Jury selection begins in high-profile Saints star’s death
NEW ORLEANS — Potential jurors in the trial of a man charged with second-degree murder in the death of former New Orleans Saints star Will Smith were asked Monday about their attitudes on lethal self-defence, whether they can put aside opinions formed amid intense media coverage of Smith’s death and how Smith’s popularity might affect a verdict.
Smith was a star on the 2006 Saints team that helped lift the stricken city’s spirits with a winning season after Hurricane Katrina. He played with the team when it won the franchise’s only Super Bowl three seasons later. He was shot to death April 9 during a confrontation following a vehicle crash.
Charged in his death is a 29-year-old former semiprofessional football player named Cardell Hayes. The owner of a tow-truck company and the father of a 5-year-old son, Hayes is described by friends as soft-spoken and even-tempered — hardly the type to erupt into a lethal road rage. His attorney has been laying the groundwork for a self-defence argument, saying Smith was the aggressor.
Jury selection started with about 130 potential jury candidates filing into a New Orleans courtroom. Judge Camille Buras hoped to assemble a jury of 12, with four alternates, by late Monday or sometime Tuesday.