He said he would excuse the seated jurors because their empaneling had occurred while the selection process was being tainted by the exclusion of the white prospective jurors.

The empaneling of the jury came after the disclosure that over the weekend Federal agents searched the home of a Virginia Beach man who is a communications hobbyist and acquaintance of Senator Robb, a Democrat.

Ms. Holtzman rejected a plea yesterday by two advocacy organizations for the empaneling of a grand jury to investigate the system in which the city keeps healthy babies in hospitals and dormitories of group shelters before they can be placed in foster homes.

"As I understand your order, the leaks in the Sunday New York Times ought to result in the empaneling of the grand jury and the imposition of penalties against the Government," one lawyer, Martin Garbus, said in a letter to Judge Duffy.

Stearns was tried separately in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California in San Francisco, after Bugliosi persuaded the court that publicity about the murders in Hawaii prevented the empaneling of an impartial jury there.