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Jury selection completed for Trump hush money trial in NYC; opening arguments begin Monday

Molly Crane-Newman and Josephine Stratman, New York Daily News on

Published in News & Features

NEW YORK — The action-packed first week of Donald Trump’s Manhattan hush money trial ended Friday with 12 seated jurors and six alternates locked in — and a fourth failed bid by the former president to sabotage it, paving the way for prosecutors to begin presenting their case.

Four women and one man were selected as the final alternates around midday, completing the jury selection process after four days of hundreds of Manhattanites being surveyed about whether they could judge the evidence against Trump with an open mind. Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan told them to plan on coming back for opening statements on Monday.

The panelists — who added to seven men and five women selected to serve on Tuesday and Thursday — are poised to make history by weighing the first-ever criminal charges brought against an American president and determining whether Trump is a felon before voters head to the polls in November.

Their selection came as several prospective panelists said they felt unable to participate in such a high-stakes case, expressing fear after the gravity of the case sunk in.

“I think, possibly, I have really bad anxiety,” one woman told the court. “The more days that go on and more and more people in my life know that I’m here without me even telling them, they just put pieces together.”

Another woman said she had every intention of keeping an open mind when summoned to the downtown courthouse earlier this week for jury selection but no longer felt she could realistically be fair.

 

“I want to be, and I had every intention,” she said. “I think after the questions posed to prospective jurors, and asking those questions to myself, I don’t think I can be impartial.”

Merchan excused both women without either side objecting.

Just after the slate of alternates was chosen, disturbing news broke of a man setting himself on fire in front of the courthouse. The man, identified by authorities as Maxwell Azzarello, 37, reportedly threw pamphlets that continued a QR code linking to an online manifesto in the air, before dousing and lighting himself on fire. Despite the timing, there was no indication he did so out of loyalty to Trump.

The trial proceeded uninterrupted.

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