After about five hours of the arduous process, 82 prospective jurors had been questioned as a group and individually.
SPRINGFIELD - Eight jurors - half the total needed - were selected Monday in the trial of Adam Lee Hall, the 36-year-old Peru resident charged with a Berkshire county triple murder.
After about five hours of the arduous process, 82 prospective jurors had been questioned as a group and individually.
Jury selection resumes Tuesday.
Among questions posed to people individually by Hampden Superior Court Judge C. Jeffrey Kinder is whether hearing evidence that the victims were dismembered - and seeing graphic photos of the victims - would prevent them from being impartial jurors.
Even though only a few people ended up saying it would prevent them from being impartial, many people hesitated a moment before answering.
Kinder told them he knows no one wants to hear such evidence and look at such pictures, but he was only asking if they could do so and still be fair.
Hall was a ranking member of the local Hells Angels when he, David Chalue, 46, of North Adams, and Caius Veiovis, 32, of Pittsfield, kidnapped David Glasser, Edward Frampton and Robert Chadwell from Glasser and Frampton’s Pittsfield home sometime in the early hours of Aug. 28, 2011, and then killed them, according to prosecutors.
Hall is being tried first.
The trials were moved to Hampden Superior Court after defense lawyers said publicity in Berkshire County would make is impossible for a fair trial.
Berkshire County District Attorney David Capeless and defense lawyer Alan J. Black were given 16 peremptory challenges each - meaning they could ask for someone to be excused without cause.
On Monday, Capeless used nine of his and Black used seven of his.
Jury selection and other pre-trial motions will be this week, and opening statements and testimony begin Jan. 13.
The trial is expected to take four to six weeks, and Kinder excused jurors who were full time students, or for whom the trial length would mean financial or physical hardship.
The victims’ remains were discovered buried in a shallow pit on private property in Becket.
There is a fourth co-defendant in the case, but he is not charged with murder and has not been involved in the motions to suppress and other pre-trial matters with the other three.
David Casey, 64, of Canaan, N.Y., is charged with three counts of accessory after the fact of murder, three counts of accessory after the fact of kidnapping, and three counts of accessory after the fact of intimidation of a witness.
Jurors were given a copy of a list of potential witnesses numbering about 250.