Jury Chosen....Finally

Seven days to screen and seat a jury?

• Finding a jury to hear the case against former Illinois House Speaker Michael J. Madigan took as long as some trials do from start to finish.

  After seven days and scores of interviews, eight women and four men have been chosen to decide if Madigan is guilty of a racketeering conspiracy. Two of six alternate jurors are still needed, but the judge is aiming for opening statements to begin Monday afternoon.

  So what took so long?

  U.S. District Judge John Blakey seemed to blame the amount of time lawyers spent questioning the many candidates over the last two weeks. In fact, the judge said Thursday he’d no longer take the lawyers at their word when it comes to estimating the trial’s length.

The cynic in us supposes that Madigan's corruption runs so deep that there is an entire subset of people whose lives he's touched in one way or another.

Now they're talking about an eleven week trial, running nearly until Christmas time, and with unforeseen delays likely to pop up, this could run even into the holidays.

We did hear Ed Burke is looking for a roommate though.