Just a reminder of what the Andriano jury went through
"They gathered in the jury room Dec. 16 to consider whether there were reasons for sparing Andriano's life.
It took four days.
The sometimes-heated deliberations dramatically changed the case's outcome, with a split jury gradually shifting toward the death verdict.
When the deliberations began, the nine women and three men took a vote. Only three supported a death sentence, with four favoring a life sentence and the others undecided, said juror Mary Fobes, 74, of Mesa.
Catalano said he wasn't sure.
"I still hadn't made up my mind. I was giving her the benefit of the doubt," he said.
After one day, the jury went home for a three-day weekend that some called full of soul searching.
When they reconvened, Catalano gave a pivotal speech outlining his reasons for supporting a death sentence, and the vote swung to 11-1 in favor of execution, Fobes said.
"It was very passionate on why he thought she deserved the death penalty," Fobes said. "The more I thought about it, how could she be so brutal? She must have totally flipped her wig. I don't know how anyone could do that."
But the jury was on the verge of a deadlock, with one holdout, a senior citizen from Gilbert, saying he was adamantly against the death penalty.
On the third day of deliberations, jurors took turns discussing each of 23 reasons listed by the defense for sparing Andriano's life, the mitigating factors, weighing whether they were sufficient cause for leniency.
They included that Andriano was a good mother to her children and had signed up at age 19 for missionary work when in Mexicali, Mexico, for the 91st Psalm Church, now the Harvest Family Church in Casa Grande.
Catalano said he gave all the mitigating factors some weight, but in the end, they were not enough.
"Does a good mother brutally murder her husband?" he said.
Percy said she also considered the arguments against execution, but on balance, "we could not find mitigating factors that overwhelmed the cruelty. To me, to everybody there, the knife wound was the crowning blow. She had three chances to back off."
While jurors were discussing whether to execute Andriano, they considered that they would have no control over whether the trial judge, Brian Ishikawa, would give her life in prison with or without parole, she said.
Jurors did not want to see a 25 years to life sentence.
"We also knew with the death penalty that she has an automatic appeal," Percy said.
Different parts of the case resonated with jurors. Some said they were moved by Andriano's plea for life during the mitigation phase on Dec. 16, just before the final deliberations, while others considered it an Academy Award acting job. "
http://www.nlada.org/DMS/Documents/1106668066.47/0124deathjurors24.html
Praying the jury find a way to talk this through. It's been a long long trial for them.
anic:
