Deedy jury struggled throughout deliberations, notes show

The jury in the Christopher Deedy trial struggled early on to reach a unanimous verdict on all but one count against the federal law enforcement agent, according to written communications between the group and the court released Monday.

On the fourth day of deliberations, which stretched over parts of seven days, the leader of the jury sent the first formal question, noting the difficulty the group was having on reaching a verdict.

"If we know the jury will be hung or is 99 percent looking to be that way, how long do we wait to tell the judge or how do we continue?" forewoman S. Brown wrote in the handwritten note Aug. 11.

"Please continue to deliberate in accordance with all of the court’s instructions to you," Circuit Judge Karen Ahn responded in writing 15 minutes later.

During the course of deliberations, which ended Thursday when the jury found Deedy not guilty of second-degree murder in the fatal 2011 shooting of Kollin Elderts but deadlocked on all the lesser charges, the jury sent nine communications to the court raising questions.

At 1:15 p.m. on the final day of deliberations, Brown informed the court that the jury had come to a unanimous verdict on one charge, was hung on the others, and felt more time wasn’t needed to continue deliberating.

"How should we proceed?" the forewoman asked.

Later that afternoon, Ahn summoned the jurors back to the courtroom to read their verdict.

She subsequently acquitted Deedy of the second-degree murder charge and declared a mistrial on the manslaughter and assault ones, saying he was eligible to be retried on those.

His first trial last year resulted in a hung jury, but jurors then had only murder to consider. Ahn at the time said the evidence didn’t support manslaughter.

But during the second trial, she added manslaughter and assault as options, prompted in part by two Hawaii Supreme Court decisions that overturned convictions she handed down in two unrelated trials. The justices said she should have permitted the jury in those proceedings to consider lesser offenses.

On the second-to-last day of deliberations in the just-concluded Deedy trial, the group indicated it was unable to reach a unanimous verdict and asked how to proceed. The judge, after offering counsel on the deliberative process, asked whether going home and returning the next day would assist in reaching a unanimous verdict.

Fifteen minutes later, the jury responded: No.

They returned the next day anyway, at one point asking whether reckless manslaughter was included in the second-degree murder charge or was a separate one. Ahn said that if the jury found the defendant not guilty of murder or was unable to reach a unanimous verdict on that count, the group then must consider whether he was guilty of reckless manslaughter.

Ahn set an Aug. 29 hearing to discuss the status of the case.

Deedy, a Washington, D.C.-based State Department agent, was in Hawaii in November 2011 to provide security for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting. While off duty, he shot Elderts at a Waikiki McDonald’s restaurant during an altercation.

Deedy claimed self-defense. Prosecutors contended the agent was drunk and did not identify himself as a law enforcement officer before starting the fight that ended with Elderts’ death.