First, credentialed journalists will have access to a Media Center where they will be able to view the proceedings in their entirety (including jury selection) through live closed circuit video and audio feeds. [FN#3] Moreover, a second courtroom has been equipped with a closed circuit video and audio feed which will be available for the public and other journalists to view the proceedings. At no time in the history of this courthouse have such accommodations been provided to the public and the press in a criminal case.

[May make for enough space for all the itinerant legal tourists, eh, lhp?] Judge Walton states that the trial will be taking place in Courtroom 16 (not Courtroom 5, as the schedule stated, although 5 may be the overflow courtroom). Two pertinent footnotes:

#2. In fact, due to space limitations in the courtroom and the number of jurors who will comprise the venire, there will be limited seating capacity for journalists and the general public during the initial questioning of the entire panel and when the peremptory strikes are exercised.

#3. No recordings of either the audio or video feed will be permitted.

Judge Walton says they expect over 100 requests for press credentials for this trial (at slow-downs in the proceedings, I think FDL could probably put their hard-earned credential to good use just by eavesdropping on the antics of the mainstream media horde…). The length of the trial is estimated as follows (Wednesday’s status conference may well reveal further specifics regarding this and other matters):

Unlike appellate proceedings, which last at most an hour and are then taken under advisement by the judges who will decide the case, the proceedings in this case will continue in progress for at least a month, during which every effort will be made by the Court to ensure that the non-sequestered jurors are not exposed to media coverage of the trial which could potentially impact their ability to decide the case based solely on the evidence.

http://noeasyanswer.blogspot.com/

Adie @ 160

Interesting. You hit on several reasons why I’ve often felt the really good blogs (FDL especially!) share characteristics with peer-reviewed scientific research. What say you? Just curious.

Adie – do you think the influence of the professional ego is the same factor in both realms?

Maybe I’m being unrealistic to some degree, because I know ego drives a lot of people, and makes ‘em do strange things. But at least in the scientific realm we’ve inhabited, the ‘pure science’ won out eventually, always. Because of the importance of being able to replicate results of experimental work, anyone who tried to fake results was regarded as kinda crazy. I’m not saying it’s never happened, but generally the system is self-correcting over time. Most scientists, I think, are seeking truth. Any who deliberately fake results will have their career evaporate in a hurry, once they’re found out.

Till now. I assume things will right themselves eventually, but the blending of political agendas, business interests, & science has approached alarming proportions in the past several years, imho. Not among any of our colleagues that I know of – but… well, I’m immediately suspicious when I hear about the oil companies supporting research which just happens to label global warming bunk, FDA suddenly saying cloning is perfectly safe, etc. And yet they produce no real proof.
Likely as not, they’ll be proven wrong eventually, but this recent trend is alarming, if only because of the possibly irretrievable harm that will be done before folks prove the hokum is what they suspected in the 1st place. If they’re careful and thorough, it takes others awhile to prove what’s correct, whereas the mercenaries can just make a claim and collect their check… (short & brutal description, but maybe you get the point).

I hope you see this eventually, and that it makes some sense. It’s been kind-of a long day here. STILL haven’t had time to read the whole thread the way I’d promised, dang! Please stay in touch..

I served on a LONG civil case that ended up being a lot more contentious to the jury than apparently everyone else thought it should have been. (They had to send out for sandwiches for dinner while we were deliberating because everyone had assumed we would have a verdict before dinnertime.)

The other big case I served on was an ugly arson case in which one victim was a professor at the University of Oregon. I worked in the same department at the time, as did another juror, and my sister had been an acquaintance of the other victim for many years. I still can hardly believe we weren’t disqualified, but we weren’t.

They select juries differently in Oregon now, and I live in a county with a smaller population, so I’ve been in the jury pool several times since, but have only served on one jury. It was a MINOR drug crime, and the 12 of us unanimously felt our time and tax dollars were being wasted by prosecuting this young woman, but we found her guilty anyway because the evidence was quite clear.

Oh, hell, it keeps changing. Anyway, if you look long enough you will see an ad for a Scooter Libby defense fund.

thanks. I was wondering what I was looking for the first time. I’ve seen that ad on several sites of the ‘other side’ type that I venture into for research.

I hope he doesn’t end up a hero like Ollie.

PLEASE TAKE NOTE of the banner at the top of the article!

http://article.nationalreview……VjODQwYmM=

1) You MUST put aside your personal beliefs when deciding on guilt or innocence
2) You MUST apply the law itself, regardless of your personal beliefs
3) The distinction between criminal and civil trials – the first requiring a unanimous vote, the second being decided by a 10-2 vote

One trial dealt with a street robbery where a man pulled a knife on someone. The details are fuzzy, but I think that we found the guy guilty, based on witnesses’s testimony. What was memorable about that trial was this: The defendant was black, we we had one black juror in the jury. Even though the evidence seems overwhelming against the defendant, this specific juror did argue for the defendant. The discussion centered around the seriousness of pulling out a knife on someone; her point
was that, in certain environments, that act itself was not intended to hurt, rather to warn. She eventually relented to “peer” pressure and the defendant was convicted.

The other trial involved, again, a robbery in a restaurant involving a gun this time. Shots were fired by the defendant, allegedly, at the ceiling as a warning. Again, the defendant
was black, and the star witness was a (white) waitress who was working there at the time. The defense attorney attempted to cast doubt on the witness’s familiarity with black people – was she around such folks much? One specific question that was posed by the prosecutor was: “Is this the man who robbed
the restaurant that night”, pointing to the defendant. The witness thought hard, and answered after a considerable pause,
“I think so”. As far as I was concerned, there went the “beyond a reasonable” doubt concept. There was no way that I would have voted to convict. It wasn’t long before the jury
was informed that the trial was over – the two sides had struck some sort of a “deal”: the defendant was going to jail for I don’t remember how long. I looked around the jury members, and there was disbelief. Many jurors chatted with the defense attorney afterward, and let him know that it was likely that
there would NOT be a conviction, based on what we had heard so far. He said, “Oh, man! Don’t tell me that!”

The third trial dealt with an orthodontist and his client. This was a civil trial. The client was suing for a botched job; she was asking for damages. What I recall about the case is that the orthodontist had all of the evidence on his side – lots of pictures before and after the procedure. All that the client had
was that she was in pain. No witnesses. Nothing else. We did not have much choice but to to acquit.

I was called more recently for jury duty, but did not serve. The trial would have lasted at least a month, and most prospective jurors,
including me, claimed hardship as the excuse (I had a vacation that I had set up and could not cancel). We sat at the waiting area for
three days. On the third day, we were all dismissed – out of a pool of about 80 people, they could not find 14 to serve on the case. It
must have been a bad one.

The jury dynamics was interesting…By and large, people did try to be fair. When someone strayed from the operating rules, they were
reminded by others. There was a lot of soul-searching; after all, this WAS serious business.

The frustrating thing at that time was that we could NOT take notes during the trial. Now the rules have changed, as I understand it; this
is a welcome development and should help make the process fairer.

One source of fear about the whole process, especially on criminal cases, is that the defendant is present during jury selection; NOT a concern off-hand, but he/she has access to each juror’s home address, etc. The fear is one of revenge, once he/she is convicted, serves the term and comes out. There must be cases of revenge on jurors…

Everyone should serve on a jury. There IS a certain competence that is required to serve on one, let’s not fool ourselves. Good commandof English, some good common sense, communication skills, ability to understand some basic legal concepts, etc.

Please consider doing a post on Ted Kennedy’s legislation regarding war escalation in Iraq.

The anti-escalation caucus in this country is as close to unanimous as you will ever see on an issue and yet, no one but Kennedy is attempting to use it to hold President Bush accountable to the people’s will.

A post on Kennedy’s efforts can bring much needed attention, and a display of broad support, to the issue. He has a petition and is taking names of people who are in support. Thank you.