Jury picked, openings statements set in hate crime case stemming from fatal Pa. beating

Jury picked, openings set in Pa. hate-crime case

SCRANTON, Pa. — Jury selection has wrapped up in the federal hate crime trial of two men involved in the fatal beating of an illegal immigrant in Pennsylvania.

Opening statements are set to begin Wednesday afternoon after the jury is seated and sworn-in for the trial of Brandon Piekarsky and Derrick Donchak. Prosecutors say the men brutally attacked 25-year-old Luis Ramirez, a Mexican immigrant, because of his ethnicity in July 2008.

Ramirez died after brawling with a group of high school athletes in the old mining town of Shenandoah.

Piekarsky and Donchak were acquitted of the most serious state charges last year by an all-white jury.

The defendants say Ramirez’s ethnicity had nothing to do with the melee and that the prosecution is politically motivated.