Update: Jury selection began this morning in the Kwame Kilpatrick trial in Detroit. As of 11 a.m., two male and two female prospective jurors -- all white -- had been questioned by the judge, prosecutors and defense. All four said they could be fair and impartial. Both the prosecution and defense did not move to bounce them. The four will make up what eventually will be a pool of 66 prospective jurors. That pool will then be narrowed to 12 jurors and six alternates.
Interestingly, each juror had no idea who Victor Mercado was. Mercado, the former head of the city water department, is one four defendants and is the only white one. Jury selection will continue through the day and could take about a week to complete. -- A.L.
The racial composition of the jury will be a overriding issue today when the corruption case against ex-Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick gets underway today, reports Robert Snell of the Detroit News.
The jury pool, chosen last month, contains more African-Americans than the recent trial involving Kilpatrick's close friend and co-defendant Bobby Ferguson, Snell writes.
Ferguson and Kilpatrick have made an issue of the lack of diversity on federal court juries in Detroit, and that issue is expected to arise again as jury members are chosen from the pool.
Kilpatrick, his father Bernard Kilpatrick, Ferguson and former Detroit water boss Victor Mercado face racketeering charges and face up to 30 years in prison, if convicted.
Kilpatrick has unsuccessfully challenged the selection process in this case, saying there aren't enough blacks in the jury pool. He lost an appeal last month after trying to gain access to jury records in hopes of dismissing the indictment.
"Race is 90 percent of this trial," local political consultant Adolph Mongo told Snell. "Race will overshadow anything and everything that comes out in the first week or two of this trial."
