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Jury Selection Begins in Boot Camp
Death September 24, 2007
By Melissa Nelson
PANAMA CITY, Fla. (AP) — Chanting
demonstrators carried photographs of a dead 14-year-old as jury
selection began Monday for the manslaughter trial of seven juvenile
boot camp guards and a nurse who are charged in his death.
Martin Lee Anderson died in January
2006 after being taken to a hospital from the now-closed Bay County
Juvenile Boot Camp.
He had been sent to the camp for a
probation violation and became lethargic during a physical fitness
test shortly after arriving. An exercise yard videotape shows seven
guards repeatedly hitting the boy with their fists and knees. The
camp nurse is accused of watching but doing nothing during most of
the 30-minute encounter.
Anderson was black; white and black
guards hit him.
By the time jury selection ended
for the day Monday evening, 82 potential jurors of about 160
questioned had been approved for additional screening. Circuit Judge
Michael Overstreet said he would likely begin additional questioning
once 120 to 150 potential jurors had been selected from the larger
group.
Nearly all of those questioned said
they had seen at least part of the video on television. They were
not automatically dismissed if they had seen the video; some were
dismissed for knowing the guards or Anderson's family.
Anderson's parents declined to
answer questions from The Associated Press during a brief break in
questioning.
More than 1,400 Bay County
residents were summoned for jury selection, being held in a
makeshift courtroom in a civic center to accommodate the crowd. That
is one of every 90 adults in the Florida Panhandle county.
The large number is needed because
the case has gotten so much media attention locally. If an impartial
panel can't be found, the trial will be moved to another Florida
county.
Defense attorney Waylon Graham said
he expected to have a jury pool by Tuesday night.
"You are talking about something
that has been on TV constantly and on the radio constantly and the
governor has meddled in this thing almost from the beginning, but I
don't think it will get moved, said Graham, who represents Charles
Helms Jr., the ranking camp guard on duty the day Anderson entered
the camp.
Prosecutors have declined to answer
questions about the case.
About 20 demonstrators stood
outside the civic center and carried large posters showing Anderson
and bearing slogans such as "Justice 4 Martin."
Their chants of "What do we want?
Justice. When do we want it? Now," could be heard in the
second-floor courtroom.
The original autopsy on Anderson,
conducted by the Bay County medical examiner, attributed his death
to natural complications of sickle cell trait, a genetic blood
disorder.
After an outcry from Anderson's
family and the public, his body was exhumed and a second autopsy by
another doctor found he had suffocated.
The defense will lean heavily on
the first autopsy, saying it shows the guards and nurses were not to
blame.
Then-Gov. Jeb Bush appointed
Hillsborough County State Attorney Mark Ober to prosecute the case,
citing a potential conflict of interest for local prosecutors. His
team will say that the second autopsy combined with the video shows
that Anderson was killed.
The Florida Legislature dismantled
the state's military-style youth boot camps after Anderson's death.
The case also led to the resignation of the chief of the Florida
Department of Law Enforcement.
The Legislature agreed to pay
Anderson's family $5 million earlier this year to settle civil
claims in the case.
Several potential jurors questioned
the settlement.
"I just think it was out of
sequence as to what was supposed to happen," said one potential
juror, an older white man. "Suits going this way and that, people
paying out money, demanding this or that or that before anyone was
adjudicated guilty."
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