Jerry Sandusky Trial: What Prosecution Resting Case Early Means for Both Sides

The Jerry Sandusky trial is going fast. Faster than anybody predicted. So fast that on Wednesday, the prosecution was expected to finish its trial by the end of the week... and now, just one day later, the new prediction from the judge is that the prosecution will rest today.

Here's the news from Yahoo! Sports' Dan Wetzel, who's there at the trial:

"

Judge announces the prosecution will rest its case this afternoon, way ahead of schedule #Sandusky

— Dan Wetzel (@DanWetzel) June 14, 2012"

Now, so we're clear, that isn't the judge deciding that for the prosecution; it's not like the state got denied a request for another day or anything. That's just a reflection of how quickly the trial is proceeding.

So what this means for the prosecution is that they'll have been satisfied with how well their case was made in just four days. That's probably a good thing—by and large, the trial has gone well for prosecutors thus far—but just because they're happy with the information they've gotten out doesn't mean that jurors will (or should) consider the speediness of that aspect a positive. It's up to the information itself, not the appearance thereof.

As for Jerry Sandusky and the defense, the date of the end of the prosecution's case doesn't directly affect their legal strategy. There isn't a trial clock or a hard end date because this isn't sports, it's the judicial system.

It might behoove the defense to think of creating a large disparity between the time prosecutors spent making their case and the time the defense spends sowing doubt about it—and the list of 60-odd potential witnesses seems to indicate some willingness there—but unless the defense really has that many salient points to make, they're not going to win anyone over in the jury just by dragging the case out as long as possible.