Although jurors in the capital murder trial of Ted Burnett didn’t talk to the press publicly, one of the jurors posted on Twitter that the final count in the penalty phase was 10 in favor of the death penalty and two against. It takes a unanimous verdict to hand down a death sentence.
The capital murder trial of Ted Burnett is going on this week, and we’re covering it live from the courtroom on Twitter.
Twitter is a micro-blogging, social networking platform where millions of people answer the question “What are you doing?” with short messages. What I’m doing is covering the Burnett trial and I’m posting updates live from the courtroom, including details you won’t necessarily read in the print edition of The Eagle.
Anne Reed, a trial lawyer and jury consultant from Milwaukee has been following my “tweets” and explained it this way in her blog, Deliberations.
You can also follow the updates here on Kansas.com.
You can interact if you sign up (it’s free) and put “@rsylvester” before your message to leave a comment or question. Be patient. Between Twittering and keeping track of the trial, it gets pretty hectic in the courtroom.
Ted Burnett’s capital murder defense won a rare victory before his trial begins next week.
Judge Ben Burgess ruled that Steven White’s testimony was unreliable, or hearsay. White had claimed he had information from Burnett’s girlfriend, Trudy Guthrie, that Burnett confessed in a jailhouse telephone call to killing Chelsea Brooks.
Guthrie denied taking such a phone call from Burnett. Then under cross-examination during the preliminary hearing 18 months ago, White couldn’t remember for sure where Guthrie had heard it.
The information was not just hearsay, lawyer Gary Owens argued for Burnett, but “double hearsay.” Burgess agreed.
Prosecutors had fought to keep the testimony in, because it might have bolstered Everett Gentry’s testimony that Burnett strangled the pregnant teenager in what the state says is a murder-for-hire scheme.
Burnett, 51, goes on trial for capital murder, when jury selection starts next week.
Watch for blog updates during jury selection here and then on the Kansas.com home page for live updates from the courtroom during the trial.