CHICAGO _ The Cook County judge overseeing Chicago police Officer Jason Van Dyke's murder trial has given the Chicago police officer's lawyers until Friday to decide whether to opt for a bench or jury trial.
Meanwhile, two more jurors have been picked already Thursday, bringing to 12 the total so far. Four alternates must still be selected.
The two latest jurors are a white male with a degree in nuclear engineering and a woman in her 30's who works as a CT scan technologist.
It was unclear if the latest woman picked for the jury was white or Hispanic, but the other 11 jurors are six whites, three Hispanics, one Asian-American and one African-American.
The latest male juror said that he had seen the video of Van Dyke fatally shooting 17-year-old Laquan McDonald and believed that the officer "had gone too far."
The defense unsuccessfully tried to remove him for cause but did not use up one of its two final discretionary strikes to remove him from the jury.
The woman picked Thursday said in a questionnaire she filled out that "no matter what your occupation is if you knowingly did something wrong, you should face consequences."
She said during questioning she had not seen the shooting video and had no opinions on the case.
Under Illinois law, Van Dyke can unilaterally switch to a bench trial at any point before the 12th juror is sworn in.
But Judge Vincent Gaughan has given the defense until Friday to decide. That likely means he will not swear in the 12th juror until Van Dyke's lawyers announce whether they will opt for a bench or jury trial.
Once the full jury has been impaneled, the defense would need the approval of Gaughan to make the switch to a bench trial. But that seems unlikely after the months of work toward a jury trial by the judge and others.
At a brief news conference Thursday morning outside the courthouse, the president of the union representing rank-and-file Chicago police officers called the murder charge facing Van Dyke inappropriate and said a court order prohibiting public comment about the case violated the officer's First Amendment rights.
"Mr. Van Dyke is not a bad person, I know for a fact that he prays every day," said Kevin Graham, the Fraternal Order of Police president told reporters. "He is facing (an) almost insurmountable amount of public pressure from people who have not heard one piece of the evidence."
Moving the trial outside Chicago would be "the fair way to run this," said Graham, citing the widespread dissemination of the dashboard camera footage showing Van Dyke shoot McDonald.
"People who have been here in the city of Chicago have seen that video over and over again," he said. "That is a one-dimensional video that does not tell the whole story. The public just hasn't heard the whole story. I think already the jury pool in this city has been tainted."
Gaughan had been pushing the defense for weeks to make a decision on whether Van Dyke will leave his fate with a jury or the judge, though he pulled back on that pressure Wednesday afternoon. Gaughan assured Van Dyke's attorneys he would allow them time to think about the decision after an 11th juror has been selected.
"I'll give you until overnight to decide, which is a lot more time than I give other people," the judge said.
If the defense opts for a bench trial, Gaughan would decide Van Dyke's fate instead of a dozen Cook County residents.
Earlier Wednesday, Van Dyke's lawyers announced they had not yet decided whether to have a jury trial because the judge had not ruled on their request to move the trial out of Chicago. Gaughan has delayed that decision until after jury selection.
Van Dyke, 40, a veteran of nearly 13 years with the Police Department at the time of the shooting, faces six counts of first-degree murder, 16 counts of aggravated battery and one count of official misconduct for the October 2014 shooting.
Police dashboard camera video released by court order more than a year later showed Van Dyke opening fire within seconds of exiting his squad car as McDonald, holding a knife, appeared to walk away from police, contradicting reports from officers at the scene that the black teen had threatened officers with the weapon.
The release of the graphic video led to months of protests and political upheaval.
