Posted on 02/25/2011 10:52:20 AM PST by Second Amendment First
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Since 2009, Mr. Heicklen has stood there and at courthouse entrances elsewhere and handed out pamphlets encouraging jurors to ignore the law if they disagree with it, and to render verdicts based on conscience.
That concept, called jury nullification, is highly controversial, and courts are hostile to it. But federal prosecutors have now taken the unusual step of having Mr. Heicklen indicted on a charge that his distributing of such pamphlets at the courthouse entrance violates the law against jury tampering. He was arraigned on Friday in a somewhat contentious hearing before Judge Kimba M. Wood, who entered a not guilty plea on his behalf when he refused to say how he would plead. During the proceeding, he railed at the judge and the government, and called the indictment “a tissue of lies.”
Mr. Heicklen insists that he never tries to influence specific jurors or cases, and instead gives his brochures to passers-by, hoping that jurors are among them.
But he feels his message must be getting out, or the government would not have brought charges against him.
“If I weren’t having any effect, would they do this?” said Mr. Heicklen, whose former colleagues recall him as a talented and unconventional educator. “You don’t have to be a genius to figure this thing out.”
Prosecutors declined to comment on his case, as did Sabrina Shroff, a lawyer who was assigned to assist Mr. Heicklen. (He is acting as his own lawyer.)
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
No doubt the defendant has taken lessons from the Dear Leader. You don’t like the law just ignore it or do how you FEEL about it!
If he were tried and I were a juror and lacking evidence that he attempted to affect specific outcomes on specific cases, I would nullify these charges.
Jury nullification is a great power against unjust laws, just like state nullification.
If he were tried and I were a juror and lacking evidence that he attempted to affect specific outcomes on specific cases, I would nullify these charges.
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Agreed. On its face this is a mere thought crime against the Washington government and its wholly owned subsidiaries.
Is that like Presidential nullification of DOMA?
That is not jury tampering.
To inform juries of their constitutional rights is not tampering.
Attempting to influence their vote is. He was not trying to tell them to vote one way or the other on anything.
He’d better win this case.
A jury in New York City recently nullified a charge against a man from out of state who had a handgun in his vehicle. He admitted he had it in his glovebox but had forgot it was in there. He was facing a felony conviction and years in prison. I would have nullified the charge against him also.
Jury nullification serves as an important safeguard against unjust laws, as well as against the unfair application of well-intended laws, ie RomneyObamaCare.
I think I saw that guy at the O.J. trial.
It sounds like free speech to me. We see a lot worse speech—seditious, vicious—every day, but no one interferes. Look at Wisconson... or MSNBC.
That’s right! Ultimately legitmate power only comes from the people. That means a jury has the right to nullify the effect of a law by refusing to convict based on the law.
this is what he was handing out:
http://fija.org/download/BR_YYYY_true_or_false.pdf
...oh, the horror!
Yes, jury nullification gives the people (the jury) the ultimate control in a court case. Which is where it belongs.
I encourage FReepers to serve on juries and help take back this country; and be familiar with jury nullification should the need arise.
OJ’s attorney argued nullification based on racial payback.
In the Nannygate matter of 1993, Wood was Bill Clinton's second unsuccessful choice for United States Attorney General.[7] Like Clinton's previous nominee, Zoë Baird, Wood had hired an illegal alien as a nanny; although, unlike Baird, she had paid the required taxes on the employee and had broken no laws. Wood employed the undocumented immigrant at a time when it was legal to do so, before enactment of the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 made hiring of undocumented workers unlawful.[8] The threat of a repetition of the same controversy quickly led to a withdrawal of Wood from consideration. Janet Reno was later nominated and confirmed for the post.
No, it’s being judged by a jury of your peers.
Some lawyer, huh?
Bingo!
Bingo!
THOMAS JEFFERSON (1789): I consider trial by jury as the only anchor ever yet imagined by man, by which a government can be held to the principles of its constitution.
JOHN ADAMS (1771): It’s not only ....(the juror’s) right, but his duty, in that case, to find the verdict according to his own best understanding, judgement, and conscience, though in direct opposition to the direction of the court.
ALEXANDER HAMILTON (1804): Jurors should acquit even against the judge’s instruction....”if exercising their judgement with discretion and honesty they have a clear conviction that the charge of the court is wrong.”
U.S. vs. DOUGHERTY (1972) [D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals]: The jury has....”unreviewable and irreversible power...to acquit in disregard of the instructions on the law given by the trial judge.”
Judges “instructing” juries should be illegal. Advise, yes, but instruct, no.
Actually, jury nullification goes back to the beginnings of this nation
The publicity over this will destroy citizen confidence in the Just Us system far more than this guy's pamphlets, and he'll beat the rap with twelve jurors nullifying instead of one.
No that was Lainie Guinier.
However Wood is of kindred spirit
>>Only judges are allowed to influence juries, even if they do so in unconstitutional ways.<<
In the courtroom, but handing out pamphlets on the street is a free speech issue. Now, if what he is saying is false, that is another matter.
I’ve been on two juries, both of which were for trials that lasted roughly a month. In both cases I told my fellow jurors that, regardless of what the judge instructs, each of us can individually decide which way to vote in any way we see fit, even if it’s because you don’t like the guys heairstyle. It’s really only common sense.
I did not know at the time that it was called jury nullification (it was 20 years ago) but I knew enough about law to look up the responsibilities of the individual juror, plus, I saw 12 angry men. ;)
Same here.
In my opinion, jury tampering is only a valid charge if he handed out the pamphlets only to specific juror(s) for purposes of influencing the verdict in specific case(s).
Excellent quotes. Thanks.
No.
I’m wondering how the prosecution is going to make its case, dancing around the offense he is alleged to have committed.
Even then it is covered by the First Amendment. Why? It’s not germane to the facts of the specific case. It’s no different then telling jurors that 2+2 is 4.
His pamphlet should be entered into evidence, and trial by jury.
The jury can then examine the evidence.
That will be interesting for sure.
No, it is not. This is no attempt to defraud, slander, defame. It is still free speech even if false.
And even in a case like this -- WHO determines what is political fact, or a historical fact? The history of jury nullification is strong and a certain influence upon the Bill of Rights. Go look up the Trial of William Penn in London.
What are their names? Why did they do this unconscionable act?
Free Speech is "jury tampering"?
These SOB's can't even get an indictment against Mafia gangsters who really are doing that, and they go after a decent man on the street?
Despicable. Tell us who they are so we can heap shame on them.
Scuttlebutt from a long ago, dismissed, hung-jury, marijuana smoking case in California.
“It they want to smoke pot, let them.”
It’s exclusion should be reason for appeal, I would think.
When one is asked a question and the answer does not include the "whole truth" re critical information to make an informed decision, is that lying? When I was a kid, my dad thought so.
Good point.
Conscientious juuries frighten the heck out of out corrupt LEO/Judiciary complex.
I’d be interested in knowing what, specifically, he was indicted for. What’s the actual law he is charged with breaking?
This is clearly a very conscientious man. A true hero.
They’ve been harassing him, too, evidently.
Jury nullification goes way back in this land, famously in colonial times when it was used to protect freedom of speech, later in prosecution of the Fugitive Slave Act and during Prohibition. Unfortunately, it was also abused during the Jim Crow days, exonerating obviously guilty whites of crimes against blacks. You take the bad with the good.
The power is absolute and constitutional, upheld multiple times. However, its application has been eroded by later decisions. By the late 1800s judges didn’t have to inform the jury of their power, and by the 1960s they were allowed to prevent the jury from being told in the courtroom that they had this power at all (a judge will declare a mistrial if the defense tries). This guy was simply trying to inform potential jury members of their legal power and their rights as citizens. Consider it Miranda for juries.
“It is presumed, that juries are the best judges of facts; it is, on the other hand, presumed that courts are the best judges of law. But still both objects are within your power of decision ... you have a right to take it upon yourselves to judge of both, and to determine the law as well as the fact in controversy” — John Jay, first Chief Justice of the United States
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