RALEIGH - A Wake County jury could reach a verdict today in the second criminal trial of former state Rep. Thomas Wright, who is charged with obstruction of justice.

The jury deliberated about 50 minutes Tuesday before leaving for the day.

Deliberations will resume this morning in the trial of the Wilmington Democrat, who in March became the first North Carolina legislator since the 19th century to be expelled from office.

Wright is accused of failing to disclose $150,350 in campaign contributions as well as other irregularities in his campaign finances. He is already serving a state prison sentence for an April conviction on three fraud charges.

Jurors heard about three hours of testimony Tuesday from an elections investigator and two people who helped Wright with his campaign finances.

Wake District Attorney Colon Willoughby introduced several charts detailing those finances. One showed that Wright had personally received $84,150 in cash from two campaign accounts, but Wright did not report where $76,892 -- or 91 percent -- had gone.

In his closing argument, Willoughby told jurors that Wright had no credible explanation for failing to disclose the transactions.

"Don't you think he knew that he had 76,000 extra dollars in his bank account? Wouldn't you know that?" Willoughby said.

Wright's attorney, Doug Harris, called no witnesses. He told jurors to question whether Wright's financial irregularities fit the crime of obstruction of justice.

"Don't we essentially have a prosecutor who's trying to alter a misdemeanor into a felony?" Harris said.

Jurors have three options on the Wright case: guilty of felony common-law obstruction of justice, guilty of misdemeanor common-law obstruction of justice or not guilty. A misdemeanor conviction could add as much as 45 days to his prison sentence. A felony conviction, which requires intent or malice, could add as much as 15 months depending on state sentencing guidelines.

For the fraud convictions, Wright is scheduled to be released May 31, 2015.

Outside the presence of the jury, Harris asked for a mistrial because Judge Donald Stephens' instructions to the jury included an extemporaneous explanation of common law. One of Harris' central arguments to jurors has been that the common law -- which is unwritten and comes from English tradition -- has less weight than written statutes.

Stephens denied Harris' request.

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