The first day of former Qwest chief executive Joe Nacchio’s trial ended Monday with little doubt that U.S. District Judge Edward Nottingham is in charge.
Nottingham scolded the defense, issued warnings to reporters and buzzed through jury selection with good-humored questioning that occasionally drew laughter from spectators and even the defendant.
When Nacchio and his legal team remained absent after a break ended, Nottingham sat quietly for a few moments. “Where are they?” he finally snapped to the single lawyer at the defense table.
“Get them. Right now,” he ordered her.
When the group trooped into the courtroom a few moments later and Nacchio’s lead lawyer, Herbert Stern, apologized, Nottingham showed little inclination to forgive.
“I expect that when I take the bench, everybody is here, no excuses,” he grumbled.
Nacchio is charged with 42 counts of illegal insider trading for selling $100.8 million worth of stock while privately aware that the Denver- based telecommunications company was struggling to meet quarterly financial targets.
Dressed in a dark suit, blue shirt and blue polka-dot tie, the New Jersey resident listened intently to the questioning, held whispered conversations with his attorneys and smiled and laughed frequently during the hearing.
His son Michael, who was seated in the front row with other members of Nacchio’s family, occasionally removed a pair of sleek framed glasses and chewed on the stem. Michael Nacchio declined to answer a reporter’s questions during a break.
Soon after Nottingham began questioning prospective jurors to determine what they knew about the case, one said he paid no attention to media reports and had little interest in Nacchio’s alleged misdeeds.
“I wouldn’t be interested in it either if I wasn’t sitting here,” Nottingham replied.
After another said he didn’t believe everything he read in the newspapers, Nottingham asked if any of the other 17 prospective jurors believe what they read in the news. None answered.
After a prospective juror told Nottingham he had “three or four” compressed disks, the judge commiserated, telling the man that he had one bad disk himself.
When Stern complained that he couldn’t hear a prospective juror, Nottingham suggested he move to the prosecution table, which is closer to the jury box.
“Why don’t you chummy up with Mr. Stricklin,” he said, referring to First Assistant U.S. Attorney Cliff Stricklin.
Nacchio’s attorneys plan to use classified information to defend him against charges, and Stricklin objected to the seating arrangement, saying there could be state secrets at his table.
Nottingham solved the problem by providing microphones to the prospective jurors.
When he found out that someone had asked a prospective juror a question, he warned that he wouldn’t tolerate members of the media approaching jurors and threatened to bar offenders from the courtroom.
Staff writer Tom McGhee can be reached at 303-954-1671 or tmcghee@denverpost.com.
