ASHLAND - A potential juror in the case of suspected serial killer Shawn Grate said he asked her for a date.
"I was at Hawkins grocery store," the older woman said Wednesday during jury selection. "He was sitting on a bench. He walked up to me and said, 'You're such a beautiful lady. Would you consider going out with me?' "
The woman said she turned Grate down, and he offered to carry her groceries. She again said no, and he asked her if she would have coffee with him. She rejected him again.
"If I'd accepted that, I would have probably been a victim," she said.
Ashland County Common Pleas Judge Ron Forsthoefel excused the woman from further consideration for the jury.
"It's a little too close to home for you," the judge said.
Another woman was dismissed when she said she was unsure if she could recommend the death penalty, though she favors it for people who abuse animals or children.
"I don't know if I'd want that on my conscience if I had to decide it," she said. "I struggle with how I would live with myself afterwards."
Michael McNamara, a special prosecutor helping the state, asked the woman if she could sign a verdict form recommending the death penalty.
"Honestly, I don't know," she said. "It just makes me sick to think about it."
A man who was excused from the pool had heard a retired Marion law enforcement officer talk about Grate, who also is a suspect in the death of a woman there.
The potential juror said what he has heard about the case would not affect his deliberations.
"It's hard to wipe your mind out, but the state has to prove its case," he said.
Despite the man's claim, defense attorney Robert Whitney asked that he be removed from the pool.
The three other people in Wednesday's early session were certified by Forsthoefel to listen to a death penalty case. They will return to court, tentatively Monday, for final consideration.
Case background
Shawn Grate, 41, is charged with 23 counts, including aggravated murder. If convicted of that charge, he could face the death penalty.
The main charges involve the deaths of Elizabeth Griffith, 29, and Stacey Stanley, 43, and the kidnapping of a woman prosecutors are calling Jane Doe. According to a previous news release, Doe was kidnapped and raped multiple times but escaped after calling 911 on Sept. 13, 2016.
After Doe's rescue and Grate's arrest, police found the bodies of Griffith and Stanley at a house at 363 Covert Court, near downtown Ashland. According to the preliminary autopsy, both women had been strangled.
