ORLANDO, Fla. – In an exclusive interview with Local 6 reporter Tony Pipitone, one of the six jurors who found millionaire developer Bob Ward guilty of murdering his wife talks about the decision.
On Saturday, Ward was found guilty of second-degree murder in the 2009 shooting death of his wife, Diane Ward, inside their Isleworth mansion.
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Pedro Gonzalez, a 24-year-old Universal Studios technician, was among the six-member jury, which also included a postal worker, two secretaries, a health inspector and a citrus worker.
After six days of testimony and arguments, Gonzalez, the youngest juror, said the jury was evenly divided.
"We just said, 'Guilty, guilty, guilty, not sure, not sure, not sure," Gonzalez told Pipitone.
Gonzalez said he and the other jurors looked at pictures and reviewed the blood spatter evidence, but the group wanted to see the murder weapon.
"We really wanted to feel the 12-pound trigger pull," he said. "It was kind of hard to really pull that trigger, and I would imagine it would be kind of hard to pull it in a struggle as was claimed (by Bob Ward's defense team). (The gun) was pointed directly at her face, and again, this is a gun that just doesn't go off. He had to have squeezed that trigger, and no matter what scenario we ran, the gun always seemed to end up in his hand and he always seemed to be the one that pulled that trigger."
After 12 hours of deliberations on Friday, Gonzalez said the jury was exhausted.
"We were burnt out. I was very, very burnt out. My head was killing me," he said.
After meeting Saturday morning, Gonzalez said a reading of the judge's instructions led a consensus.
"Basically, what we believe is there was a fight on the patio -- wine glasses broken, stain on the back of his shirt -- and the fight escalates and goes upstairs and somehow he gets enraged and takes out the gun," he said.
Another poll was then taken, Gonzalez said.
"Guilty, guilty, guilty, guilty, guilty, we all picked guilty," he said.
Gonzalez said the decision was not easy to make.
"It's still a very somber feeling, especially for the Ward daughters. Their mother's dead and now their father is going to jail," he said.
"Did (the) Casey Anthony (verdict) enter into this at all?" Pipitone asked.
"No, no, not at all. In fact, we so focused on the evidence and the gun and what happened that night, I don't recall any of us bringing up Casey Anthony," Gonzalez said.
Some evidence was withheld from the jury during the trial, including information about an interaction Ward had with his girlfriend 30 years ago.
Ward's ex-girlfriend, Diane Callahan, testified about a lunch meeting he had with Ward in early 2009, where she said he told her his wife spent too much money and his company was filing for bankruptcy. Callahan was not, however, allowed to testify about being hit by Ward in the 80s.
"He pulled a fun on me and he took a bedpost off the bed and hit me with it. I wound up in the hospital," Callahan said.
Callahan said that episode ended her 4-year-long violent relationship with Ward, but the jury never heard that.
Gonzalez said hearing this information made him feel better about the verdict.
"If I had any doubt at all, which, I didn't, this would have definitely made me feel a lot better about my choice," Gonzalez said.