Sep 11, 2007 6:00 pm US/Pacific
Spector Jurors Enter Second Day Of Deliberations
LOS ANGELES (AP) ―
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Phil Spector arrives with his wife, Rachelle, at Los Angeles Superior Court (file).
AP
Jurors weighing whether to convict record producer Phil Spector of second-degree murder began their second day of deliberations Tuesday.
Spector, 67, is accused of shooting 40-year-old actress and House of Blues VIP hostess Lana Clarkson through the mouth on Feb. 3, 2003, in the foyer of his Alhambra mansion.
The defendant, who maintains Clarkson shot herself because she was despondent over her career and finances, faces 15 years to life imprisonment if convicted, with a possible added 10-year penalty for use of a firearm.
During the first communication with the court since beginning deliberations Monday, the nine-man, three-woman jury asked to look at the alleged murder weapon.
A bailiff brought the snub-nosed Colt Cobra .38 Special six-shot revolver -- which Alhambra police discovered underneath the victim's left ankle -- to the jury room. Five minutes later, the bailiff brought the gun -- which was secured inside a box -- back into the courtroom.
The panel, which deliberated for three hours and 45 minutes before going home Monday afternoon, began hearing testimony in the case on April 26. The jury heard from 77 witnesses in a case in which more than 500 exhibits were submitted into evidence.
Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Larry Paul Fidler Monday ordered the defendant not to speak to the media or use any surrogates to do so. He issued a similar order to the Clarkson family.
Spector and Clarkson met when he went to the House of Blues on the Sunset Strip, where she was working as a $9-per-hour VIP hostess. Spector, who had spent the night on the town dining and drinking with two other women, invited Clarkson to come home with him. Hours later, she was dead.
Prosecutors allege Spector shot Clarkson when she rebuffed his romantic advances. Five women testified that Spector pulled guns on them in similar situations over the years when they spurned him romantically and tried to leave.
The defense contends that Clarkson was depressed about her career, but also suggested that she may have accidentally pulled the trigger. She had been drinking tequila and taking pain medicine.
Clarkson was best known for her starring role in the 1985 Roger Corman cult hit "Barbarian Queen," though she had bit parts on dozens of TV shows and in a few well-known movies, such as 1982's "Fast Times at Ridgemont High."
Spector, renowned in music circles for the "Wall of Sound" recording technique he invented in the 1960s and used in his work with the Beatles and other groups, is free on $1 million bail.
(© 2007 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
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