Friday, February 22, 2019

CA - Mongols Jury Was Confused

OFF THE WIRE
agingrebel.com
One of the jurors who found the turn of phrase “Mongol Nation” guilty of racketeering last December, admitted today that the jury made a mistake.
In a batch of four motions filed late Thursday afternoon by Mongols attorney Joseph A. Yanny, Juror Number Two, a citizen named Eric Garcia told the court:
“I am submitting this declaration because I feel ethically compelled to do so as I do not want to see an injustice and I therefore feel an obligation to speak up. It is my belief and, I am informed, the belief of others jurors as well who served with me in the Mongols Nation trial that we reached the wrong decision in our verdict in the guilt phase. For these reasons. I felt the need to write a letter to the Court and hand deliver it approximately Friday a week ago. I also sent a copy to both the prosecution and the defense lawyers.”
“Once jury deliberations began for the guilt phase of the trial, the jury never re-read any of the jury instructions. The jury instructions were held exclusively by the foreperson and not distributed to the group at all during the initial guilt phase deliberations.”
“During the closing arguments on the forfeiture phase, when defense counsel place some of the guilt phase jury instructions on the overhead projector, it was then that I and several other jurors realized that a mistake had already been made.”

The declaration was attached to motions filed in reply to the government’s opposition to previous motions for a directed verdict of not guilty an, failing that, a new trial.