The murder trial of music producer Phil Spector ended on Wednesday in a mistrial after the jury, leaning heavily to convict him, could not reach a unanimous verdict.
The Los Angeles County district attorney's office said it planned to retry the case.
Spector, 67, charged with second-degree murder in the 2003 killing of Lana Clarkson in his home, stared blankly forward as Judge Larry Paul Fidler of Superior Court ended the proceedings after the jury foreman reported a 10-2 deadlock.
The impasse came after an earlier deadlock of 7-5, which jurors later said also tilted toward conviction, that led the judge to take the unusual step of sending jurors back to deliberate with new instructions, which angered the defense.
Three jurors, speaking to reporters afterward, said the two holdouts gave credence to a defense assertion that the death of Clarkson, a 40-year-old struggling actress, might have been a suicide rather than a murder.
They said the jurors had also been troubled by the lack of large amounts of blood on Spector and the poor English of a witness, Spector's driver, who said he heard Spector say, "I think I killed somebody."
Fidler kept gag orders in place preventing lawyers and parties in the case from speaking publicly. He set a hearing for Wednesday.
Spector, the mastermind behind hits like Da Doo Ron Ron and Be My Baby, escorted by his wife, lawyers and bodyguards, left after the verdict through an adjacent courtroom without saying a word, free on bail.
"We're disappointed the jury was unable to reach a verdict in this case, and we will immediately begin preparations for a retrial," said Sandi Gibbons, a spokeswoman for the district attorney's office at a news conference.
Spector was accused of killing Clarkson, whom he had met at a nightclub hours before she was found dead from a gunshot wound to her mouth in the foyer of his home.
Prosecutors said Spector shot Clarkson in an alcohol-fueled rage after she resisted his advances. They presented testimony from five other women who described similar threats by Spector.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS