THE MATTHEW SHEPARD SLAYING: WYO. v. HENDERSON
				Discuss the case on our message board Nov. 19 1998 Update Dec. 11, 1998 Update March 23, 1999 Update March 24 Update (Jury Selection) March 25 Update March 29 Update March 30 Update March 31 Update April 2 Update April 5 Update (Plea Bargain and Sentencing) May 22 Update (Pasley Sentencing)

LARAMIE, Wyo. (Court TV) — As jury selection for the first Matthew Shepard murder trial ended its fourth day, more than a quarter of the 71 potential jurors have been dismissed.

The chosen jurors will decide the fate of 21-year-old Russell Henderson, one of two men accused of brutally slaying the gay college students last October. Both suspects may face the death penalty if convicted.

Twenty-two of the potential jurors have been dismissed. The jury selection process is taking place behind closed doors, but Henderson's attorneys offered a public glimpse of their planned defense Monday when they suggested that their client witnessed, but did not participate in, Shepard's fatal beating.

Prosecutors say Henderson and his co-defendant, Aaron McKinney, pretending to be gay, met Shepard at a bar and lured him into the pickup truck McKinney was driving.

Then they pistol-whipped him, beat him, robbed him, tied him to a fence and left him on the chilly Wyoming plains.

Bloody and unconscious, the slender student was found still tied to a fence 18 hours later and taken to the hospital. He died several days later.

Opening arguments in Henderon's trial are scheduled to begin April 6. McKinney will face trial on a later date

Until this week, Henderson's attorneys had not publicly commented on the murder. But as jury selection began Henderson's defense appeared to imply that McKinney was responsible for Shepard's death.

While admitting Henderson witnessed Shepard's murder, the defense lawyers claimed he was not involved in the beating.

Prosecutor Cal Rerucha told 71 prospective jurors that Henderson initially told police that he was in Cheyenne, Wyoming's capital, not Laramie, at the time of the murder and did not witness the beating.

They said McKinney's girlfriend, Kristen Leann Price, and Chasity Pasley, Henderson's girlfriend, tried to provide the defendants with alibis by throwing Henderson's bloody clothes in a dumpster at Cheyenne. Prosecutors also say the women hid Henderson's bloody shoes in a storage shed.

Price and Pasley were charged as accessories after the fact to first-degree murder. Pasley pleaded guilty in December in exchange for her testimony against Henderson and McKinney at trial.

Price is scheduled to go on trial in May, and she has reportedly said that Shepard was not killed because he was gay, but only because the McKinney wanted to rob him.

Prosecutors did not explicitly focus on Shepard's sexual orientation during jury selection. Prosecutor Rerucha asked jurors to put aside their emotions of pity and rage.

Telling them that Shepard was a "victim that was different ... not the same as you and I," he stressed that the victim was entitled to justice. Rerucha said the Constitution requires all people be treated fairly under the law.

Court TV's Clara Tuma and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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