U.S. District Court Judge Laura Taylor Swain approved the decision after the defense team resolved internal disagreement over whether to proceed with 11 jurors — one short of the full complement — or instead recall an alternate who was released before deliberations began Monday.
The jury had deliberated for roughly eight hours when a panel member reported a stomach ailment after lunchtime Tuesday. That forced a halt in the verdict process. She has not returned since, and on Thursday reported suffering what the judge characterized as an additional household accident.
Proceeding with 11 jurors is relatively rare. However, the federal rules of criminal procedure state that a jury may consist of fewer than 12 members if both sides stipulate approval in writing. Once deliberations have begun, the court may permit a jury of 11 to return a verdict without prosecution and defense approval provided that the court finds good cause to excuse one juror.
The agreement will enable the remaining jurors to resume deliberations at the point they stopped — amid reviewing transcripts of testimony by several witnesses, including one of the five former co-workers charged with knowingly aiding the scam.
If attorneys had opted to recall an alternate, jurors would have been legally required to disregard the their previous deliberations and re-start the decision-making process anew.
The illness and legal dilemma it spawned added an unexpected twist and delay to the five-month trial, already one of the longest white-collar crime proceedings in Manhattan federal court history.
Jurors heard testimony from more than 40 witnesses and saw dozens of exhibits in the case focused on charges the defendants knowingly conspired in and and profited ! from the fraud that stole an estimated $20 billion from thousands of investors worldwide.
The trial is the first Madoff-related criminal proceeding to be weighed by a jury. The disgraced financier pleaded guilty without standing trial after the scam imploded in December 2008. He's now serving a 150-year prison term.
The former co-workers face decades behind bars if they're convicted. They include former Madoff operations manager Daniel Bonventre; Annette Bongiorno, who managed investment accounts for her boss' most important customers; JoAnn Crupi, who had day-to-day oversight of the firm's largest bank account; and ex-Madoff computer programmers George Perez and Jerome O'Hara.
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