Nearly eight months after Freddie Gray was found dying in the back of a police van, the trial for the first of six Baltimore police officers accused of killing him is officially underway. Jury selection begins today for the trial of William G. Porter, charged with involuntary manslaughter, second-degree assault, misconduct in office and reckless endangerment. All six trials will be held consecutively and will run to or through April of next year, according to Ebony.
As the first in a series of trials, Porter’s trial will be the first to test some important decisions by the judge and jury. Presiding Judge Barry G. Williams, selected in June to oversee the entire process, has a history of rigorous investigation and prosecution of police misconduct. The Baltimore Sun reports:
In Missouri, [Williams] prosecuted three officers charged with beating a high school student. In Florida, he won a conviction against an officer who pistol-whipped a teen fleeing a drug bust. He was dispatched to the Virgin Islands to prosecute — and convict — an officer there for violating the civil rights of a dozen people over a four-year period.
Williams made key rulings in the jury selection and allowed evidence for each of the six trials. The most important two decisions are those to keep the proceedings for each trial in Baltimore and to reject a request by defense attorneys to sequester each juror. This means that, once selected, jurors will remain anonymous and under gag order but will not be forced to submit to the onerous process of sequestration, which according to prosecutors would have interfered with the decision to keep the trial in Baltimore.
Judge Williams also allowed two key trial elements—character witnesses on behalf of Porter and the admission of two cell phone videos of the arrest and stop in which Freddie Gray suffered the head injury that killed him. The court will also deny use of testimony on Gray’s prior arrests.
Protests around the incident itself marked the late spring and early summer in Baltimore, with some turning violent after clashes with police. Protests also marked key court dates in the summer, when Williams ruled on the procedures. Many authorities expect sustained protests as this trial begins.