Defense: Don’t dress jury instructions in black

You know a trial’s winding down when attorneys start discussing such nitty-gritty details as the color of binders.

That happened Monday as attorneys met with the judge in former Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s corruption retrial.

Jurors are off until Wednesday, when the defense starts calling witnesses.

But the sides met Monday to agree on instructions Judge James Zagel will give jurors when they start deliberating.

Among the issues raised by defense attorney Lauren Kaeseberg was the color of the binders the instructions will be contained in.

She asked they not be black. That’s the color of binders that hold prosecution evidence.

Kaeseberg says she doesn’t want jurors to wrongly view the instructions as also coming from prosecutors.

The judge agreed and said he’d have staff look for red binders.