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Al-Arian jury selection enters second day

By midday Tuesday, 54 potential jurors had made it to the next round after questioning by the attorneys.

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published May 17, 2005

The questionnaire for potential jurors in the Sami Al-Arian trial (PDF) More than 300 potential jurors completed 26 pages of questions as a precursor to serving in the trial of Sami Al-Arian and three co-defendants. Dozens of jury candidates already have been disqualified based on their answers. On Monday, U.S. District Judge James Moody began interviewing about 150 others, hoping to settle on 12 for the trial.

TAMPA -- With jury selection entering its second day, most potential jurors in the Sami Al-Arian trial say they could fairly decide the fate of the former college professor charged with aiding Palestinian terrorists, making it more unlikely that his trial will be moved.

Attorneys for Al-Arian and his three co-defendants had asked U.S. District Judge James S. Moody Jr. to move the trial out of Tampa, claiming that the jury pool has been tainted by politics and pervasive media coverage.

But by midday Tuesday, 54 potential jurors had made it to the next round after questioning by the attorneys. Moody has dismissed 19 of them because of medical or financial hardships, or because they had already formed an opinion that Al-Arian is guilty and weren't sure they could be convinced otherwise.

Some potential jurors were dismissed Tuesday after acknowledging that they would have trouble considering the defendants innocent if they chose not to testify on their own behalf at trial.

One man who was dismissed said he has heard discussion of the Al-Arian case on talk radio and on Fox News and has come to the conclusion that Al-Arian is guilty. "I would have to listen to very strong evidence to change it," he said.

Most, however, said they could put aside anything they heard or read in the media and consider just the evidence presented at trial.

Questioning of jurors is scheduled to last through Wednesday. After all potential panelists are questioned, attorneys for the four defendants will be allowed to dismiss without stating a reason up to 15 jurors while prosecutors can dismiss nine. A jury of 12 plus six alternates will be chosen from the remaining pool.

Moody has reserved ruling on the change-of-venue request until after everyone in the jury pool is questioned this week.

Al-Arian, a 47-year-old former University of South Florida computer scientist, and his three co-defendants face a 53-count indictment that includes charges of racketeering, conspiracy and providing material support to terrorists. Five other men have been indicted but are not in custody.

Prosecutors allege the men used an Islamic academic think tank and a Palestinian charity founded by Al-Arian as fund-raising fronts for the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which is on a State Department list of terrorist organizations. The group is blamed for more than 100 deaths in Israel, the West bank and Gaza Strip.

In asking for the change of venue, attorneys William Moffitt and Linda Moreno said Al-Arian could not get a fair trial because of years of pretrial publicity and Al-Arian's emergence as a high-profile issue in last year's U.S. Senate campaign.

Democrat Betty Castor, former president of the University of South Florida, was criticized for not firing Al-Arian, and Mel Martinez won despite counter allegations that powerful Republicans earlier associated with Al-Arian in hopes of winning Muslim votes in Florida. Both sides used Al-Arian's image against the other in televised campaign ads.

The defense also cited what they said were many questionnaires filled out by potential jurors indicating they had already made up their minds that Al-Arian is guilty. Most of them were already excluded from the process before jury selection began Monday.

Court documents show the government built its case by reaching back through decades of intercepted telephone calls, faxes and other documents gathered by the FBI's foreign intelligence agents dating back to 1984.

The trial, which is set to begin June 6 if Moody doesn't move it out of Tampa, is expected to last more than six months.

[Last modified May 17, 2005, 14:09:01]