical chairs, the judge said, "We have a jury." The young woman next to me began a quiet freak-out. She didn't have child-care, her job would only pay for 3 days of jury duty, but she insisted she didn't want to say anything.

We were sworn in.

"You can't be on this jury -- I'm a journalist!"

When the Red Giant finally looked up from his laptop and registered what I told him about the case, his eyes got big. "We talked about that when he got kicked off the water board! You know too much about this case. You can't qualify for this jury, hon."

I shrugged. I rejected out-of-hand that I couldn't be an objective juror because he'd written a story about a raucous water board meeting. Truth is, I hadn't allowed the details to take up permanent residence in my brain. The Red Giant writes a lot of stories, full of technical detail, and I often read them for egregious grammar errors. But I don't retain what I've read. So, I walked, open-hearted, forward into the process.

The jury duty notice

I opened the envelope from the Jury Commissioner and groaned. I was supposed to report to the superior court in the county seat, an hour-and-a half drive away. Oh, well, I thought, all the other times I had called the night before and didn't have to go.

This time was different. I called on Sunday night and heard the recording say, "All groups must report." Oh, well, a day off from work.

There were at least a hundred of us in the jury room. We heard a bare-bones summary of the case, and immediately my interest was piqued. We were handed a 15-page questionnaire to weed out people with obvious biases. The questions were remarkable: What did we like to read? Did we watch crime dramas on TV? Did we know any of a list of about 100 people involved in the case? Did we know anything about the case? If so, where did we learn it?

For some reason, more than anything, I wanted to find out what this process was like, so I wanted to get past the first elimination round. Was anyone in my household involved in the media? This one I admit to parsing. I had lived with a journalist for a few years, and had just moved into my own place in January. There are probably a few lawyers and judges among my ancestors, and I admit to enjoying occasional hair-splitting. This would come back to haunt me.

Sumary of this summer's trial

Rogers trial summary


The link above provides a really good summary of the trial on which I spent 3 weeks as a juror this summer.

Following posts are my takes on the experience.