While watching Fox & Friends during his “executive time” on Tuesday morning, President Donald Trump demanded his associate Roger Stone get a new trial after legal analyst Andrew Napolitano argued for one on the program.
Just last week, Trump interfered with Stone’s case by complaining about the sentencing recommendation by federal prosecutors of seven to nine years in prison. After all, Stone was found guilty on all seven counts against him for obstruction, witness tampering and lying to the FBI.
Attorney General Bill Barr immediately responded to the complaint by denouncing the recommendation, resulting in all four federal prosecutors withdrawing from the case in protest.
Now Trump is angling for a new trial for his associate by quoting Napolitano, who tried to excuse a new trial on Fox News by attacking the jury foreperson.
“Judge Jackson now has a request for a new trial based on the unambiguous & self outed bias of the foreperson of the jury, whose also a lawyer, by the way. ‘Madam foreperson, your a lawyer, you have a duty, an affirmative obligation, to reveal to us when we selected you the…..
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 18, 2020
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…..existence of these tweets in which you were so harshly negative about the President & the people who support him. Don’t you think we wanted to know that before we put you on this jury.’ Pretty obvious he should (get a new trial). I think almost any judge in the Country…..
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 18, 2020
…..would order a new trial, I’m not so sure about Judge Jackson, I don’t know.” @Judgenap (Andrew Napolitano) @foxandfriends
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 18, 2020
One juror alone does not issue a verdict. There are 12 jurors in a federal trial and the guilty verdict against Stone was handed down unanimously. So, Napolitano’s gripe about the jury foreman being a Democrat makes no sense. After all, Democrats could easily make the same complaints about a jury foreman being a Republican, and Napolitano and Trump would ignore them.
Again, Stone committed several crimes and a jury found him guilty. The defense had every opportunity during jury selection to dismiss the juror and they did not do so.
In addition, jury selection is supposed to be non-discriminatory.
According to the United States Courts website:
Each district court randomly selects citizens’ names from lists of registered voters and people with drivers licenses who live in that district. The people randomly selected complete a questionnaire to help determine if they are qualified to serve on a jury. Those qualified are randomly chosen to be summoned to appear for jury duty. This selection process helps to make sure that jurors represent a cross section of the community, without regard to race, gender, national origin, age, or political affiliation.”
That means it is more than likely that a Republican voter or several served on this jury as well and still found Stone guilty.
Cherry-picking one juror to call for a new trial is a ridiculous argument and Judge Amy Berman Jackson is hopefully wise enough to see through this scheme to subvert justice and her court.
Featured image via screen capture
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