Houston, Texas (KTRK) – Jury selection will begin Monday in the third trial involving the punishable murder of AJ Armstrong.
Armstrong, now 23 and a father himself, is accused of killing his parents in their southwest Houston home seven years later, when he was just 16 years old.
But the trial will not begin immediately.
Jury selection is expected to take three to four weeks, with the trial beginning June 1.
It is the third time in nearly seven years that prosecutors will seek to prove to a jury that Armstrong killed his parents. Armstrong maintained his innocence.
Jury selection is expected to move forward despite a motion Armstrong’s team made last Thursday, claiming that they needed more time to “examine (a) a second-trial juror regarding a dating relationship with a Harris County prosecutor.”
The Harris County District Attorney’s office responded to that request by filing its strongly worded motion on Friday, seeking its continuation.
The DA’s office criticized the timing of the defense’s request, writing that the state was “unfairly biased at present” by the media coverage.
Sources familiar with the Armstrong case told ABC13 that the juror briefly dated the Harris County District Attorney who has nothing to do with Armstrong’s case. We were also told that she was a substitute juror who did not participate in the deliberations.
Defense attorney Rick Detuto did not comment, but his motion read: “By withholding this information from the defense during the trial, the right to a fair trial was denied.”
The attorney general’s office also declined to comment. Because of the publicity of the case, Judge Kelly Johnson warned attorneys on both sides not to make statements to the media that would “harm the judicial process.”
It has been more than six months since the retrial ended without a verdict.
In July 2016, Dawn and Antonio Sr. were shot in the head, with pillows placed over their faces, while they slept in their southwest Houston home. Armstrong was arrested hours later. He was 16 years old, entering his junior year of high school at that time.
See also: “I Didn’t Do It:” Accused Killer AJ Armstrong Tells His Story
Today, Armstrong is an adult, who has worn a GPS ankle monitor his entire life, ever since he got out of prison in 2017.
In March, court papers showed that Armstrong violated the bond clause when the two-and-a-half-hour GPS tracker died because he failed to charge him.
Since his last trial, Armstrong has been married to his son’s mother, his high school girlfriend, Kate Ober, who testified on his behalf during his first trial. Major accomplishments for anyone, but Armstrong is yet to move forward with his life as investigators assert he is the only person who could have killed his parents, which prosecutors will try to prove to a third jury.
There have been many delays in what seems like the never-ending saga that is the Armstrong case thanks to Hurricane Harvey, COVID, dozens of rescheduled hearings, and even missing evidence. It has become one of the thousands of backlogs plaguing criminal courts in Harris County.
While District Attorney Kim Ogg noted during a recent press conference that the backlog has shrunk by about 21% since June 2021, we found that when it comes to violent crime, the backlog continues to rise, specifically showing delays in prosecuting first-degree murder cases.
Comparing January 2021 to January 2022, data from the Texas Office of Court Administration shows that the number of first-degree murder cases awaiting trial in Harris County increased about 12%. Compare January 2022 to January 2023 and there is a 7% increase in murder cases pending.
But legal analyst Steve Schleist says you can’t compare the unprecedented Armstrong case to the backlog.
“If you were to average it, it would take, like, two years to get to every trial? It’s not crazy,” Schelst said. “(That’s) not a long time to get to three trials.”
Of concern, he says, is the cost, which does not necessarily mean dollars.
“It’s a cost that can’t be put into a calculator,” Schlest said. “(Prosecutors) can work on other cases. These are very high-profile prosecutors. There are other victims out there or families of victims who are awaiting their cases and defendants who are awaiting cases. And those prosecutors can devote their time to those cases.”
For full coverage of the AJ Armstrong case, follow Courtney Fischer on Twitter FacebookAnd Twitter And Instagram.
‘I’m innocent’: Houston teen AJ Armstrong backs his side as he awaits trial for his parents’ murder
See the original case below
[ad_2]
https://abc13.com/aj-armstrong-antonio-armstrongs-son-update-third-capital-murder-trial/13200710/
