There will be 6 jurors chosen and 4 alternates. According to Florida Criminal Procedure Rule 3.350, each side gets 10 peremptory challenges for the chosen jurors and an additional peremptory challenge for the alternates. The parties can only challenge the alternates with their one peremptory for that purpose (they can't use an unexercised peremptory challenge from the main panel on the alternates.)
Thus far the jurors are only being questioned on their exposure to media and whether they have formed opinions and can set them aside. Sometimes the questioning veers into a discussion of security fears, race or whether sequestration (which the Judge has not yet decided on) will be a hardship.
The jurors being questioned are those who answered a certain way to a specific question on the questionnaire. It appears the questin was about exposure to pre-trial publicity and those being questioned come from the subset that said they can put what they've heard and read aside and/or haven't formed an opinion. The lawyers agreed on which ones from this subset should be questioned. The others, those who replied they had a fixed opinion which wouldn't change were excused without questioning.
After each juror is questioned, the parties approach the bench so either one can make a challenge for cause. The judge rules but does not announce how she ruled. Although today, one potential juror was dismissed right after questioning by the state's attorney. He had insisted murder is murder, even in self-defense, and said he didn't know if he could put that view aside if the court instructed the jury differently. There was no need for defense questioning -- the parties approached the bench and he was done.
According to the Herald, 73 potential jurors have been dismissed so far. All but 2 were dismissed without questioning. 100 jurors are being summoned each day. That means roughly 24% (71 of 300) either said they had a fixed opinion that couldn't be changed or had some other reason for not serving. (Most hardship and ineligibility excusals were determined in advance by another judge. They didn't have to show up at all.)
The court administrator says when 30 prospective jurors have been passed for cause on the pre-trial publicity issue, they will move into the second phase which is the actual voir dire on all topics. They will be questioned as a group. I wonder if they don't need 32 prospective jurors for the second round. If all 20 peremptory challenges were used on the main panel, they would need 26. If both sides used their alternate peremptory challenge in choosing the four alternates, they would need 6. 26 plus 6 is 32.
There is no publicly available written order on how the process is occurring. The issue of admissibility of voice/speech expert testimony has not yet been resolved.
