Fuel Fitness shooter’s attorneys review jury pool data in quest for new trial

Attorneys for Fuel Fitness shooter Jonathan Douglas Shaw received more time Wednesday to study data on the available jury pool for his July murder trial in an effort to see his convictions on deliberate and attempted deliberate homicide charges reversed. 

A jury found Shaw, 37, guilty of both felony counts on July 13 following a four-day trial in Flathead County District Court. The 12-person panel took a little more than four hours to return with a verdict for Shaw, who testified that he shot a Fuel Fitness manager dead in the gym’s parking lot in 2021 out of fear the employee was about to attack him. 

Shaw was expected to return before Judge Dan Wilson for sentencing on Sept. 21, but his defense attorneys, Colin Stephens and Paul Simon, filed a motion requesting the reversal of his conviction and a new trial earlier that month. 

The pair argue that Clerk of District Court Peg Allison failed to follow state law in summoning an impartial jury for Shaw’s trial. In the motion, they wrote that she omitted prospective jurors for that jury term who failed to respond to an initial notice requesting they complete a questionnaire. She also failed to pass along the list of unresponsive prospective jurors to the Flathead County Sheriff’s Office to serve the notice in person, according to the motion. 

“Shaw is not unsympathetic to the burden a new trial will place on the witnesses, the families, the court and the state,” Simon and Stephens wrote. “It is, however, a structural error and … reversal of Shaw’s conviction is warranted.”

Prosecutors countered by arguing that Shaw’s defense team missed its window to object to the formation of a jury panel and the deadline to file a motion requesting a new trial, which extends 30 days after the verdict. They contend that Allison substantially complied with state statute and that Shaw’s team has offered no evidence of prejudice as a result of a technical violation. 

“[Shaw] participated in the selection of the jury, examined the jury, passed the jury for cause and informed the court of no error in the jury selection process,” wrote Deputy County Attorney John Donovan in the prosecution’s response.

DURING THE Oct. 25 hearing on the motion, Stephens quizzed Allison on the witness stand about the process of creating a pool of prospective jurors. Working off of a list of 14,000 names annually compiled by the Court Administrator’s Office of the Montana Supreme Court — using voter rolls, driver’s licenses and state-issued IDs — Allison said she splits them into groups of 7,000 for each of the court’s two jury terms. 

Notices then go out to prospective jurors directing them to fill out a questionnaire online or request a hard copy, she said. Of those, about 1,000 come back undeliverable from the U.S. Postal Service. Some have forwarding addresses linked to them and if they still appear to reside in Flathead County, she will attempt again to reach them with a notice, she said. 

Others go to people who have died or are otherwise unable to serve on a jury, for a mental disability, for example, she said. They are considered permanently excused from jury duty. 

In Shaw’s case, Allison said she ultimately summoned jurors by drawing on the group of people qualified to serve who answered questionnaires, a pool of 2,570 residents. About 2,742 residents never responded.

Stephens pressed her on whether she asked the Sheriff’s Office for help in tracking down the unresponsive prospective jurors, describing the county as racially, economically and demographically diverse. 

“You don’t send the Sheriff out to knock on the doors of the 2,700 people who just ghost?” Stephens asked. 

“For that term, I did not,” Allison replied. 

During his turn questioning Allison, Deputy County Attorney John Donovan, who appeared alongside County Attorney Travis Ahner, asked why she held off on involving the Sheriff’s Office.

“In the past, … [I] had gone through the arduous task of completing a list of people who had not responded and had certified those lists to those couple of different sheriffs, and each time there was nothing done,” Allison said. “And each time it was because the sheriff called me and said, ‘There is absolutely no way under the sun that I have the time or resources to go serve these 2,000 people.’”

She testified that Sheriff Brian Heino had begun attempting to reach prospective jurors by sending out deputies and that — plus a reminder sent to unresponsive residents that their contact information would be turned over to the Sheriff’s Office — had increased participation. 

As to the efficacy of tracking down unresponsive potential jurors in person, Undershiff Nic Salois said his deputies reported a poor success rate. 

“It’s been very rare,” Salois said later in the hearing. “I pulled one employee yesterday who has been serving probably the most out of all of these. Her estimates were one in 10.”

FOLLOWING THE testimony from Allison and Salios, both called to the witness stand by the defense, Shaw’s attorneys requested data on the group of 7,000 prospective jurors selected for the convicted killer’s jury term. Stephens sought, and later received from Allison’s office, an Excel spreadsheet containing the names, and physical and mailing addresses, of all 7,000 as well as separate spreadsheets for those that responded and those that were unresponsive.

Stephens earlier had expressed interest in the percentage of respondents from Kalispell as compared to that of county residents. 

But both the defense attorneys and prosecutors, who likewise received the reports, acknowledged not having enough time to review and analyze the data when the hearing reconvened for arguments in the afternoon. 

Wilson, indicating that he expected a request for more time, asked when both sides could file written arguments on what the data contains and what conclusions the court should draw from the information. While Simon and Stephens suggested a date, Donovan worried that the defense team was changing their argument from the original motion.

“Given that the argument is going to change, the state needs to be able to view the defendant’s new motion and what this information would support in an argument to reply to that, to respond to that argument,” Donovan said. “If the state has to respond at the same time or provide the court with a brief as to what is contained in this data group, the state wouldn’t be able to adequately respond.”

Wilson replied that he would consider the forthcoming documents to represent supplemental arguments rather than a new motion. Still, he directed prosecutors to take up to 14 additional days to submit.

“Anything that is submitted by either party will be deemed by the court in the nature of supplemental factual argument and/or supplemental legal argument,” he said, before setting a 5 p.m., Nov. 1 deadline for Simon and Stephens to submit their findings. 

Prosecutors will have two weeks from that date to respond to it, Wilson said, leaving open the possibility of allowing Shaw’s defense team a chance for rebuttal. 

“It appears we are now in an intermediate stage on this motion and these issues, and those are your deadlines,” Wilson said. 

News Editor Derrick Perkins can be reached at 758-4430 or dperkins@dailyinterlake.com.