Vote to Convict Haunts Carmona Juror

He describes himself as “the last holdout,” the final juror who could have given accused teenage robber Arthur Carmona a reprieve but didn’t.

Instead, on the second day of deliberations last October, he supplied the 12th vote to convict.

Now, with Carmona a day away from a possible prison sentence in the range of 12 to 23 years, the juror says, “It really bothered me that we found him guilty. In fact, it still bothers me. I blame myself. I could have hung on for a hung jury.”

Should you have held out, I ask.

“Let me put it this way,” he says. “I think there was enough reasonable doubt to do that.”

The juror doesn’t want to be identified, but only because he doesn’t want wider publicity. Those connected with the case know who he is, a retired 58-year-old department store manager who lives in South County.

He hasn’t been eager to discuss the case, which ended in Carmona’s conviction for robbing at gunpoint an Irvine juice bar and a Denny’s restaurant in Costa Mesa two days apart in February of 1998. In recent weeks, I’ve written a series of columns questioning the case against Carmona, which was built solely on eyewitness testimony in the complete absence of physical evidence linking him to the crimes.

Two weeks ago, one of the key witnesses against Carmona contacted me and said she’s plagued with doubt.

Now, the juror has stepped forward, conceding he should have voted his conscience and forced a mistrial.

His comments represent one more wobbly pillar in the case against Carmona, convicted of being the gunman who, five days after his 16th birthday, robbed a Denny’s at 2 in the morning. Two days later, authorities say, he robbed the juice bar in midafternoon and then escaped with a 33-year-old getaway driver--a driver to whom police never established a prior connection. Since his arrest, Carmona has quietly maintained his innocence and that he had never met the convicted getaway driver.

The juror says the eyewitness testimony and lack of alibi sunk Carmona. “The easiest verdict to find was guilty, right?” the juror says. “We’ve got the eyewitnesses, we don’t have essential defense testimony telling us what he was doing that day, we don’t have him talking to us. . . . “

I ask him, then, why he’s second-guessing himself.

“There was absolutely no hard evidence tying him to the crime other than eyewitnesses,” he says. “I mean, none. They didn’t produce any communication, via telephone or anything that tied him to the driver of the truck. There was absolutely no evidence tying him to the truck. . . . It just seems ridiculous to me that you have a young kid, 16 years old, and he wouldn’t leave any physical evidence, either in the apartment or the truck [of the getaway driver who was arrested] that tie the two together. It’s like they met on a street corner the night before the Denny’s robbery and [the older man] said to Carmona, ‘Let’s go rob this place.

Here’s a gun and a hat. Go in and do it.’ ”

. I’ve been able to contact only five of the 12 jurors, including the holdout. He is the only one to express doubt about his vote, and as recently as a couple of weeks ago, turned down my request to talk. Two days ago, he changed his mind and phoned.

The juror knows that acceding to the majority likely meant the difference between prison and a new trial for Carmona. He says he is browbeating himself over his vote, because, he says, he never relinquished all his doubts about Carmona’s innocence.

“I guess it was just the 11-1 deal,” he said, referring to real or imagined pressure from other jurors for a verdict. “I think I just caved in, which really upsets me. I should have been stronger.”

While his fellow jurors put a lot of stock in eyewitness testimony, he did not.

The strongest witness, he says, an employee at the juice bar, only gave an “80% sure” identification of Carmona until police put a cap on him believed to be the one worn by the robber.

“It’s totally unfair to put a hat on one person in a one-person lineup,” the juror says. “That was probably the dirtiest deed they did.”

Jurors also were troubled by Carmona’s lack of rock-ribbed alibi of what he was doing when stopped on a Costa Mesa street around 4:30 p.m., about an hour after the Irvine robbery. In testimony from police, it came out that Carmona said he was visiting friends in the area, but none of them was called to testify. Neither did Carmona.

“I think we were a little surprised when the defense rested its case,” the juror says. “We had expected, I think, to hear [Carmona] testify. Even though you’re not supposed to take that into judgment, if you’re completely innocent, you’d be up on that stand. So that troubled us a little bit.”

Carmona’s original attorney, Kenneth Reed, has said in court papers that Carmona didn’t want to testify because he “was afraid that his nervousness would hurt his case.” A number of Carmona’s former teachers and adult acquaintances (ranging from his pastor to kick boxing coach to jailhouse tutor) have talked with me in recent weeks about Carmona and, aside from describing him as shy and unassertive, have said that a learning disability prevents him from “processing” questions quickly.

While I admire the juror for baring his soul now (if only because he could have remained silent forever), defense attorney Reed is not nearly so charitable.

“I can’t give people intestinal fortitude,” he says. “I can’t lawyer that in. You’re supposed to vote your conscience and if you allow other jurors to bowl you over . . . , the system doesn’t work.”

Carmona’s new attorneys have faulted Reed’s defense, using that as their basis for seeking a new trial for Carmona. Reed defends his performance but says he’d also like Carmona to get another trial.

Reed has accepted, with relative grace, the second-guessing of his performance. His decisions about when to rest his case and his decision not to call alibi witnesses (he called only Carmona’s mother and sister to the stand) were judgment calls based on his sense of how the trial was going, he says.

He says he thought his cross-examinations, especially of the lead detective at the end of the prosecution’s case, had built momentum for, at minimum, a hung jury.

It didn’t turn out that way, which makes the “holdout” juror’s remarks especially troubling, Reed says.

Mark Devore, Carmona’s current attorney, said he’s happy that the juror publicly expressed his doubts about the case, but also frustrated because “I don’t know what good it does now.”

Deputy Dist. Atty. Jana Hoffman, who prosecuted Carmona, declined to comment on the juror’s remarks.

I ask the juror what he wishes would happen when Judge Everett Dickey rules on the motion for a new trial and, possibly, pronounces sentence on Carmona at 1:30 p.m. Thursday in Harbor Court.

“I’d like him to get a new trial,” the juror says. “No. 1, he’s a very young boy. Robbery is a serious crime, but to ruin a 16-year-old’s life if he’s innocent is really a shame.”

The juror isn’t convinced that Carmona, who had no prior serious run-ins with the law, is innocent. It’s just that he’s not certain he’s guilty.

That means a “not guilty” vote, and it’s a reminder the juror’s been delivering to himself lately with painful regret.

Meanwhile, I’m lamenting one more breakdown in a system that has enormous stakes for young Arthur Carmona.

“I’ve seen all the good movies--”12 Angry Men”--right?” the juror says. “ . . . there’s a lot of pressure in the jury deliberation room when it’s 11 to 1. I guess I wish I’d had more strength.”

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Dana Parsons’ column appears Wednesday, Friday and Sunday. Readers may reach Parsons by calling (714) 966-7821 or by writing to him at the Times Orange County Edition, 1375 Sunflower Ave., Costa Mesa, CA 92626, or by e-mail to dana.parsons@latimes.com