Opinion ID: 2014418
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Prospective Juror S.R.

Text: According to defendant, S.R. voiced doubt about whether she could put a preexisting opinion regarding defendant's guilt, premised on media accounts, out of her mind. To support his claim, defendant points to isolated passages of voir dire where S.R. responded to his questions probing her ability to put her opinion aside by stating that I think I can or that she would try. Those responses, standing alone, did not render S.R. unfit to serve. As we have noted, words like think or try are not. . . talismanic word[s] that automatically make[ ] a statement equivocal ( People v Chambers, 97 NY2d 417, 419 [2002]). S.R.'s other answers dispelled any doubt about her ability to deliberate impartially ( see People v Johnson, 94 NY2d at 615 [in considering whether a challenge for cause should have been granted, we must look not to characterizations or snippets of the voir dire but to the full record of what the challenged jurors  sworn to speak truthfully  actually said]). The court concluded the voir dire by asking S.R. if she would want a juror with her state of mind to sit on a case in which either she or a loved one was on trial ( compare People v Chambers, 97 NY2d at 419 [noting that an additional question or two at voir dire would easily dispel any doubt as to equivocation, assure an impartial jury, and avoid the delay, and risk, of appeals]). S.R. unhesitatingly answered Absolutely. In light of that response as well as her many other assurances of impartiality, the trial court had ample basis for rejecting defendant's for cause challenge to S.R. ( compare People v Torpey, 63 NY2d 361, 367 [1984] [trial court erred by denying the defendant's for cause challenge to a prospective juror who stated, among other things, that it would `probably not' be fair to the defendant to have somebody with her state of mind on the jury]).