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Actor Robert Blake is on trial for the murder of his wife.
In the 3 1/2 years since Robert Blake's wife was slain, the case has faded from the public spotlight so much that prospective jurors had trouble remembering what it was all about.
"I think there was something about a glove being found," said one prospect, confusing it with the O.J. Simpson murder case.
It's quite a change from April 2002, when the actor's arrest put his picture on national magazine covers and gave CNN its biggest ratings jump of the year, with 1.9 million viewers tuning in as news helicopters hovered over Blake's home.
Now the Hollywood murder mystery is set to take center stage again, with opening statements in Blake's trial on murder charges to start Monday.
But a strange twist in the case suggests another delay is possible. On Wednesday, the day the jury was sworn in, someone broke into the apartment-office of Blake's lawyer and stole a computer containing what a court representative called "the heart and soul of the defense case."
Police were investigating and the judge put off responding until Monday. Blake's lawyer said he is determined to go forward with the trial.
Blake is a different man in appearance now. Gone is the shock of dyed black hair. During nearly a year in jail, he became gaunt and let his hair go white. It is cropped short.
He lives under house arrest on $1.5 million bail with an electronic ankle bracelet monitoring his movements.
The long delay in getting to trial appears to favor Blake.
"Time is on his side," said Loyola University law professor Laurie Levenson. "There was time for any public outrage to die down. Jurors are likely to feel less pressure to convict when the case is downplayed over time."
Why did it take so long to get to trial?
Levenson notes that Blake was not even arrested or charged until 11 months after the killing. There were postponements when Blake changed lawyers three times, and a five-week preliminary hearing was held to determine whether there was enough evidence for a trial.
The prosecution team also changed, with the case now in the hands of Shellie Samuels, a longtime deputy district attorney who has tried 50 murder cases, most involving gang killings.
The story that jurors will hear is a melodrama that could be a made-for-TV movie.
It features Blake, 71, a lonely, fading celebrity trawling Hollywood nightclubs for companionship when he met up with Bonny Lee Bakley, 44, a woman of dubious reputation.
She remembered him from his starring roles in the "Baretta" TV series and the movie "In Cold Blood." They had sex; she became pregnant and Blake was suddenly confronted with the prospect of marriage and fatherhood.
The baby, Rosie, stole Blake's heart. She bore a striking resemblance to him and, when DNA tests confirmed she was his, he married Bakley.
Bakley had an obsession with celebrities and once claimed to have had a child by singer Jerry Lee Lewis. Before Blake, she had an affair with Christian Brando, son of actor Marlon Brando, and for a time he believed the baby she bore was his.
On the evening of May 4, 2001, the Blakes dined at a restaurant in his Studio City neighborhood. After they left, Blake said, he walked Bakley to the car and returned to the restaurant to retrieve a gun he forgot.
When he returned to the car, he found Bakley bleeding from a gunshot wound to the head. He raced to a nearby house for help but Bakley died a short time later.
Although Blake was a suspect from the start, the lack of physical evidence was daunting to police. The murder weapon, a World War II-model gun found in a trash bin, could not be linked to Blake. There were minimal traces of gunpowder residue on his clothes, not enough to show that he had fired a gun.
The case came together when two former stuntmen who had worked with Blake said he tried to hire them to kill his wife. They were the prosecution's star witnesses at a preliminary hearing last year.
Prosecutors also charged Blake's handyman, Earle Caldwell, with conspiracy in the killing. But after the preliminary hearing produced little evidence against Caldwell, charges against him were dismissed.
The recent questioning of prospective jurors previewed the prosecution's challenges in trying to prove Blake's guilt.
Samuels told prospects the case is entirely circumstantial - no DNA, no fingerprints and no eyewitnesses to the killing. She then asked them if they could convict. Some were uncertain but were accepted when they said they would follow the law.
She also tried to pre-empt expected defense attacks on the victim's character.
"There will be evidence in this case that Bonny Bakley was not Mother Teresa. She had quite a bit of baggage, an unsavory person, she was scummy," said Samuels.
"Do you think the fact that someone wanted to protect their child from a scummy spouse means they should not be convicted of murder?"
The prospective jurors answered "No."
Source: AP