Kyle Rittenhouse Defense Team Seen Consulting With Woman Who Selected 'Perfect Juror' In OJ Simpson Case
She has been dubbed a "pre-trial pro."
YouTube / Vicki L. Miller / Shutterstock Kyle Rittenhouse’s defense team has reportedly recruited the expertise of Dr. Jo-Ellan Dimitrius, a defense jury expert, who had served as a former jury consultant for O.J. Simpson.
Dimitrius was photographed comforting Rittenhouse’s mother during her son’s testimony in which he began to cry on the stand while discussing the night he allegedly shot and killed a man in the parking lot during a civil unrest in Kenosha, Wisconsin last summer.
She was also photographed speaking with the lead defense attorney Mark Richards during the jury selection process.
Who Is Jo-Ellan Dimitrius?
Dr. Jo-Ellan Dimitrius has been dubbed a ‘pre-trial pro’ by the American Bar Association with her rise to prominence as a jury consultant for O.J. Simpson’s criminal defense team.
Her role in the case was to consult with Simpson’s defense team on who exactly should be put on the panel.
She designed the jury that helped get OJ Simpson a non-guilty verdict.
Dimitrius described the “perfect juror” as “a female African-American with high school education or less.”
The result was a jury more inclined to be sympathetic to Simpson — eight black women, one black man, one Hispanic man and two white women.
Throughout the trial, Dimitrius observed how the jury reacted to each witness and advised the defense on their line of questioning.
According to her website, Dimitrius “has consulted in over 1,000 trials and picked 600 juries.”
Among the defendants whose cases she has worked on include Richard Ramirez ‘Night Stalker,’ Rodney King, Francis Ford Coppola, and Kobe Bryant.
Dimitrius also served as a “body language expert” for ABC’s ‘Dancing With The Stars.’
She has evaluated over 10,000 jurors, witnesses, lawyers and even judges during trial, and at least that many more in pre-trial focus groups and mock trials.
She was even nicknamed “The Seer” by the American Lawyer Magazine because of her ability to understand and predict the behavior of jurors, witnesses, lawyers and judges.
Jury selection in Kyle Rittenhouse's trial has been controversial.
The jury selection has already been criticized for being a predominantly all-white jury with only one person of color.
One juror has already been dismissed from the panel after making a joke about the number of bullets the police used to shoot Jacob Blake.
It was the shooting of Jacob Blake at the hands of a white police officer that erupted a civil unrest in Kenosha last summer, and prompted Kyle Rittenhouse into the city with a loaded AR-15 style rifle.
Rittenhouse claims to have been acting in self-defense after being chased by a mob of people who presumed the teenager was an active shooter.
Rittenhouse even took the stand, recounting the sequence of events that he says left him feeling afraid for his life.
At one point of the testimony, Rittenhouse breaks into a sob, prompting the judge to call for a break.
“I didn’t want to have to kill anybody,” he said. “I was being attacked.”
Rittenhouse was also cross-examined by prosecutor Thomas Binger, in which the lawyer had brought up comments that the teenager had made in a video that Judge Bruce Schroeder had not yet allowed to be admitted in court.
It was afterward that defense attorney Corey Chirafisi asked for a mistrial with prejudice, arguing that the prosecution had breached Rittenhouse’s right to remain silent as well as bringing up evidence that was not allowed to be used in court.
Schroeder said he would consider the request, and if granted means that Rittenhouse will not be able to be tried again in the future.
Nia Tipton is a writer living in Brooklyn. She covers pop culture, social justice issues, and trending topics. Follow her on Instagram.