Jury selection begins for Punta Gorda murder suspect

PUNTA GORDA, Fla. A six-person jury and three alternates were selected Tuesday for the trial of a 29-year-old man accused of killing a 7-Eleven employee and setting the store on fire.

Michael Russo faces second-degree murder and first-degree arson charges in the death of Kyle Farishian, 18, whose remains were found following a November 2015 fire at the convenience store on the intersection of Bal Harbor Boulevard and Aqui Esta Drive.

Attorneys questioned 62 potential jurors about their knowledge of the high-profile case after nearly all of them said they had either watched or heard something about it.

Prosecutors will use pretrial testimony to make their case that Russo shot and killed Farishian and set fire to his body in a premeditated murder.

Russo’s attorney, Mark De Sisto, claimed prosecutors and investigators fed confidential information to jail informants to help their case against him, though he dropped a motion claiming investigative misconduct.

An informant claimed he attempted to coerce Russo into confessing by posing as a law clerk and falsely stating he was facing murder charges to help reduce his own sentence, according to court documents.

“If somebody murders somebody and tells me about it, I’m going to use it to my advantage and I’m going to tell the right people,” the informant said in a deposition. “You shouldn’t kill people and you shouldn’t tell people that you did it.”

The trial is expected to last two or three weeks.