The conviction in Karina Vetrano's murder was swift, but a juror now says it was tainted

The juror, who said he was the final holdout against finding Lewis guilty, accused other jurors of violating the judge’s orders not to discuss the case before deliberations. The holdout juror said that on the second day of the trial, after Vetrano’s parents had testified, the foreman announced that his mind was made up.

The juror said he had deep misgivings about the verdict and still harbors doubts about Lewis’ guilt. He spoke to The New York Times on Saturday, but asked that his name not be disclosed because he said he feared retaliation.

“This is bigger than Chanel Lewis,” the juror said. “I’m standing up to the system. Showing people what the inside of a jury room is really like.”

The allegations are an unexpected coda in a case that has already become embroiled in a broader debate over police conduct in the investigation into the killing of Vetrano, 30, in August 2016.

The first trial of Lewis ended in a hung jury in November after several jurors agreed with the defense’s argument that Lewis’ confession was coerced and that DNA evidence was tainted.

The sentencing of Lewis, 22, after the second trial has been delayed because of the holdout juror’s claims. He faces life in prison without parole. A hearing about the claims will be held Monday at the New York state Supreme Court in Queens.

The jurors accused of misconduct have denied his claims in a motion filed by the Queens district attorney’s office.

A spokeswoman for that office declined to comment Sunday. But the lead prosecutor in the case, Brad Leventhal, said last week that he supported holding a hearing on the allegations.

“We believe that in the interest of justice that a hearing should be held so that this court could see and the public could see that this was a valid and a good verdict,” Leventhal said.

Vetrano’s family, who hailed the conviction of Lewis, declined to comment Sunday on the juror’s allegations.

Some of Lewis’ supporters believe that DNA evidence was planted in order to convict him. Lewis’ mother, Veta Lewis, has said her son was framed. Police and prosecutors have said that the evidence was handled properly.

In the interview, the juror said he had doubts about Lewis’ guilt, but gave in because he believed that the judge was going to keep the jurors there well into the night until they delivered a guilty verdict.

He said he was also dismayed about technical difficulties that prevented the jury from viewing Lewis’ videotaped confession.

When the jurors voted to convict Lewis, it was after 9 p.m. and they had been in the courthouse for about 12 hours.

“I was getting flustered, having migraines, and they were serving food from a pizza joint — not the healthiest,” said the holdout juror, referred to as “Juror A” in the defense’ motions. “I felt I needed to get out of there.”

Juror A said he also felt subtly pressured by the judge, Justice Michael Aloise, to reach a guilty verdict.

He said he noticed during the trial that the judge was wearing purple, which he learned was Vetrano’s favorite color, and he believed it was a deliberate show of solidarity with the victim’s family.

The judge did not respond to requests for comment.

After the jury received the case April 1, deliberations became contentious, Juror A said.

He said he tried to send a note to the judge to find out how long the jury would have to stay that evening, but the jury foreman, known as “Juror B” in the motion, ripped up the message.

The foreman, in his court response to the allegations, said he did not recall making any statements to Juror A about his opinion before deliberations and that he had “no recollection” of ripping up a note.

Juror A said he told his fellow jurors that he did not believe prosecutors had proved Vetrano had been sexually abused, and noted the absence of DNA establishing that there had been such an attack.

But he said one of the jurors, called “Juror D” in the motion, recalled her experience of having been raped and persuaded the other jurors that Lewis was guilty. (The jurors could convict on the first-degree murder charge only if they also found Lewis guilty of sexual abuse.)

Another panelist, known as “Juror C” in the motion, used evidence and testimony from an unrelated rape case to evaluate the likelihood that Vetrano had been sexually abused, according to the affidavit.

Juror C acknowledged drawing a comparison between evidence in Lewis’ trial and another case on which he had also been a juror, but stopped after another juror asked him to, according to the court response. Juror D denied in the response that she had ever been raped.

On Aug. 2, 2016, Vetrano went for a jog in Spring Creek Park in the Howard Beach section of Queens. When she did not return, her father, Philip Vetrano, contacted a neighbor, a chief in the Police Department, setting off an extensive manhunt.

After investigators learned the DNA found on her body belonged to a black man, detectives sought DNA samples from hundreds of black men who had been arrested in parts of Queens and Brooklyn.

Detectives focused on Lewis on the recommendation of a police lieutenant who had seen him on two occasions “acting suspiciously” in Howard Beach, a predominantly white neighborhood.

Lewis lived 3 miles away in the East New York neighborhood of Brooklyn, with his mother, and had graduated from a school for students with learning disabilities.

The DNA taken from Lewis matched traces found on Vetrano’s neck and cellphone, and a mixture sample from two of her fingernails.

But his lawyers have argued that the DNA evidence was weak — and suggested an alternate theory that Lewis might have touched the same surface as Vetrano at some point before she was killed.

Lewis initially denied killing Vetrano, but after 11 hours in police custody, he confessed in a videotaped interview to beating her. At times during the confession, he appeared confused and mumbled through some of his responses.

Vinoo Varghese, the holdout juror’s lawyer, said that if it were not for the jurors’ actions and the judge’s decision to keep the jurors into the night on the first day, the outcome might have been different.

He said his client was steamrollered. “He was bullied in the jury room,” Varghese said. “That is an insane coercive atmosphere for any juror to be in.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

The conviction in Karina Vetrano's murder was swift, but a juror now says it was tainted

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