Author: Michael A. Ventrella

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What IS a Grand Jury, anyway?

“A Grand Jury saw all the evidence and made its decision and therefore justice was served.”

I’m seeing that comment a lot today from people who clearly do not understand the difference between a Grand Jury and a jury.  And it clearly is shaping opinions in the wrong way.grand-jury

A jury is selected by a prosecutor and a defense attorney, who question each of them and have the right to remove any they think are possibly biased.  Then a trial that is open to the public is held. Both sides present evidence and witnesses and cross examine and challenge anything the other side does.  A judge is present to make sure it all runs fairly.  Both sides then give closing arguments summarizing their version of what happened.  And in order to find guilt, the jury needs  to be unanimous and convinced “beyond a reasonable doubt.”

A Grand Jury is none of those things.  A Grand Jury is a group of citizens who have not been challenged or removed for possible bias.  A Grand Jury hearing is closed and secret and not open to the public.  The DA presents whatever evidence he or she wants to without the worry that a defense attorney may cross-examine his witnesses or challenge his evidence.  There is only one side presented.  There is no judge.  And then the only question the jurors have is whether there is enough evidence to send it to a real jury to determine guilt or innocence.

That is a very low burden to meet, which is why 99.99999% of all Grand Juries result in an indictment.

It would be much better if we didn’t call these things Grand Juries, because people hear “jury” and they think “trial.”  There is no trial in a Grand Jury.

I’ve had to defend cases with much less evidence than existed in the Ferguson case. I agree that there was a lot of contradicting testimony but that just means we probably should have a jury hear it all and decide what to believe. Instead, the DA made up his mind and told the jury that we didn’t know so they shouldn’t indict. That’s not how it works!

Seriously, watch the DA’s press conference — he practically admitted that he acted as judge and jury, decided there wasn’t good evidence, and then told the Grand Jury what to do.  Give me a Grand Jury and let me present only the evidence and witnesses I want to without anyone contradicting me and I can get them to go the exact opposite way, I promise you.

President of the Pennsylvania Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (and friend) Jim Swetz pointed this out:  Former New York state Chief Judge Sol Wachtler famously remarked that a prosecutor could persuade a grand jury to “indict a ham sandwich.” The data suggests he was barely exaggerating: According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. attorneys prosecuted 162,000 federal cases in 2010, the most recent year for which we have data. Grand juries declined to return an indictment in 11 of them.

So for the DA not to get an indictment pretty much means he had no intention of getting one — making the whole thing a bit of a sham, done so he can fool people who don’t understand what a Grand Jury is to think that “justice was done.”

The real problem once again (I sound like a broken record) is voting. Ferguson is majority black and most of them never vote. Just like how the US is majority Democrat and we don’t vote. And then we get stuck with a government that does not represent the majority of the people. It’s our fault.

 

 

 

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Editorial cartoons we’ve missed

My sister-in-law died last week, and that is why I have not updated this blog in so long.  I apologize.  I want to write about that, but every time I start, I get depressed and put it off.  So instead I’m going to just publish a bunch of editorial cartoons that I have not posted over the last ten days or so.

Editorial cartoon: Low Information Nation

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Don’t be proud of being a non-voter

Government sucks but you don’t vote?  You’re part of the problem.

Bill Maher explains it well here, and with jokes.

Editorial cartoon: The broken system

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South Carolina joins the 21st Century; Senator Graham has the vapors

Upon learning that his home state of South Carolina would be forced to allow gays and lesbians to marry, Senator Lindsay Graham waved his hands before his face, said “Goodness gracious me!  I think I have the vapors!” and then fainted.  He suffered minor injuries as he hit his head on the closet in which he resides.  Lindsey-Graham

For the rest of us, it was a day of cheering, as yet another federal court has ruled in favor of equality, leaving just the one that decided that no, the Constitution doesn’t say what every single other federal judge in the entire country has said it says.

The South Carolina Attorney General vowed to appeal to the 4th Circuit Court — the same Circuit Court that has already ruled in favor of gay marriage not too long ago.  In other words, Republicans once again will be using taxpayer money to fight another futile battle against equal rights, because Jeebus. Or something.  (Certainly not the law.)

 

Editorial cartoon: Keeping their promise

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The latest ridiculous conservative outrage

The latest outrage consists of making fun of Obama for wearing silly clothes at a recent summit in China, as you can see from this meme polluting the right-wing blogosphere.

obama china

I suppose I don’t have to point out that every other foreign leader was wearing the same thing, including Vladimir Putin, do I? And that every President before Obama wore similar garb?

Heh! It’s funny because the implication is that facts matter to these people.

What’s even funnier are the comments about the incident, which once more include two completely contradictory themes:

“We hate China! We should not be beholden to them. America needs to assert itself. The President should not bow down to China.”

and

“Hey, look! Obama looks real unhappy dressing in the traditional clothes they make them all wear at these things! And he was chewing gum when he arrived! How dare he not show proper deference to China!”

At least they are consistent in their beliefs.  No matter what Obama does, they hate it.

Editorial cartoon: What the election meant

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In defense of voting

It seems strange to me that I have to defend voting against people who argue with a straight face that you shouldn’t — either because “your vote doesn’t matter” or “no one represents me”.

Trust me — your vote matters.  That’s why they spend so much money trying to get it.  That’s why Republicans try so hard to keep Democrats from voting.vote-button

And there are good candidates out there. Quite often they don’t make it past the primaries because people don’t vote. People don’t pay attention. They don’t get involved; they don’t read about the elections, and then when the election rolls around, they say “Hey, no one represents me” — which might not have happened had they done something about it.

I am involved in my local party. I go to meetings, I encourage candidates to run, and I’ve even run for a minor office myself (and won). I read about politics, I write about politics, and I contribute to politicians I like. And I vote. And because of this, I have a say in who these candidates are. I can affect the results.

Complaining that no one represents you in an election when you are doing absolutely nothing to change that seems like whining to me. And you know you’re going to end up with one of them, so at least vote for the lesser of the two.  Surely one represents your views better than the other one.

Democracy means we are the government. We, the people. We have a say in what our government does. The candidates answer to us, not the other way around.  They represent us.  They are not the government, we are.

If you don’t participate, then they ignore you. And then you get what you deserve.

The people who do vote (which are pretty much always Republicans) win elections, and then the stupid Democrats think “Guess we should be more like Republicans” and move to the right.  Whereas if we voted in the same number as Republicans, we would win many of the elections and no one would be saying that.  But because we stay at home, our candidates lose.  So what do their campaign managers say then?  “We need to appeal to those people who do vote, not those who sit at home and complain without doing anything.”

It’s not going to change from the top. It has to change from us at the bottom. And complaining without action changes nothing.