East Texas

By KENNETH DEAN
Staff Writer

NEW BOSTON - Prosecuting and defense attorneys Tuesday began a key process of selecting jurors for the KFC murders trial - individual voir dire.

Romeo Pinkerton, 49, stands accused in the 1983 case in which five people were abducted from a Kilgore KFC restaurant and shot to death. He is charged with capital murder and could face the death penalty.

Pinkerton's cousin, Darnell Hartsfield, also has been indicted in the case. His trial is scheduled after Pinkerton's.

The case was moved from Rusk County, where the bodies were found, by State District Judge Clay Gossett of Henderson on a change of venue order.

Gossett told the Tyler Morning Telegraph Tuesday afternoon that, out of 350 people summoned for jury duty in the case, 68 were being questioned individually.

"We qualified 90 of those summoned, and once we got the questionnaires the two sides agreed to excuse 20, then we excused two more this morning," he said.

The case is being prosecuted by the Lisa Tanner of the Texas Attorney General's Office in conjunction with the Rusk County District Attorney's Office. The defense team consists of Tyler attorney Jeff Haas and Gilmer attorney David Griffith.

Gossett said plans are for the prosecution and defense to pick 12 jurors and two alternates, but a third alternate might be picked.

"If we have enough jurors then we will pick a third alternate, because this may be a lengthy trial," he said.

Much of the morning was devoted to questioning a man who works in the medical profession. The native of India arrived to the U.S. in 1992, has since been naturalized and said he was residing in India when the murders occurred.

In answering questions, he spoke of his Christian beliefs, belief in the justice system and said he could sentence someone to death if evidence supported the sentence.

When asked about the time that had expired since the crimes, he told Ms. Tanner, "If I was the family of the people then (the time) would not diminish (the severity of the crime)."

Attorneys also questioned a woman who said she worked as a counselor. The woman said she questioned the accuracy of DNA testing because human error in testing procedures could occur. She specifically cited the fingernail DNA finally proved was not a former KFC suspect's who was indicted for the murders in 1995.

Prosecutors have said they will present DNA evidence as part of their case against Pinkerton.

On the night of Sept. 23, 1935, Mary Tyler, 37; Opie Ann Hughes, 39; Joey Johnson, 20; David Maxwell, 20; and Monte Landers, 19, were taken from the restaurant where some of them worked. Their bodies were found the next day on a rural Rusk County oil lease. Authorities said the five had been shot to death "execution-style."

At the time, authorities believed the crime might have begun as a robbery.

Gossett said he plans to have five people go through the voir dire process each day until the jury is selected. He said he believed the process could take up to one month.