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Thirty Excused as Komisarjevsky Jury Selection Resumes

Prosecutors and defense attorneys use peremptory challenges to reject three from jury.

Jury selection resumed Tuesday for the second Cheshire home invasion triple-murder trial of Joshua Komisarjevsky, but no jurors were selected.

Observers in the courtroom said prosecutors used peremptory challenges to excuse two prospective jurors and defense attorneys used one.

Each side had a total of 40 peremptory challenges to use to reject a prospective juror without giving a reason. Usually, the challenges are used when the lawyers believe an individual would favor the other side.

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Previously, Komisarjevsky’s defense lawyers used three challenges and the prosecutors used one.

A total of 30 prospective jurors were examined Tuesday in the sixth-floor courtroom in New Haven Superior Court during the process known by the legal term voir dire.

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Komisarjevsky faces the death penalty on 17 counts including capital felony murder, kidnapping, arson, larceny, burglary, assault and sexual assault.

He is accused of being one of two men who broke into the Cheshire home of Dr. William Petit and Jennifer Hawke-Petit, restraining the couple and their two daughters, robbing the family, beating the husband, sexually assaulting the wife and one of the girls, then killing Mrs. Petit and her daughters.

Dr. Petit escaped, but not in time to stop the men from setting the house on fire as they attempted to escape.

Komisarjevsky’s co-defendant, Steven Hayes, 47, was convicted in a separate trial in 2010 and has been sentenced to death row.

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