9 a.m. today: Jury selection, Ceremonial Courtroom, 11th floor, Bob Casey Federal Courthouse, 515 Rusk. The NY Times’ Alexei Barrionuevo and Simon Romero report on the all-important jury selection process, which U.S. District Judge Sim Lake will handle himself and will complete today.
9 a.m., Tuesday, January 31: Opening arguments, Courtroom 9B, ninth floor. Prosecution gets two hours and each defendant gets two hours.
Late Tuesday afternoon or 8:30 a.m. Wednesday, Feb. 1: The prosecution puts on its first witness, which I am betting is former Enron investor relations chief, Mark Koenig. Given Judge Lake’s desire to move things along, it would not surprise me if he requires the prosecution to put its first witness on the stand on Tuesday afternoon, even after six hours of opening arguments.
The trial will run four days a week with each Friday generally being an off day. The prosecution currently estimates that its case-in-chief will take 36 days of court-time to present. There are about 60-65 spaces available on a first come basis for the general public in courtroom 9B, but a closed circuit telecast of the proceedings is available for overflow spectators on the fourth floor of the courthouse in one of the old Bankruptcy Court courtrooms.
By the way, Chronicle Enron reporter Mary Flood and Chronicle business columnist Loren Steffy are live-blogging the trial, and my old friend Joel Androphy is blogging the trial as KTRK-13’s legal analyst.