A Stunned defence team for Louise Woodward, the British au pair girl convicted of second degree murder on Thursday in Cambridge, Massachusetts, says it has "no idea what went wrong". The trial ended yesterday with their 19-year-old client being sentenced to life imprisonment.
As the sensational trial and disputed verdict is now mulled over, there are mysterious references to possible anti-British bias from Irish areas of Boston. Resentment to the defence bringing in highly paid medical experts and "celebrity lawyers" is also mentioned as contributing to the unexpected decision of the jury to bring in a murder verdict.
There is a particularly heated debate about the defence tactics in refusing to let the jury consider a possible manslaughter verdict. By insisting that the jury could only convict of murder or acquit Ms Woodward - the "noose or loose" approach - the defence took a gamble which went terribly wrong.
But her main defence attorney, Mr Barry Scheck, insisted that this decision was that of Louise Woodward herself and her parents, a decision the defence agreed with.
This crucial decision was reached when testimony from both sides had ended but before the case went to the jury. In fact, it was the prosecution which asked for a manslaughter finding to be available to the jury in addition to the original charges of first or second degree murder.
The view among the legal commentators closely following the trial was that the prosecution felt at this stage that a murder verdict was most unlikely in the light of the medical evidence offered by the defence and the strong performance by Louise Woodward under cross-examination.
For the defence, which was at that stage confident of an acquittal, there was the danger that the jury would see manslaughter as a compromise which would carry a much lighter sentence than the mandatory life sentence for murder. Louise Woodward clearly believed that she would be free to walk out of the court if only murder charges were being considered, so she also rejected the manslaughter option.
There were reports that the prosecution had offered a plea bargain if Ms Woodward pleaded guilty to manslaughter. The eight months she had been in custody since Matthew Eappen's death would then have been regarded as a sufficient sentence. However, the prosecution has said that this speculation is "totally inaccurate".
Since the verdict the defence has been complaining about the jury, claiming that four highlyqualified persons who could have understood the technical medical evidence were jury alternates rather than full members of the jury. Some credence has been given to this view by a statement from one of the alternates denouncing the verdict: Mr Robert Mangold told local television that "I was wondering if these people were sitting in the same courtroom as I was for the last three weeks".
At the end of the day, however, the defence placed too much weight on their medical experts who argued that the eight-monthold baby had suffered a previously undetected head injury which could have been re-opened by minor jarring on February 4th, the day he was rushed to hospital unconscious.
Ms Woodward, according to police evidence, had agreed she had been "a bit rough" with the baby that day when he cried a lot. In court she said she had been misunderstood, but for the jury it was a damning admission.
The defence lawyers with hindsight allege damage to their client through a lot of "negative publicity" before the trial. The US media are much less inhibited than their Irish or British counterparts in speculating about the guilt or innocence of people awaiting trial.
But speculation that there was an "anti-British bias" towards Louise Woodward in the Boston suburb of Cambridge and that this was linked in some way to an "Irish" presence is seen as over the top. The "yuppie" suburb is not the Irish area of Boston. Besides, Louise Woodward's friends in Britain have pointed out that they have received strong support from people in Ireland.