A jury has been seated in the high profile rape retrial of former Vanderbilt University football player Brandon Vandenburg.
The painstakingly slow process happened in Memphis, where attorneys, the judge, and Vandenburg all traveled in hopes of finding an impartial jury. The national publicity of the case tainted a large portion of the jury pool, while others were dismissed because they couldn't commit to spending at least a week in Nashville for the retrial expected to take at least five days.
In 2015 both Vandenburg and his former teammate Cory Batey were convicted of raping an unconscious female student inside of Gillette Hall after a night of drinking and partying. That conviction though was thrown out after it was discovered the jury foreman may have been biased.
"For the state, this is the more difficult case to prove. Even though this was his cellphone, his room, his girlfriend, the reality is he didn’t touch the alleged victim," said NewsChannel 5 legal analyst Nick Leonardo.
Since being free on bond, Vandenburg has been living at home in California with his family.
His retrial has been set to begin Monday morning at 9 a.m. in Nashville.
