Defense attorneys want each juror questioned in Q&A

Michael Jackson’s defense team wants the final jurors to be put through a question-and-answer session. They are trying to find out what the jurors know about what the accuser had said, which had leaked to the news last week. Robert S. Sanger, the defense attorney, wrote in a motion released the day before: “The text of witness testimony before the jury has leaked to the media, and the result has been that jurors have become biased. If those texts were released by the prosecutors, or if the law allows it, or even if they were stolen by supporters of the prosecutors, the impact is devastating. Before these texts were exposed, providing a fair and impartial jury was difficult enough. Now, achieving that goal under any circumstances may be impossible.” Robert Sanger believes it may be necessary to excuse everyone who has been called to form the jury from this duty unless the defense attorneys can find out what they know about the leaked texts. In another motion, the defense attorneys asked that the prosecutor be barred in court from bringing up the details of a settlement over the 1993 allegations. This motion is expected to be considered in a hearing session on January 28.