Jurors answer questions in Pomona barbershop murder trial

Some of the jurors in the murder trial for Larry Hammett's killing have responded to a few questions about how they came to their verdicts last week.

Omari Ali, the admitted shooter, was convicted of voluntary manslaughter rather than murder, and Keyon Rasheed Hill, suspected of setting up the alleged robbery, was acquitted. Full Story.

Hammett's friends and family were very upset about the verdicts. One of Hammett's friends said of the jury: "The blood of Larry is on their hands." Full story.

The first juror whose comments I'm posting is Riena Welch, a 30-year-old accountant from San Dimas.

The second juror is a 35-year-old woman from Glendora who works as a hospital clerk. She asked that her name not be printed.

It's clear that both women took a lot of time and care writing their responses.

The responses have been edited for spelling and (lightly) for grammar, and I removed two sections at the beginning of Welch's e-mail related to organizing the interviews and coverage.

...

RIENA WELCH

Hello Will,

Hope your weekend was well. I am still not quite the same after that trial. I haven't slept in weeks. It's hard sleeping when I had the case on my mind, going over the testimonies in my head and not able to speak to anyone at home about my feelings was very stressful. The way I usually manage stress is I speak to my fiance and seek advice. I wasn't able to talk to the people closest to me about the case, so I had to bottle up my feelings. Now I can't sleep because of the public's view of the jury on this case. We are being painted as lazy, stupid or cold-hearted. It hurts that no one actually knows how hard it was so be in our shoes, to be locked up in a room with someone's life in your hands. It was very taxing on the emotions. I really believe it was a life-altering experience.

Questions:

Q: When the jury first retired to the deliberation room, what was the general feeling among jurors about the verdicts? Did some think Hill was guilty, or that Ali should be acquitted?

A: Some of us were crying and holding each other. We were relieved it was over, the burden has been lifted and we were free of the stomach aches and the nightmares. I felt bad for all the families involved. I wished so hard they could be in my shoes to feel what I was feeling, that I was frustrated too. We were frustrated at the lack of real evidence, frustrated that out of all the people at the barber shop, only 3 came forward. Frustrated that we had less control of the situation than we thought. There were a few people who thought Hill was guilty, but the thing is we had to PROVE it beyond reasonable doubt. Since we had several rational scenarios we were forced by law to choose the one that pointed to innocent. There just wasn't enough evidence and testimony that he was guilty -- we didn't have proof he planned anything. We didn't have proof he was in the room.We didn't have a whole lot on Hill at all. I feel It's better that 100 guilty men go free than one innocent man is sent to prison with a life sentence. No one thought Ali should have been acquitted.

Q: How were the verdicts for Ali settled on, and what was the general consensus about his role in the incident?

A: We started from the top. We went over Murder 1 then Murder 2 and so on. We read the criteria for each and if we can prove he met each criteria point. We could not agree at all for the first 2 1/2 days. We tried so hard to put aside personal opinions and any biases we had. It's hard to put feelings aside and just judge someone based on facts, when the facts you have are so conflicting and honestly not much to go on. We knew from his own testimony he shot Mr. Hammett, but we didn't have hard evidence and proof of the reason why. We wished SOOO hard there was a camera in the office so we had hard trustworthy evidence. We didn't have ONE piece of such evidence. We could speculate all day on his role in the incident, but we swore via an oath we would go by the facts and testimonies to piece the story together. We also swore if there was more than one rational scenario, we would have to choose the one that points to innocent, no matter what we felt, we had to go by the facts provided to us and follow the law.

Q: How were the verdicts for Hill settled on, and what was the general consensus about his role in the incident?

A: We decided to evaluate Hill based on our verdict of Ali. We had even less information on Hill than we did on Ali. We had no evidence he was actually in the room at the time of the struggle and no evidence he had anything premeditated. We looked at the evidence over and over, talked it out and could not find anything to convict Hill. We didn't have much to work with.

Q: How much time did the jury spend discussing each defendant?

A: We spent 2 1/2 days on Ali and about a day on Hill.

Q: Why didn't you, and the the jury as a whole, believe Ali and Hill robbed Hammett?

A: It's not that we didn't believe it. We couldn't base our verdict on what we thought happened, or an opinion on what happened. We had to base it on evidence. Believing it and proving it are totally different. We had to go by what was provided to us. And sad to say, it wasn't much. If we decided a verdict on opinions it would of been a different case all together. We owed it to those boys to follow the law not personal opinions.

Q: Who did you/the jury believe brought the gun to the barbershop?

A: We didn't have proof of whose gun it was, or where it came from. So we discussed possible scenarios and each were rational and made sense. By law we had to choose the scenario that pointed to innocent. Believe me, we wished we had more evidence, or some star credible witness who was able to clear it all up for us. I can't tell anyone who's gun it was. And even if I guessed I can't prove it beyond a reasonable doubt. That's the problem.

Q: What are your thoughts on Finley's role in the incident? Do you believe she wasn't involved in anything, as she testified?

A: Speaking for myself only, I think Finley was definitely at the wrong place at the wrong time. I think she was really oblivious to anything that was going on. Before she took the stand I was hoping she would give us some real information, she would really spill the beans so to speak. But for taking the plea bargain in exchange for information, I was disappointed in the lack of information she really had. It didn't help us very much, not as much as I would have liked. I think if she really HAD more information she would have given it. It proved to me she really didn't have much information and reaching out to save herself.

Q: Do you believe Hammett got angry at Ali, as Ali described in his testimony?

A: I believe there were several rational scenarios to this situation. I can't prove Hammett did get angry at Ali, just like I can't prove Ali brought the gun and aggravated Hammett. Only 2 people know what happened behind that closed door and one of them is deceased. We can only go by the person who was there. Like I have said before, if there was a camera in the office, we would have NO doubt what happened in that room, but we can't prove beyond a reasonable doubt based on evidence that Ali is guilty of the charges.

Q: Do you believe Hammett's drug sales had an impact on jurors' opinions about the case?

A: NO, we didn't base anything on opinion. No matter what Hammett's personal life was it didn't mean he deserved to die. He was a human being with a family and my heart goes out to them for their loss. His drug sales had no weight on our choice.

Q: How did you feel when you saw Hammett's friends and family members react to the verdicts?

A: My heart felt like it dropped to the pit of my stomach. I felt so bad for them, I know they wanted nothing more than for us to give a murder 1 verdict. I would of had NO problem returning a murder 1 verdict if we had substantial evidence and more credible witnesses, but we had little of both. Only a few people came forward to testify and what little evidence we had lacked quality. I read that some people called the jurors morons and cold-hearted. If we would have returned the verdict murder 1, we would have still been called those things from the other parties. I never served jury duty before and when this case started I was a bit excited to be a part of something so big. When days went on I was beyond stressed out and totally confused as to what the right thing to do is. I swore I would only go by the evidence, that I would listen to the testimonies with an open mind and piece together what was credible and then come up with a rational explanation. Again, we came up with several scenarios and explanations. If we would have decided on a verdict on personal opinion we would have taken the easy way out and also been done within a few hours. But the fact we spent days in deliberation following what the law states, we didn't take the easy way out. We did something that wasn't easy, it was very hard to return the verdict we did. I wouldn't be able to live with myself if I wasn't fair to those boys, if I just returned the verdict based on opinion. I believe in my heart we gave it our all. I don't regret the choice we made, because I know it was fair. The deliberation room was covered wall to wall with huge pieces of paper, charts and diagrams. We were very passionate in making the right choices and being fair. I had my kid at age 14, I worked and went to school and made many hard choices in my life. This one is still one of the hardest choices I had to ever make.

....

GLENDORA HOSPITAL CLERK

Please let me start off by saying this was the most physically and emotionally exhausting thing I have ever been through. It was my first time serving on a jury and after that experience it will be a long time before I think I could handle doing it again. We were charged with holding those two young men accountable for their alleged crimes and we did the best we could with the evidence and testimony the district attorney gave us. We had so little to go on it made our task all that much more difficult to perform. It pains me to see all the bashing from Larry's family and friends against the jury when they really had no idea what it took for us to even come to the conclusion we did. We had to forget out opinions and feelings because that is what the law said we had to do. We are not emotionally dead people, we had a job to do and we did it to the best of our ability. None of us wanted to rush through our decision, we really did take our time and talk things out at great length, going back to our instructions/law many times to make sure we were on track. In closing the decision is the best we could have hoped for with what we were given. We can live with ourselves, hold our heads high and sleep at night knowing we did what we could and no one could ask for more....

Now for your questions:

Q: When the jury first retired to the deliberation room, what was the general feeling among jurors about the verdicts? Did some think Hill was guilty, or that Ali should be acquitted?

A: This was not going to be an easy process, we had little to go on and had to figure out the best place to start our deliberations. We never thought that we would be acquitting either one of them let alone Ali who admitted he killed Lary.

Q: How were the verdicts for Ali settled on, and what was the general consensus about his role in the incident?

A: We looked the counts one at a time, read and re-read the law as was given to us several times to make sure we understood what we were deciding on. We went through them one at a time starting at Murder in the 1st on down until we got our guilty verdict of voluntary manslaughter. We knew he was the shooter from his testimony, but with all the conflicting statements it was hard to decipher just what really happened.

Q: How were the verdicts for Hill settled on, and what was the general consensus about his role in the incident?

A: It was done the same way. As for his role? There wasn't much in a way of evidence either way. He may have shown them how to get there but only one person can really put him in the office at the time of the shooting. We felt that he was possibly an accessory but that was not one of the charges we had to choose from.

Q: How much time did the jury spend discussing each defendant?

A: 2.5 days with Ali, and 1 day with Hill.

Q: Why didn't you, and the the jury as a whole, believe Ali and Hill robbed Hammett?

A: Only one witness stated anything was stolen, and that was only after several interviews with police. It's not to say it isn't true, but it was enough to cast doubt in our minds as to who really took the money and marijuana.

Q: Who did you/the jury believe brought the gun to the barbershop?

A: Not really sure on that one, I think we were split on it. There was no hardcore proof one way or another.

Q: What are your thoughts on Finley's role in the incident? Do you believe she wasn't involved in anything, as she testified?

A: I do believe it was a case of being in wrong place at the wrong time, and she got VERY bad advice on taking a plea deal. I do believe that she is innocent.

Q: Do you believe Hammett got angry at Ali, as Ali described in his testimony?

A: I do believe it is possible that Larry did become angry with Ali, not necessarily the way Ali described but I do believe it is possible. There is testimony to a scuffle being heard in the office, but since none of us were in there at the time we will never know who really started it.

Q: Do you believe Hammett's drug sales had an impact on jurors' opinions about the case?

A: I can't answer for the other jurors but as for myself it had no impact on my decision what so ever. If he chose to sell drugs on the side then its his business. It doesn't mean he has any less right to live than anyone of us.

Q: How did you feel when you saw Hammett's friends and family members react to the verdicts?

A: My heart went out to his family and friends, I felt sick to my stomach. But we were sworn to uphold the law and that is what we did. No one can say we rushed our decision because its obvious we did not. We did the best we could with what we were given which was not very much.