Jean Casarez of TruTV is reporting that the jury in the Thomas Fast murder trial returned a guilty verdict very late last night. Two points are very interesting to me about this jury deliberation: 1) that the judge permitted the jury to deliberate late into the night and 2) that one of the female jurors sobbed emotionally as the verdict was being read.

Late Night Verdicts

I often think it would be useful for juries to be permitted to deliberate past business hours. In many states I suspect that courthouse employees may not work overtime, and therefore trials are limited to eight or fewer hours a day. But this serves the deliberation process ill.

Emotional Juror

If I had been on that jury, I would have wept, too. I have felt great pity for both the victim’s husband and the defendant, his son. Yesterday one of the legal commentators said one possible motive for the murder was jealousy of his stepmother. In other words, Thomas Fast felt the victim had alienated him from his father’s affections. Clearly, by killing his stepmother the mentally ill defendant had some wish to regain a central role in his father’s life and heart. Yet all he did was cause his father to hate him. The father, too, was clearly torn by the sad fate of his son.

All murder trials are very, very sad. I believe jurors understand this. I wonder about lawyers, though.