Results from the first day of jury deliberations in the criminal trial against Donald Trump

(CNN) — The jury in Donald Trump’s hush money trial in New York ended its first day of deliberations on Wednesday without reaching a verdict after sitting for more than four and a half hours.

Jurors return Thursday at 9:30 a.m. ET, but the 12 men and women will hear from Judge Juan Merson again.

On Wednesday afternoon, the jury was asked to hear four separate testimonies from witnesses, including former National Enquirer chief David Becker and former Trump fixer Michael Cohen. Jurors also want to repeat Merson’s instructions on the law that he gave them Wednesday morning.

Jurors sought four pieces of testimony: Becker’s testimony about his phone conversation with Trump in June 2016; her testimony about not finalizing Trump’s payment to AMI for the rights to the Karen McDougal story; His testimony about the meeting at Trump Tower in August 2015 and Cohen’s testimony about the meeting at Trump Tower.

Evidence jurors are seeking about Trump’s concerns directly related to Becker. Cohen and Becker’s testimony about the 2015 meeting refers to a meeting Becker acknowledged was the “eyes and ears” of the campaign, while Becker testified that he discussed McDougal’s history in his June 2016 call with Trump. Buy her.

For the first time in U.S. history, a jury will decide whether a former president has been convicted of a serious crime, while Trump is running against President Joe Biden in November’s presidential election.

Credit: Jabin Botsford-Pool/Getty Images

Instructions of the judge

The political implications of the case were not openly discussed Wednesday morning, when Merson spent an hour instructing the jury on the law.

A judge indicted Trump on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records about payments he made to porn star Stormy Daniels before the 2016 election. The guilty must be sentenced.

Merson reminded jurors to set aside their biases when deciding a defendant’s fate.
Remember that you have promised to be an impartial jury,” said the judge. “A fair juror is one who keeps his promise to be fair and impartial, and who does not allow a bias or prejudice for or against a person present at the trial to influence the verdict.”

Merchan asked jurors Thursday morning to clarify whether the hour-long presentation should be read in its entirety or if there are parts that should be heard one more time.

CNN legal analyst Eli Honig said the jury did not receive a written copy of Merchan’s instructions, which is a problem. While most federal judges send the original document with the jury, New York state courts prohibit this practice.

“This is the way New York state courts do it,” Honig said. “They’re stubborn, they’re stuck in the past, they make life difficult for the jury.”

As deliberations continued, Trump and his attorneys said in a courtroom in downtown Manhattan that if the jurors had any additional input, it could be questions or requests to hear testimony again Wednesday afternoon.

Jurors also received a laptop with all the evidence from the trial so they could consult it as they deliberated. The judge said the computer did not have internet access.

Meanwhile, six alternate jurors have yet to be acquitted. They have been asked to return if any of them cannot appoint one of the 12 jurors, in case any of them need to be replaced.