Ghost Ship trial: Judge removes three jurors, orders panel to hit reset in deliberations

OAKLAND — In another setback to the long trial against two men charged in the deadly Ghost Ship warehouse fire, a judge removed three jurors Monday, stunning the courtroom and bringing jury deliberations to a halt after 10 days.

Alameda County Judge Trina Thompson replaced the jurors with alternates and ordered the panel to start a fresh round of deliberations on the fate of warehouse tenants Derick Almena and Max Harris, each charged with 36 counts of involuntary manslaughter for each of the lives lost in the Dec. 2, 2016, inferno at the Fruitvale district warehouse.

The judge did not reveal the type of misconduct the jurors are accused of but instructed them not to talk to news agencies or discuss information from news articles. She also issued a gag order prohibiting attorneys from discussing the case outside of court.

As the four-month long trial drags on, the jury is now down to one alternate, bringing it dangerously close to running out of jurors and forcing a mistrial. Judge Thompson said there is a “high probability” of having to use the last alternate because of scheduling conflicts.

With three female jurors dismissed and two men and a woman brought in as replacements, the jury is now made up of seven women and five men. After the new jury was seated Monday and told to disregard all previous deliberation, one frustrated juror took off his glasses and rubbed his forehead in an apparent moment of distress.

It all began Monday morning with the jury sending a mysterious note to the court. Soon after, Judge Thompson brought prosecutors, defense attorneys and the defendants into a closed courtroom. At least two jurors were seen being escorted into the courtroom and then back out via the elevator by a sheriff’s deputy. It appeared jurors were being questioned individually, around 10 minutes or so each during the morning session.

By afternoon, the families of the victims had been summoned to the court, told that a major announcement would come but that it was not a verdict. The families last year sat through two days of reading their impact statements to Almena and Harris before a judge tossed out a planned plea deal and sent the case to trial instead.

David Gregory, the father of victim Michela Gregory, appeared anxious waiting for court to open for the afternoon session. Gregory, who has attended the hearings daily, lowered his head when the jurors were excused.

“I put my faith in the hands of the jurors,” he said after the hearing. “I hope they do the right thing.”

The original jury of nine women and three men have been deliberating since July 31, a total of 10 days after listening to three months of testimony from dozens of witnesses. Last week, jurors asked for read-back testimony from three witnesses: Nico Bouchard, who signed the lease with Almena; Ryan O’Keefe, who witnessed the fire, and Almena himself. But then jurors changed their minds and decided not to listen to all four days of Almena’s testimony in its entirety. They instead said they would let the court know if they needed portions of his testimony read back to them. So far, the jury has sent a total of six notes to the court.

On Thursday afternoon, they also asked for specific portions of testimony from Carmen Brito, a former tenant of the warehouse, a possible sign that they were focused on the safety of the warehouse. Some of what was read back includes testimony on the warehouse’s lack of a sprinkler system and a makeshift front staircase.

Prosecutors hold Almena and Harris responsible for the blaze, arguing the pair built a fire trap and allowed people to live and attend concerts at the Ghost Ship warehouse even though the building was not zoned for either of those uses. The defense has shifted blame to others, such as police, fire or child protective services workers who were inside the building in the months or years leading up to the fire but did nothing. They also introduced the theory of arson as a potential cause of the fire.

But the attorneys were prohibited from speaking after Monday’s hearing as the judge re-issued a gag order that was in place until the original jury was seated.

“We’re gagged,” Tony Serra, who represents Almena, said as he left court.

Staff writer Thomas Peele contributed to this report.

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