Twelve anonymous jurors in former police officer Derek Chauvin's murder trial have now found themselves both behind the scenes and at center stage of one of the most significant police brutality trials in American history.
After they reach a verdict on whether Chauvin is guilty in George Floyd's death, the jurors will likely receive an expression of gratitude from Hennepin County District Judge Peter Cahill, a flier on coping with jury duty — and little else, according to those familiar with Minnesota courts.
Jurors face heavy stress in many cases, court and trauma experts say, but they are especially vulnerable in high-profile proceedings such as Chauvin's where protesters are demanding a former police officer be sent to prison for more than a decade, while his lawyers have made their case for acquittal.
"You have this trauma exposure, and you have the pressure of the decision, and the worldwide scrutiny, and the consequences for racial justice, and the lack of your typical coping strategies and support," said Patricia Frazier, a University of Minnesota psychology professor who studies stress and trauma and also serves as an expert on sexual assault cases.
The jurors in Chauvin's case will have a lot to process in the trial's aftermath: The three-week trial has been laden with tearful testimony from eyewitnesses haunted by bystander guilt, scientific charts tracking the second-by-second narrowing of George Floyd's airways under Chauvin's knee and repeated videos capturing Floyd's cries of agony and death.
On the third day of testimony, amid a series of those videos, Juror 44 — a white woman in her 50s — suddenly waved to get Judge Cahill's attention and asked to leave the courtroom due to a "stress-related reaction." She'd been awake since 2 a.m. that day, unable to sleep, the juror said.
"There is vicarious trauma exposure," Frazier said. "You can't look away. You can't take the day off, you can't talk to anybody about it."
The jurors' families may have deduced that they're serving in the Chauvin trial, but jurors aren't supposed to discuss what they've heard with anyone. All the 12 virtual strangers have are each other, Frazier pointed out.
There are no mental health resources for jurors in state district court, a courts spokesman said. They receive a $20-a-day stipend, but no parking or child care reimbursements.
Unlike state courts, judges in federal court can offer jurors counseling by issuing an order recognizing jurors as temporary federal employees eligible for critical incident stress debriefings and other services under the Employee Assistance Program, said Chief U.S. District Judge John R. Tunheim.
Tunheim said he spends a little time with jurors after trials to answer any questions they may have, and makes a point to observe who might be suffering as a result of their service.
Child pornography cases typically render the most traumatizing evidence, he said. But even in more run-of-the-mill cases, jurors still get worn out from the friction of debate. "You can tell sometimes, some of them appear upset. Perhaps a deliberation resulted in a conclusion that they initially didn't agree with, and they were pushed to get to an unanimous verdict," Tunheim said.
Investigators who collect evidence on grisly murders and child rape, firefighters, and paramedics who see death in their day-to-day careers are often exposed to more horrific images than those shown to juries, said Steve Wickelgren, a former Minneapolis police officer who transitioned into mental health counseling. Still, first responders don't have to deal with the pressure of having to decide guilt, he said.
Wickelgren, a former use-of-force instructor who trained Chauvin in police academy, said he doesn't agree with what his former student did, but he's glad he doesn't have to decide the outcome of the trial.
"The process itself is overwhelming, the politics involved in this, the threat of rioters learning who you are and where you live," Wickelgren said. "If I were a civilian, I would go into that jury pool and say the most outrageous things to get dismissed … I give those people a lot of credit for going ahead and doing it. I don't know what their motivation is, but why risk yourself and your family?"
Jurors in the Chauvin case were not shown on the livestream beamed around the world and their names will remain secret until Cahill deems it safe to release that information.
Retired Hennepin County District Court Judge Kevin Burke said after 36 years on the bench, he's concluded that the biggest source of anxiety for jurors is their desire for validation that they made the right choice with the verdict.
"The canon of ethics make it kind of difficult for a judge to say, 'You did the right thing.' The bottom line is, it was your decision," Burke said.
That decision may be easier in Minnesota than other states because there's no death penalty and judges determine sentencing. Still, it's important jurors understand their service is essential, Burke said.
"The easy thing about that message is it's true," he said. "You're doing something that's really significant to our democracy."
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Decision hour arrives for jurors in high-pressure, emotionally draining Chauvin trial - Minneapolis Star Tribune
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