Casey Anthony in court during jury selection.
Clearwater, Florida - Potential jurors in the Casey Anthony trial are preparing to work through the weekend.
Judge Belvin Perry has said all along that he will have a jury seated by the trial date, which is set for Tuesday in Orlando.
As of 5:25 p.m., eight potential jurors had been cleared through the pre-trial publicity and death penalty phases of the questioning.
The hardship phase was earlier in the week.
For the first time during jury selection, attorneys questioned a woman who had never heard of Casey Anthony. A 32-year-old woman laughed when Judge Perry began talking with her. She told him that her mother was kidding around with her about getting on the jury.
"Do you have any impressions in this case?" the judge asked.
"My ignorance works in my favor right now," she joked.
The woman told Judge Perry she had never heard of the case until the previous weekend, when an article was written about the case.
During jury selection, other potential jurors were asked about the death penalty.
Defense attorneys asked, "On a scale of one to ten, how do you feel about the death penalty?"
One man told the Judge he would be able to decide on Casey Anthony's innocence or guilt. However, he said he would not want to decide on her dying by lethal injection or spending the rest of her life in prison.
On Thursday, for the first time, the defense laid out it's strategy to defend Casey Anthony, saying she was sexually abused as a child. Potential jurors were asked on Friday about the mitigating factor of sexual or physical abuse. A potential juror, who is a nurse, was asked about treating patients who have suffered sexual abuse.
"Have you treated people for sexual abuse who have not reported it?" asked the attorney.
The woman answered, "Yes, it is common."
"Jurors just don't come out and tell you everything you need to know in a matter of ten minutes," says local defense attorney Jeff Brown, who is watching the trial closely.
Judge Perry says that he wants to get a small pool of jurors together, possibly 12 or 16, and have the attorneys strike from that portion of the pool. Normally, attorneys will clear a large group of potential jurors and strike from that bigger pool. Doing things a different way is a bit against the norm, says some legal analysts. "But, this judge has a way of doing his own thing," said one attorney.
Brown says picking from a smaller group could set the defense team up for an appeal later, since a larger group of better-suited jurors may not be available.
Earlier in the day, a potential juror got into trouble for not disclosing a DUI arrest.
"Were you accused of a crime?" the defense asked.
"Uh, no," the man answered.
The defense then pulled up a mug shot of the man.
"Were you arrested for a DUI?" the defense asked him.
"That was a misdemeanor," he answered. "I didn't think it was a crime."
The Judge Perry said he was going to limit the amount of time for each attorney to question jurors. He had it down to 30 minutes per side.
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