1st Central District jury trial of the pandemic starts in Santa Ana

The Central District of California began its first jury trial Monday after a 14-month hiatus before U.S. District Judge Cormac J. Carney, who sits in Santa Ana.

The day's proceedings went smoothly with no obvious hiccups or technical difficulties. A jury was impaneled by 2 p.m. with opening statements commencing just after 2:30 p.m.

The case before the jury is a civil rights and wrongful death lawsuit against the Los Angeles Police Department. Clara Barillas v. City of Los Angeles; Los Angeles Police Dept., 2:18-CV-8740 (C.D. Cal., filed Oct. 10, 2018). The complaint was filed by Dale K. Galipo and Eric Valenzuela of the Law Offices of Dale K. Galipo in Woodland Hills, on behalf of the wife of Juan Barillas, who was shot and killed following a vehicle pursuit in November 2017 near North Hollywood.

The plaintiffs said Barillas, who was unarmed, voluntarily pulled over following a brief pursuit, attempted to surrender and followed officers' commands before he was shot at 13 times. The city's lawyers said the detectives observed Barillas reach for the right side of his waistband and reasonably believed he was armed and posed an imminent threat.

The incident was caught on surveillance video, according to plaintiffs' counsel. John E. Sweeney is representing Barillas' parents. Cory M. Brente and Colleen R. Smith from the Los Angeles City Attorney's Office are representing the LAPD and the two detectives, Corbin Rheault and Michael Montoya.

Jury selection began just before 10 a.m. Members of the public were allowed to observe remotely from an empty courtroom next door. Plexiglas was installed in front of every desk in Carney's courtroom, including those belonging to the court clerk, staff, court reporter, counsel table, witness stand and the judge's bench.

Prospective jurors took the witness stand to answer questions from the judge and counsel. After each person finished, the witness stand was thoroughly disinfected.

The judge ordered paper documents, including police reports, to be placed in advance on the witness stand to help refresh witnesses' recollections, rather than to have attorneys repeatedly hand them out during questioning. Some evidence, such as maps of the Los Angeles area where the incident took place, were digitally displayed on a monitor mounted on the wall just behind the witness stand.

Carney advised counsel that despite their desires to ask several follow up questions to keep it brief.

"We're in a pandemic, and we're not going to be able to do all of that," he said. Unless a potential juror had specific, negative experiences with law enforcement, each individual had their general questions capped at 2 minutes by either side's counsel.

"There is Plexiglas that you're surrounded in, and people are more than 6 feet away from you, but again, if you rather keep your mask on, please do," Carney told the jurors. The majority of the jurors took off their masks while answering questions.

Attorneys remained unmasked while standing behind the Plexiglas during opening arguments. Jurors were seated throughout the courtroom gallery, but not in the jury box.

The Southern Division of the Central District began issuing jury summons on March 22. Carney was scheduled to start a criminal jury trial on Monday for a defendant accused of cocaine possession, but that defendant agreed to plead guilty, and the Barillas case took its place. USA v. Darren McGhee, 2:19-mj-5122 (C.D. Cal., filed Dec. 20, 2019).

The Eastern and Western divisions of the Central District began issuing jury summons on April 19 with jury trials scheduled to commence June 7.

Carney has waged a public battle against his bench colleagues for agreeing to halt jury trials late last summer. He threw out several criminal indictments with prejudice, citing the Speedy Trial Act. Last month he agreed not to dismiss the criminal drug case after the Central District announced jury summons would begin going out in mid-April.

The jury was excused at 3:50 p.m. after opening arguments. Testimony will resume at 8:30 a.m. Tuesday with the first witness.