LAWRENCE CO.—Here’s your newsblast of day two of the First Degree Murder trial of Tyler McQueen, followed by transcript below:
McQueen is the young man who was living in Mt. Carmel a little over a year ago when, authorities say, he killed 78-year-old Bob Westall at Westall’s sister’s apartment at the United Methodist Village in Lawrenceville, on the night of March 24, 2012.
Jury selection started off slow this morning, with both the large and small courtrooms being occupied, one with court appearances and the other with today’s jury panel.
In an effort to continue to move the process forward, Judge Robert Hopkins took the remainder of yesterday’s holdovers into the jury room where there was not enough room for media and conducted interviews there.
Judge Hopkins has assured the public will know if any jurors are selected from that brief interview process.
At the close of yesterday’s questioning of potential jurors 4 of 14 were selected.
Thus far today 6 prospective jurors have been interviewed, with only 2 being dismissed.
The defense is being lead by Wayne County attorney Matt Vaughan while the prosecution is being lead by state’s attorney Chris Quick and appellate prosecutor Michael Vujovich.
Quick has opted to let Vujovich handle the questioning of prospective jurors thus far and Vaughan has done well holding his own for the defense.
One interesting note:…. with as much distain as Disclosure has had for the likes of appellate prosecutor David Rands for the better part of a decade, thus far Vujovich has proven to be professional and tenacious with a knack for cutting through the legalese crap so often confusing to prospective jurors.
Court broke for lunch at approximately 12:15 and is expected back to continue the jury selection process at 1:15.