The state Supreme Court awarded a new trial to convicted...

The state Supreme Court awarded a new trial to convicted killer Todd Charles Boggess, who is on death row for fatally beating Danny Lee Pence, a student, 9 years ago. The court said Judge Orlando F. Hudson erred by not allowing defense lawyers to dismiss a juror whose best friend, it belatedly was discovered, knew the murder victim's mother. Both sides approved the juror, but the jury was not seated when the situation came to light. It would have been appropriate to excuse and replace the woman, the Supreme Court concluded. The high court also found fault with one of Hudson's instructions to the jurors. The court said Hudson might have misled jurors when they asked for a definition of life without parole. He told them they should not consider what "another arm of the government might or might not do in the future." That erroneously led the jury to believe that "another arm of the government" might parole Boggess, his lawyers argued.