As you might guess, when a jury deliberates whether somebody is guilty of a murder, they're going to look at the evidence.  They're going to look at what the prosecutors present.  Are there any eyewitnesses?  Is there any video evidence?  Are there any admissions by the defendant?  Is there any DNA evidence?  Is there any fingerprint evidence?

Our criminal defense lawyers are providing an overview below to help readers better understand what juries look for when determining whether a defendant is guilty or innocent in a murder case.

In my experience, and I've been doing this for over twenty-five years, they're looking for hard evidence.  Are there witnesses that are pointing at the defendant and saying yeah, that's the guy that shot the victim?  That's the guy who stabbed the victim.

Did the defendant admit that they did something?  Are there other co-conspirators or other co-defendants in the murder case that are saying something against the defendant?

So, they're going to look at hard evidence. If it's just guesswork, speculation, or fishing on the part of the prosecutors, and they just think the person might be guilty, that's not going to be enough to get somebody convicted of a murder case.

Juries know in Los Angeles County in particular, where I've tried a lot of murder cases that it's not fair to convict somebody of murder if they don't have good, hard, solid evidence. This is especially true in a first-degree murder case.

As the defense, our role is to guide the jury's understanding of the evidence. We present a clear picture of what evidence should be present if the defendant is guilty of murder.  If this evidence is lacking, there's a reason for its absence. This reason could be that the defendant is not guilty of this particular murder case, and the prosecutor cannot prove all the elements of the crime.

That reason the person is not guilty of this particular murder case, and the prosecutor can't prove all the elements of the crime.

One thing you also have to realize is each case spins on its facts.  So, not in all cases is it relevant that there are witnesses or DNA evidence.  It all depends on the circumstances.

In some cases, the person admits that they killed the other party, but they were defending themselves.  So, if there are no eyewitnesses to it and there's bad blood between the two parties, and you can bring evidence that shows that they were defending themselves, that could be itself a complete defense to the murder case.

Motive, Witnesses, Fingerprints, Defendant's Statements

Other times, they find a body, and the person is dead, and they don't know who did it.  They are going to try to see if your defendant has a motive to do it.  They're going to try and see if your defendant left any clues or evidence or fingerprints.  Or are there any witnesses who see the defendant there?

Did your defendant talk to somebody about killing another party?  So, you can't just say the same thing in every murder case.

It depends on how the murder occurred, who the suspects are, whether or not it's clear or not that a particular defendant actually is the one that killed the other party, or whether the argument is they're not the one who killed the other party.

Once you have all this information, you can start talking about what a jury will look at and what evidence they'll need to convict a person, and that's one of the big things that I do.

I sit down and meet with the client. I go over their story, and I love to have all the evidence at hand when I meet with the client. I love to have looked at all the video evidence, talked to the witnesses in the case, seen the police reports, and talked to the prosecutor about their theory of the murder.

After gathering the evidence, I sit down with the defendant and say, 'Here's what evidence they claim they have.  Here's what the prosecutor thinks happened.  Now, you tell me.  What's your side of the story?' The defendant's perspective is crucial in building our defense strategy.

Then, I get the defendant's side of the story. Once I have all that, I might have my investigator do some investigation, talk to some witnesses, look at some of the evidence in the case, and really evaluate it if that evidence is going to be crucial in proving the case.

Then, I get together a list of pros and cons in the case.  Here's the stuff that's good for us.  Here's the stuff we're going to be able to show to the jury and here's what the problems are.

Here's what the prosecutors are going to show to the jury.  Then, once you have that evidence, now you start to think to yourself, what evidence is going to be most important to a jury?  Sometimes, there's going to be evidence that can go either way.  There's kind of a gray area and that evidence we need to build up in your favor.

Once we have all that laid out, we're in a position to evaluate the case and get an idea of what we think a jury might do in this particular murder case. Then, we can decide whether we want to take it to trial and risk getting convicted or whether we should take it to trial because we've got great evidence and because the client is saying that they're innocent and did not do it.

Review Murder Case Strategy with a Criminal Layer

That's really how I break the tie in these murder cases when I'm evaluating what a jury might do.  I say, yeah, the jury could go this way; the jury could go that way.  Maybe it's not clear what the jury's going to do.  Maybe the case could go either way.  How you break the tie is you ask your client.

If you had anything to do with this murder, if you believe that you did commit the murder, and you do believe you did some of these bad things that the prosecutors are claiming you did, we should probably work out a deal.

You don't want to take a chance of going down when we might be able to get you something less than twenty-five to life or fifty-to life if you're convicted full-boat for this murder.

If, on the other hand, you did not murder this person, you are not guilty of this murder, and you believe that in your heart and you don't think you did anything wrong, then absolutely you should not take a deal.

We should move ahead full force, even if there's a chance you could lose.  If you're innocent, you must move ahead.  It would be best if you defended yourself.  It would be best if you fought the case.  Let's get the evidence.  Let's get the witnesses.

Defendant Testimony in a Murder Case

You might have to testify as a criminal defendant in the case because a jury likes to see a defendant testify, in my experience in a murder case, because they want to hear what they have to say.

The key is whether or not that testimony will benefit you, whether you can stand cross-examination if you do testify, and finally, how a jury will view your testimony.

Are they going to think that you're a solid, credible witness, or are they going to believe you're sneaky and some bad evidence came in against you?  These are the types of things we have to evaluate in a murder case in Los Angeles when we're considering fighting the case, taking it in front of the jury.

We've got to look at how the jury will react to some of this evidence, how well you'll come off as a witness, and our real chances of winning this case and getting a not-guilty verdict.