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Jurors after trial...
Topic Started: Jan 11 2016, 08:55 AM (254 Views)
Quasimodo

Quote:
 
http://www.wbaltv.com/news/jurors-allegedly-threatened-at-baltimore-city-courthouse/26750150

Jurors allegedly threatened at Baltimore City courthouse

6 jurors told authorities man threatened to kill them

Published 5:32 PM EDT Jul 01, 2014

BALTIMORE —The lives of some jurors were allegedly threatened after rendering a verdict inside a Baltimore courtroom.

The jurors were allegedly threatened in the hallway of the Mitchell Courthouse and out on the street. They told sheriff's deputies and that led to the arrest of a 32-year-old Baltimore man.

Shaken and afraid is how Baltimore City sheriff's deputies describe six jurors who complained a man using profanity threatened to kill them.

"We take threats of that type very seriously," Baltimore City Sheriff's Office Maj. Sabrina Tapp-Harper said.

Jamaal Douglas, of Baltimore, is charged with obstruction of justice, juror intimidation and assault. Originally, his bail was set at $6 million. Now, he's being held in jail on a no-bail status.

"Matters of this type are very serious and I think the fact that he was immediately apprehended and arrested and is at a no-bail status is a clear indication of that," Tapp-Harper said.

Douglas was arrested June 19. He's accused of making verbal threats to jurors outside a courtroom just after a friend of his was found guilty of drug possession and distribution. A short while later, four jurors ran back into the Mitchell Courthouse reporting that the man who they believed had made the threats was outside at St. Paul and Fayette streets near the entrance for jurors.

"This kind of thing doesn't normally go on here and I think the courts will have a strong interest in making sure they send a strong message to people that we're going to protect our jurors," Defense attorney Andrew Alperstein said.

Alperstein is not Douglas' lawyer. WBAL-TV 11 News asked him about the unusual circumstances of the case, especially since the alleged actions happened as the jury was leaving the courthouse and had no impact on its verdict.

"The court system needs to have a sanctity to it. When jurors are being threatened, it hurts everything. It hurts everybody. The system needs to operate with integrity and when people threaten jurors, that's a real serious situation," Alperstein said.

Court records indicate Douglas has convictions for burglary, drug possession and distribution, and was on parole when the alleged jury intimidation happened.

11 News tried to reach his attorney who did not want to comment at this time.


A few questions:

What might have happened had jurors returned anything less than a guilty verdict in a lax prosecution?

Would jurors have been aware of the potential for threats against them as they deliberated, and would that have affected
the outcome?

Would Durham have reacted as strongly against threats?

Was that a compelling reason for a change of venue?



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Quasimodo

Quote:
 
http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/02/22/astor.trial.jury.appeal/

Appeal: Astor trial juror says she felt threatened

February 22, 2010 4:32 p.m. EST

-- A holdout juror says she feared for her safety when she "folded" under pressure and voted to convict Anthony Marshall of charges that he stole from his mother, wealthy philanthropist Brooke Astor.

Court documents filed Monday in Manhattan Supreme Court paint a dramatic picture of jury-room intrigue at the high-profile trial that painted a troubling portrait of the socialite's life as she succumbed to Alzheimer's disease in her final years. Astor died in 2007 at age 105.

Marshall, Astor's 85-year-old son, was convicted in October of conspiracy to defraud his mother, larceny and other offenses and sentenced to one to three years in prison. He is free on bail while he appeals.

The holdout juror, who favored acquittal, alleges that another juror intimidated her, cursed at her and flashed gang signs at her during the contentious third week of deliberations, according to court papers.

Yvonne Fernandez, the juror accused in court affidavits of making the gang signs, denied it when reached at home by phone. "I don't even know gang signs," she said.

Fernandez is a former technical director at In Session, which airs on CNN's sister network, TruTV.

The holdout juror, identified in court papers as Judith DeMarco, told Marshall's defense that she became fearful when neither the judge nor anyone else on the jury would back her. Her requests to leave the jury were ignored, she told Marshall's defense investigator and attorneys.

"The judge wasn't going to protect me," DeMarco told defense investigator Margaret Clemons, according to Clemons' affidavit. "At the end I'm ashamed I couldn't stand my ground. But I couldn't take it any longer. I couldn't take it. I don't want to see anyone innocent go away, but I had to do what I had to do," Clemons' affidavit quoted DeMarco as saying.

DeMarco declined to sign her own affidavit, saying she feared the publicity would disrupt her life, according to the court papers.

A fellow holdout also gave in, telling DeMarco that the defendants were wealthy enough to appeal, DeMarco told Clemons, according to the affidavit.

DeMarco said she felt awful after voting to convict Marshall and his estate lawyer, Francis X. Morrissey. She said she spent the next three days in her apartment, curled in a fetal position, according to the court papers.

Meanwhile, according to court papers, the other jurors were e-mailing one another, allegedly orchestrating how they would tell their story to the media.

Defense attorneys John Cuti, Thomas Puccio and John Cromartie are asking the court to toss out Marshall's conviction. They are requesting a March 4 hearing.

Prosecutors said they were reviewing the matter and would have no further comment.

The court papers also contained nearly 60 e-mail messages the defense alleges were exchanged by the other jurors. The jurors discussed how they should publicly portray their deliberations and put up a "united front."

The defense says the judge at the trial failed to properly question jurors after receiving a note that a member of the jury felt threatened.

The confrontation between DeMarco and Fernandez, who had become friends during the trial, occurred as the panel struggled with the most serious charge against Marshall: whether he stole by giving himself a $1 million raise for managing his mother's financial affairs, according to the legal papers.
Fernandez acknowledged to CNN that she raised her voice at DeMarco, but only after DeMarco said the judge's instructions "didn't do it for her."

The e-mails showed that following an interview with Vanity Fair, the jury forewoman said she "followed the script" that jurors had agreed upon and portrayed the confrontation as "a flare-up."

The jurors also discussed whether to appear on the television show "20/20." One juror described the holdout, DeMarco, as "a drama queen" in an e-mail dated November 3. Another called her "a crazy old coot."


And what might have happened if there had been one or two holdouts in a Durham jury?




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Quasimodo

Quote:
 
http://newpittsburghcourieronline.com/2016/01/09/jurors-witnesses-allegedly-threatened-into-silence-in-both-freddie-gray-laquan-mcdonald-trials/

Jurors, witnesses allegedly threatened into silence in both Freddie Gray & Laquan McDonald trials

Jan 9, 2016

Lawyers representing the Laquan McDonald estate made some bold, crucial accusations against the Chicago Police Department today. They’re alleging that the department threatened witnesses out of sharing their testimonies on the Laquan McDonald’s police shooting death from October 2014.

One man said that he and his son were told by officers to drive away after seeing the shootout, otherwise risk being thrown in jail. Other witnesses say they were thrown into police cars, separated and interviewed for hours at the police station. They even allege that officers told the witnesses that their accounts were wrong.

[Never could happen in Durham...]


“It’s not just the officers on the street,” attorney Jeffrey Neslund told CNN. “It’s a lieutenant, a sergeant and detectives — and the lengths they went to justify what simply was not true.”

While investigating the case, the McDonald’s lawyers were told by the police department that there weren’t any witness statements. From there, the attorneys deduced that the witnesses weren’t asked to sign statements by the Police Department at all.

A federal grand jury is now looking into the case and for possible corruption from the department. If proven true, legal experts say this could result in mass terminations for the Chicago police at various levels of authority.

[So why wasn't there a federal grand jury to examine the lax case non-investigation?]

“This is the first time I’m hearing of that allegation,” spokesman Anthony Guglielmi for Chicago’s Police Department said. “But this is why we want an independent investigation to look at every fact. But unfortunately, we’re not able to comment on any specific incident.”

The office for Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel also responded, saying:

“The police actions surrounding this shooting are under investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice for possible criminal charges, and by the city’s Inspector General for possible disciplinary action. The public deserves answers to a number of important questions in this case, and we eagerly await the findings of those investigations.”

(snip)

On top of telling jurors to stay quiet, Williams has sealed court filings on the Gray lawsuit. This is supposed to be acknowledged in a public court file but it has yet to come up on the website that has been mandated for documents and news updates on the Gray case. Furthermore, the hard copy of the file has been unavailable for public viewing at the clerk’s office since Nov. 30, as it was taken by the judge in time for Porter’s court dates.

Williams issued a gag order against prosecutors and defense attorneys on the trial in October. It’s unclear why the judge has made such an effort to conceal the documents, as there are many possible reasons for this. Simonson muses that this might be to protect witnesses or to prevent jurors from being more biased.

Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the University of California, Irvine School of Law and an expert in constitutional law said:

“Where I think the law is and should be is that there is a strong presumption of the openness of all documents, and there has to be a strong and important reason for secrecy as to a particular document. Once you say that the press and public has a right to attend almost all parts of a criminal trial, documents are a part of that.”


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Quasimodo



Quote:
 
Posted on 9/28/2006

Police: Gang Threats Postpone Murder Trial

By Darla Miles

(DURHAM) - Durham officials have postponed a murder trial amid alleged gang-related threats of violence... Tuesday's courthouse melee erupted on the fifth-floor, after key witnesses backed out of the Nicholson trial. They said they were being threatened.

-----

"You can't really conduct trials in an atmosphere, where there is intimidation of witnesses, or where there is fear that something might happen," Nifong said. "The District Attorney's Office is not equipped to protect witnesses in any situation. There aren't any local witness protection programs, or anything of that nature. The fact is people are to some extent on their own, in terms of their protection."




IOW, the DA is saying that he can't protect witnesses.
(Wonder how it felt to be a witness to that upcoming trial?)

But witnesses and jurors had nothing to fear from participating in a lax trial (even with Black Panthers demonstrating outside)...


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Quasimodo

Quote:
 
http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1992-05-10/news/9202110599_1_jurors-police-officers-jury-pool

Death Threats, Fear Follow King Jury

May 10, 1992



LOS ANGELES — Nine days after they delivered the verdict that stunned the nation and set South-Central Los Angeles aflame, the jurors who acquitted the four police officers charged with beating Rodney King are variously frightened, defensive, agonized by second thoughts or firmly resolved that they did the right thing. ``My life is beyond hell. I cannot take anymore,`` said Alice Debord, a 43-year-old grounds worker at a local college.

Standing outside her modest home in the verdant, remote hills near Ojai, a 75-mile drive from riot-scarred Los Angeles, she looked shaken as she recalled getting death threats.

Other jurors have left their homes in various parts of Ventura County, northwest of Los Angeles.

The courts ordered the trial transferred there on the ground that the Los Angeles police officers could not get a fair trial in the city.

[They had a change of venue, but not far enough.]

According to Lt. Robert Klamser of the Simi Valley Police, his department and the Ventura County Sheriff`s Department have been investigating threats to kill jurors and to burn and vandalize their homes.

``We`re working with the jurors on a whole range of things to protect their safety,`` he said. ``Even alternate jurors and prospective jurors who never sat on the panel at all have been threatened.``

(snip)

Christopher C. Morgan, a telephone installer who lives in Simi Valley with his wife, Marie, and six children, told USA Today that he received hate mail and telephoned death threats.

He said he was shocked and dismayed by the riots.

``My first reaction was, `Oh my God, I`ve been part of something that is completely out of control.` You have to feel some sense of responsibility for it,`` the newspaper quoted him as saying. But he defended the jury verdict:

``I was very conscious of this and how it would affect people. I`m not a prejudiced person.``

But Anna Whiting, a printer who lives near Ventura, told the Cable News Network on Thursday that she would not have voted guilty under any
circumstances.

She said she regretted ``the aftermath of how all these riots came about,`` but added that she did not feel responsible for other people`s actions. ``I couldn`t have voted any other way than I did,`` she said in a televised interview during which her face was obscured by shadows and her voice was disguised electronically.




And how would jurors after a not-guilty verdict have been received in Durham?

Would fears of how they would be treated have affected their deliberations (and verdict)?




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