Jury selection began on Monday in the Jordan Linn Graham trial, in which a bride just eight days into her marriage pushed her husband Cody Johnson off a 200 foot cliff in Montana, NBC News reported.
The jurors who were selected had heard opening statements in a Montana courtroom on Monday.
"The prosecutors presented the newly selected jurors with text messages from Graham and a friend, which indicated Graham shifted from excitement about her nuptials to despondency about actually being married," NBC News reported.
Graham maintained that her husband's fall from the cliff was an accident. Federal public defender Andrew Nelson said Graham was having doubts about her relationship, however.
It was reported that the 14 jurors "may never hear some of the most shocking claims in the case: that Graham talked about killing her own mother and stepfather weeks before Johnson's death, and that a black cloth purported to be a blindfold was found near the victim's body," NBC News reported.
A federal judge ruled the 22-year-old's alleged comments would be "highly prejudicial."
The trial is expected to last throughout the week, featuring testimony from a host of witnesses "who will talk about her relationship with Johnson," according to news reports.
The text message Graham sent her friend "expressing doubt about her days-old marriage" will be most 'crucial' in the case Also, to be discussed will be " the stories she made up to explain her groom's disappearance, and her eventual confession about the deadly end to an argument in Glacier National Park," according to NBC News.
Graham is reportedly a deeply religious person. Her husband of 8-days reportedly "did not attend church and spent his free time with friends, drinking beer, playing softball and driving cars," the defense noted in a brief," NBC News also reported.
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