The attorney for former New England Patriots star Aaron Hernandez, convicted two months ago of killing a man who was dating his fiancé's sister, claims that a juror never disclosed knowledge of his client's other murder charges, in an attempt to get picked.
The allegations, unsealed in court documents Monday, detail how an anonymous caller told Hernandez's attorney, James Sultan, that "she recognized one of the jurors from TV," and that she had discussed Hernandez's separate double-homicide case in Boston with the person.
The allegations were made over the course of four phone calls made from blocked numbers, according to Sultan's filing.
If true, the potential for bias would likely strengthen Hernandez's appeal to his murder conviction in the shooting death of 27-year-old semiprofessional football player Odin Lloyd.
Any mention of Hernandez's separate Boston double homicide case was excluded from the Lloyd murder trial. But according to Sultan, the anonymous caller said the juror in question had expressed a desire to be on the Lloyd jury, despite having discussed the Boston double shooting.
In that case, prosecutors say Hernandez, irate with Daniel de Abreu and Safiro Furtado after an encounter at a Boston nightclub, fired a gun into their car while stopped at a red light, killing them and injuring a third, on July 16, 2012.
If the allegations made by the anonymous caller are true, Sultan argued, the Lloyd juror "was untruthful during the jury selection process" and was "exposed to extraneous information which was unfairly prejudicial to Hernandez."
He noted that other potential jurors who had access to similar conversations were vetted and dismissed. If the juror had "disclosed any awareness of the Boston charges against Hernandez," defense attorneys would have sought to have the individual dismissed, Sultan said in his court filing.
In unsealing the court documents, Judge E. Susan Garsh wrote that no decision had been made on whether to investigate Sultan's allegations. Until then, details about the juror, the caller, and the specific claims made to Sultan will remain redacted.