by WorldTribune Staff, May 30, 2024 Contract With Our Readers
Before jury deliberations in Donald Trump’s New York hush money trial began, Judge Juan Merchan issued 55 pages of jury instructions. They are available online to anyone, except the jury.
The jurors did not even get paper copies of Merchan’s instructions. Jurors were given the option of having the instructions read back to them.
“This is insanity,” Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey said in a post on X. “I’ve tried many jury trials in my day. You give jurors paper instructions every time. How are 12 jurors supposed to remember the elements necessary for each of the 34 felony counts?”
Law professor Jonathan Turley said the trial and jury instruction amounted to a “Manhattan Canned Hunt.”
“The instructions in the case raised concerns that the deliberations could become a legal version of a canned hunt, where the prey is trapped in a cage or fenced in areas to be dispatched. Elements of the instructions are disturbing in reducing what is required to convict the former president,” Turley said.
Writing for The Federalist, John Daniel Davidson noted how Merchan told jurors “they need not agree on what crime Trump allegedly committed to reach a unanimous guilty verdict. You read that right. According to Judge Merchan, the jury could come back with a guilty verdict without agreeing on whether Trump committed election fraud, tax fraud, or falsification of business records. He essentially divided the jury into three groups of four, saying that if they’re split 4-4-4 on what crime Trump committed, he’d treat that as unanimous. To say this is unusual is of course a gross understatement. As Guy Benson noted on X, it amounts to a ‘choose your own adventure’ jury instruction.”
“Couple that with the fact that the judge broke the jury into separate groups for their decision and instructed them that they do not have to agree on counts in order to obtain a conviction,” Mary Rooke noted in an op-ed for The Daily Caller.
“Merchan also omitted facts proving that there was no federal campaign violation, including that the supposed payments and conversations about the money were made in 2017 after Trump was already in the White House,” Rooke continued. It is clear that Merchan is creating a no-win scenario for Trump in which an acquittal is impossible. The left wants the conviction, and Merchan has created a criminal theory out of thin air to give it to them. This isn’t a legitimate legal proceeding. Mao Zedong would be proud of Merchan’s work.”
Regime media including former leftist prosecutor Andrew Weismann, giddy at the real possibility that Trump will be convicted, rushed to defend Merchan’s jury instructions:
Unhumans at it again https://t.co/6BnjIfYNUN
— Jack Poso 🇺🇸 (@JackPosobiec) May 30, 2024
Judge cheered by regime media; Jury instructions called ‘no win scenario’ for Trump; Andrew Weissman giddy added by Editor Two on
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