The jury foreperson revealed that it took only three hours to convict Donna Adelson, the matriarch of a wealthy Florida family, of murder in the death of her former son-in-law, who was gunned down by hired hitmen in 2014.
“Within the first hour, hour and a half, everyone was agreeing that she was guilty,” a woman identified as the jury foreperson wrote on her TikTok page @laceywithaj. “It was unanimous within the first hour, hour and a half.”
On Thursday, Sept. 4, when Florida Second Judicial Circuit Judge Stephen Everett announced that Donna, 75, had been found guilty of first-degree murder in the for-hire killing of Florida State University law professor Daniel Markel, she yelled out, “Oh my God!” and began sobbing and shaking in her seat, according to video from the Tallahassee Democrat.
“Mrs. Adelson, control yourself,” Judge Everett told her.
When he announced that she had also been found guilty of conspiracy to commit murder and solicitation, she began sobbing, prompting him to request that the bailiff escort the jurors out of the courtroom.
Donna is the fifth person convicted of conspiring to murder Markel, 41, who was embroiled in a bitter custody battle over his two sons with Donna’s daughter, Wendi Adelson. Following their 2013 divorce, Markel refused to allow Wendi to relocate with their two sons from Tallahassee, where he taught, to South Florida, where Donna and other family members lived, according to prosecutors.
Now that the trial is over, @laceywithaj took to TikTok to explain how she and the other jurors came to the decision they did.
Commenters posed numerous questions about the case, including what evidence convinced her of Donna’s guilt.
“Honestly, there was sooo much,” she said in the comments, according to the Tallahassee Democrat.
“She is a smart woman, which is why she [avoided] being convicted for 11 [years],” she said. I’ll respond vaguely, but if there is enough interest, I may need to make a separate video about it.”
Noting that Donna’s son Rob Adelson’s testimony was “pretty telling,” she added that “all of her emails, texts, and calls indicate how power hungry she was—she meant it when she said Daniel Markel wasn’t going to beat the Adelson family.”
The foreperson emphasized that the jury was very careful in reaching its conclusions.
After an hour or an hour and a half of deliberation, she stated that she polled everyone to determine where they stood. While all 12 jurors believed Donna was guilty of murder, two were “kind of confused” about one point in count two, she said.
Given that the jury was “not unanimous” at the time, she explained that they went over everything “point by point,” organizing their thoughts on a whiteboard.
“We went over everything several times because this is a big decision and this is serious and we all took our duty very seriously, like this isn’t just fun and games,” she was filmed saying. “Although it is a very cool experience to talk about now and it’s exciting, it is someone’s life, and it is the law and we all took it very serious.”
She had the jury vote several times in different ways to ensure that they were all in agreement, including having everyone raise their hands if they thought Donna was guilty, which they all did, she stated.
To ensure the jury’s decision, she distributed 12 pieces of paper and asked everyone to anonymously write down the verdict.
“Then I emptied one of the little containers we had for our snacks and had everyone put it in there,” she said, adding that she wanted people to write down what they honestly felt “based on the evidence and the law provided and without feeling pressured to go along with what everyone else is saying.”
“All 12 pieces of paper said guilty,” she explained.
She went on to say that everyone verbally confirmed Donna’s guilt on all three counts.
When the verdict was ready to be read, she said they were led into the courtroom only to be led out because “there was that outburst that we all saw,” she said.
She described the trial as “a very intense two weeks,” and said her first time serving on a jury was a “cool experience.”
PEOPLE has reached out to @laceywithaj for comment, but has yet to hear back.
