There's also a possibility, however remote, that the judge could set aside a guilty verdict and either aquit the defendant or order a new trial.

I wouldn't count too much on this, though.

Tony Franklins Other Shoe said:

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eric76 said:

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Let's hope that the jury is allowed by the court to see all the evidence and that the members of the jury have enough integrity to consider the evidence in an honest manner.

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Sadly, that is a pretty big request based on the pressure of the situation and the fact they will potentially fear for their lives later if they do evaluate in an honest manner.

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I have been always skeptical of Cahill's downplaying the real risk of sequester during the trial and not just during deliberations. All trials have their good days and bad days, depending on one's POV. If Nelson lives up to his reputation, some state witnesses will get bloodied up pretty well during cross. Gaping holes in the medical evidence and when the jury hears all of the exculpatory evidence from the body-cam evidence, that the officers' repeatedly expressed concern for his well-being, called EMS twice for assistance and that the dispatcher sent that assistance to the wrong address, delaying their arrival?

Where is the intent? Where is the "depraved mind"??

But if the jury is not sequestered, their identities will be be discovered by malefactors (and quickly in my assessment) and will be doxed and their families threatened. The ONLY business being conducted in that courthouse is this trial. Won't be too hard to figure out who the jurors are when they drive and out everyday.

eric76 said:

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There's also a possibility, however remote, that the judge could set aside a guilty verdict and either aquit the defendant or order a new trial.

I wouldn't count too much on this, though.

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I'd fear for his safety big time. This won't happen

Fore Left! said:

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eric76 said:

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There's also a possibility, however remote, that the judge could set aside a guilty verdict and either aquit the defendant or order a new trial.

I wouldn't count too much on this, though.

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I'd fear for his safety big time. This won't happen

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I guess a directed verdict is too much to ask for, too?

eric76 said:

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There's also a possibility, however remote, that the judge could set aside a guilty verdict and either aquit the defendant or order a new trial.

I wouldn't count too much on this, though.

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Welllll, not so fast. Cahill has struck me as a pretty fair judge who is a stickler on the law, thus far.

The trick here will be the jury instructions. Yes they are promulgated and uniform but it is the trial court's determination of whether sufficient evidence has been adduced at trial to warrant whether a certain instruction should even be given to the jury before they are charged.

This will be where the state court of appeals mandate on the third degree murder charge being reinstated come into play. Will he charge the jury on third degree murder (depraved mind element) or not?

aggiehawg said:

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eric76 said:

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There's also a possibility, however remote, that the judge could set aside a guilty verdict and either aquit the defendant or order a new trial.

I wouldn't count too much on this, though.

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Welllll, not so fast. Cahill has struck me as a pretty fair judge who is a stickler on the law, thus far.

The trick here will be the jury instructions. Yes they are promulgated and uniform but it is the trial court's determination of whether sufficient evidence has been adduced at trial to warrant whether a certain instruction should even be given to the jury before they are charged.

This will be where the state court of appeals mandate on the third degree murder charge being reinstated come into play. Will he charge the jury on third degree murder (depraved mind element) or not?

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So the judge can kind of lead them in the right direction so as to allow and encourage the jury to come to the proper decision?

That sounds good.

eric76 said:

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There's also a possibility, however remote, that the judge could set aside a guilty verdict and either aquit the defendant or order a new trial.

I wouldn't count too much on this, though.

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The type of individual who would put himself and his family at that type of risk just for the sake of principle is exceedingly rare. Everyone likes to think they would, but almost none of us actually would. And frankly, as a husband and father, I would see it as a violation of my most important priority.

No matter how unjust, I'm not putting my family's safety on the line for Derek Chauvin. If that makes me a lesser person than so be it.

eric76 said:

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aggiehawg said:

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eric76 said:

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There's also a possibility, however remote, that the judge could set aside a guilty verdict and either aquit the defendant or order a new trial.

I wouldn't count too much on this, though.

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Welllll, not so fast. Cahill has struck me as a pretty fair judge who is a stickler on the law, thus far.

The trick here will be the jury instructions. Yes they are promulgated and uniform but it is the trial court's determination of whether sufficient evidence has been adduced at trial to warrant whether a certain instruction should even be given to the jury before they are charged.

This will be where the state court of appeals mandate on the third degree murder charge being reinstated come into play. Will he charge the jury on third degree murder (depraved mind element) or not?

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So the judge can kind of l ead them in the right direction so as to allow and encourage the jury to come to the proper decision?

That sounds good.

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Not exactly. Whether to give or withhold a jury instruction in any given case can be the grounds for reversible error. Judges tread lightly especially when already scolded by the state court of appeals. And that came pretty much out of the blue for Cahill.

The case law in Minnesota on third degree murder clearly excluded such a charge in the Chauvin case and Cahill rightly dismissed that charge last fast. Then more appeals in a completely unrelated and factually distinguishable case Noor* case reversed that long settled case law. The Noor decision is before the state supreme court in June to settle the issue but Cahill has to plow ahead with such uncertainty, i.e. fly by the seat of his pants.

*Noor case was the cop in a squad car responding to a 911 call of a possible sexual assault in an alley at night. The woman who had made the 911 call approached the squad car in the dark and Noor shot her from inside the squad car and across the body of his partner sitting next to him. I'm pretty sure the police training manual doesn't include the discharge of a weapon from inside a squad car, across the body of a fellow officer. Probably can discharge a weapon across the body of a civilian either, unless there is patent and direct threa to either.

Infection_Ag11 said:

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eric76 said:

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There's also a possibility, however remote, that the judge could set aside a guilty verdict and either aquit the defendant or order a new trial.

I wouldn't count too much on this, though.

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The type of individual who would put himself and his family at that type of risk just for the sake of principle is exceedingly rare. Everyone likes to think they would, but almost none of us actually would. And frankly, as a husband and father, I would see it as a violation of my most important priority.

No matter how unjust, I'm not putting my family's safety on the line for Derek Chauvin. If that makes me a lesser person than so be it.

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I watched the entire voir dire. At first Judge Cahill was waffling about when a juror said, "I think I can be objective," and as the voir dire wore on he allowed defense counsel to press further and demand they answer if they really could and would swear under oath that they will.

Seems subtle but it isn't. There are some distinctly poison pill jurors who were seated on the jury early on because Cahill was wishy-washy on that and Nelson didn't press harder against it. (He made his record for appeal, FTR but could have hammered harder on that, IMO.)

You have to be sure that there are 100s of people hanging around that courthouse ready to do just that. I don't see any way around it. These people are sick and twisted and would see that as a victory. Then the SJW keyboard mob will kick in.

Forgive me if this has been discussed but the article below states that George Floyd attended Texas A&M for a year, presumably on a basketball scholarship. Is this true?

https://www.foxnews.com/us/george-floyd-what-to-know

A&M Kingsville

Yes. While his kids he never saw lived in Bryan, he attended A&M Kingsville