ExigentPlan
Opinionated *advertiser censored**hole
- Joined
- Jun 2, 2011
- Messages
- 59
- Reaction score
- 0
Can a witness be in the court room?
It depends on whether the court ruled to exclude witnesses, which is very common. In this case they did rule to exclude witnesses. This means that, except for the defendant, witnesses are not allowed to observe the proceeding (not even supposed to watch on TV) until after they have been released from their subpoena. This usually means until after they have testified unless they are planning on calling them back again as a rebuttal witness. This has actually bothered me because with Det. Flores now sitting at the Prosecutor's table, he can't be recalled during the rebuttal (unless there is some exception I've never heard of for law enforcement). And, BTW, this doesn't matter if they are family or not - if excluded it means every witness except the defendant.
The one murder trial I had to testify in a long time ago, a case I was VERY, VERY emotionally and mentally wrapped up in, I was fuming mad that I was excluded for the entire trial except when I was on the stand. Even after testifying they said that they might recall me so I remained excluded until the verdict was read. I really thought I was going to go crazy and flip my lid not knowing what was going on with a case I was deeply vested in for nearly a year.