Jurors began deliberations Friday in a wrongful-death lawsuit that claims actor Robert Blake is liable for the killing of wife Bonny Lee Bakley four years ago.

The nine-man, three-woman jury went into their talks after Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge David Schacter instructed the panel on the questions they must answer to reach verdicts.

Blake, 72, was acquitted of murder in March after a criminal trial, but the lawsuit brought on behalf of Bakley's four children seeks to hold him civilly responsible and to win monetary damages.

Schacter said the jury must decide whether Blake intentionally caused Bakley's death or plotted to cause it. The jury must decide whether there was a conspiracy between Blake and co-defendant Earle Caldwell, his former handyman, to cause Bakley's death.

Verdicts require agreement by nine of the 12 jurors rather than a unanimous decision. Convicting someone in a criminal case requires a finding of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. To determine liability in a civil case, jurors must find that a claim is more likely to be true than not.

During the trial, the children's attorney suggested Blake was bent on getting rid of his wife at any cost, while the defense sought to show Blake wanted to stay married and raise the daughter he had with Bakley in a stable environment.

On May 4, 2001, Bakley was found shot to death in Blake's car parked on a street near Vitello's restaurant, where Blake was such a longtime customer that there was a dish named for him.

The couple dined at the restaurant that evening and then left. Blake claims he went back into the restaurant to retrieve a handgun that he carried for protection but had left in their booth, then went back out to the car and found his wife mortally wounded in the passenger seat.

Plaintiffs attorney Eric Dubin alleged that in the months before Bakley died Blake tried to distance himself from her and then tried to hire two former Hollywood stuntmen to kill her. Dubin claimed that when those plans failed, Blake took matters into his own hands.

Blake's attorney, Peter Ezzell, contended that because of Bakley's background, there were many people who might have wanted to kill her. Bakley ran a mail-order business in which she solicited money from men by using nude pictures of herself and promises of sex.

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