SEATTLE -- A jury was selected Thursday to hear the trial of the third and final defendant in the 1983 Seattle Chinatown gambling club massacre of 13 people who were hog-tied, robbed and shot to death.
Defense and prosecution lawyers agreed on an 11-woman, one-man jury to hear the murder case against Wai-Chiu 'Tony' Ng, 28. Three women alternates were also accepted, ending four days of jury selection in the case.
The trial, before Superior Court Judge Charles Johnson, is expected to take two weeks, with testimony scheduled to begin Monday.
Jury selection focused on the amount of exposure prospective jurors had to the highly publicized mass slaying. The prosecution summarily rejected three jury candidates without explanation, while the defense choose to eliminate four with their preemptory challenges.
On Friday, lawyers will argue whether Ng's 45-minute statement to police, made after his arrest in Calgary, Alberta, last October should be heard by the jurors.
Defense attorneys John Muenster and Mark Mestel contend Ng was not properly advised of his rights before confessing to Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
Ng is accused of participating in the 13 murders at the Wah Mee gambling club, but the prosecution is not seeking a death penalty. Ng was the only one of the three defendants not charged with being a triggerman in the city's worst mass murder.
The other two defendants -- Benjamin Ng (no relation to Tony Ng) and Kwan Fai 'Willie' Mak -- both are appealing their convictions. Benjamin Ng was sentenced to life imprisonment without parole and Mak was sentenced to death.
Tony Ng, who had once been on the FBI's '10 Most Wanted' list for the attack at the club the morning of Feb. 19, 1983, is charged with 13 counts of first-degree murder and one of first-degree assault. He faces 13 consecutive life terms if convicted on all counts.
The victims included 12 men and a woman, all of Chinese ancestry.
As in the two previous trials, the lone survivor -- Wai Y. Chin, 63, - is expected to be a key prosecution witness. Chin survived bullet wounds, untied himself and then hobbled from the club to get help. He still has bullet fragments in his neck.
Tony Ng has been described as the mystery man in the massacre. Prosecutors pegged him as a late recruit to the crime.
Mak testified he had gone to the Wah Mee club at the request of his gang, the Hop Sing, to rough up the gamblers but not to kill them. Tony Ng, who came to the United States in 1970, was not a member of the gang.
The prosecutors need not show premeditation to get a conviction. Earlier testimony showed Tony Ng was not involved in planning the robbery-murders.
