ELYRIA — After a nearly five-month delay due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the double murder trial of Jocquez Ross of Lorain started up again Thursday in a new atmosphere of concern for the health and safety of those involved.

Lorain County Common Pleas Judge Christopher Rothgery's courtroom had a much different look to it on Thursday: Plexiglass shields for the defense attorneys and their client, prosecutors and an Elyria police detective and mobile plastic shielding separating each juror in the jury box.

"As a result of the continuing pandemic affecting our state, county and country, at this point we're going to go forward and do our best to continue this trial," Rothgery told the participants, out of the jury's earshot.

He also asked the attorneys to limit their movements in the courtroom, not call for unnecessary conferences at the bench or approach witnesses on the stand — which will be sanitized after each witness completes their testimony — unless absolutely necessary.

"I don't think anybody is going to be able to try this case like they tried cases in the past," Rothgery said.

Each juror and all the participants, as well as a Chronicle-Telegram reporter, were provided plastic face shields and KN95 face masks to wear while in the courtroom. Rothgery told them and jurors that they could wear either the plastic face shield or the face mask while seated, but if they got up to move around or approach a witness or other participant, they would have to wear both.

All the attorneys chose the clear plastic face shields while posing questions to Thursday's first witness, a Bureau of Criminal Identification analyst who testified about the swabs taken for DNA analysis by Elyria police at the murder scene in 2016.

Witnesses also were asked to wear the plastic face shield but not the face mask so that jurors could see their entire faces as they testified.

Ross, 29, faces the death penalty if convicted in the deaths of Michael "LuLu" Lewis and his wife, Fannie Thomas, who were shot to death in a parked car on Fox Hill Lane near the Midway Mall in Elyria on Jan. 31, 2016.

Ross, who is being held in the Lorain County Jail on $2 million bond, is charged with aggravated murder, felonious assault, tampering with evidence and having weapons under disability.

After two weeks of testimony starting March 2, the case was postponed by Rothgery on March 17 due to the coronavirus pandemic. It was set to resume June 1, then rescheduled again to begin Thursday.

During the nearly five-month delay in the trial, court staff and other stakeholders planned for jury trials to resume in Lorain County by outfitting Rothgery's court with protective plastic screens and by consulting attorneys, the Lorain County Sheriff's Office and Lorain County Public Health on how best to proceed.

Along with the court providing personal protective equipment to all participants and trial-watchers, it has ordered the courtroom to be cleaned during each lunch break and every night after testimony ends. Two separate rooms, one each for the victims' family and Ross' family, have been set up elsewhere in the Lorain County Justice Center to allow remote viewing of testimony.

Prior to the jury being brought back into the courtroom, defense attorney Kimberly Kendall Corral objected "to the modifications to the courtroom," saying she had an obligation to her client.

"We understand. However, we believe the fairest thing is for the trial to proceed as it was proceeding before the break," she told Rothgery. The plexiglass screens between them made it difficult to confer with both her co-counsel Michael Camera and Ross, she said.

All the precautions, Corral added, "create a heightened awareness of the risk" posed by the virus. She also said Ross had not had his temperature taken before entering court.

"My understanding was that it was taken. We checked that and were told that it did" get taken, the judge said.

"Boy, that makes me unhappy," he added.

Bailiff Rob Bennett then tested Ross' temperature with a touchless thermometer, and it was 97.1 degrees.

Before overruling her objection, Rothgery challenged Corral on it.

"Well, what's your remedy for what you've suggested is the problem?" he asked. "I need to hear one. Either I put the public at risk, or your client doesn't get a speedy trial. I can't just adjourn a case for years. Are you telling me I can? I can put this jury trial off for a year until we have a vaccine? That you want no masks, no plexiglass and no temperatures, even though you just objected to not having your client have his temperature taken?"

Corral replied that she did not have a remedy.

"My obligation is to my client," and to bring the matter to the court's attention, she said. "I believe that's my obligation as counsel."

"Objection overruled," Rothgery said.

Once the jury returned to the courtroom, the judge explained the precautions he was taking in much the same way.

"We wouldn't have brought you back if we couldn't protect you," he told the jurors.

He also informed jurors they could decide to wear just the plastic face shields or just the provided KN95 masks and said there also were gloves and hand sanitizer available. Three jurors decided to wear just the plastic face shields, and the rest chose the KN95 masks.

"Remember that when you're in (the jury room), if someone has forgotten social distancing or masks and I've seen it, remind people we need to maintain that social distance for everybody's protection. Remember hand-washing, and we've got sanitizer and gloves for you," Rothgery told the jury. "Feel free to use it. We've got more. We've got plenty."

Polling the jury, Rothgery then asked if any had tested positive for COVID-19 during their months-long break. None had. Jurors also said they had no close family members, coworkers or acquaintances who had tested positive, and none said they thought they had it or had symptoms.

All also said they had not gained any outside information about the trial from newspapers, the internet, other media, or friends and family during the five-month break in testimony.

The jurors unanimously agreed they were comfortable proceeding. Rothgery thanked them, while noting the pandemic has put the court in a difficult spot.

"There is nothing we can do that is perfect here. But we're going to do our very best and lessen the possibility of the odds as much as possible," he said. "We're not in a situation where we can put everyone in a plastic bubble … This is an unusual situation, an unusual time, and we're doing a lot of unusual things physically and legally."

During Thursday's testimony, BCI analysts gave evidence about DNA swabs collected from the Chevrolet Traverse in which the Lewises were found dead, as well as water bottles, a cigar tip and shell casings found inside the vehicle.

Much of the DNA evidence, when tested, was a mixture of unknown male DNA or that of known persons including the Lewises and several unrelated people, a BCI analyst testified.

Testimony resumes today.

Contact Dave O’Brien at (440) 329-7129 or dobrien@chroniclet.com. Follow him at @daveobrienCT on Twitter.