Of all the bizarre and biased (against prosecutors) behavior U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III demonstrated in the Paul Manafort trial one decision must be slowing jury deliberations. In a case heavily reliant on documents he would not let jurors see the exhibits of tax records, accounting spreadsheets, loan applications, and other complicated materials as prosecutors questioned witnesses about them.
The judge’s reasoning was that he wanted to move the case along, and the jury could review the documents in deliberation. Imagine jurors with little experience handling such complex records now having to sort through them on their own. Worse yet, imagine some jurors claiming expertise and influencing others.
Ellis rushed presentation of the prosecution case in the name of efficiency, but in doing so who knows how much that prolonged reaching a verdict.
abc news:
[…]
Certainly each passing day gives the defense more reason to hope that at least one juror remains unpersuaded by the government’s case,” former federal prosecutor Robert Mintz told ABC News. “If you are the prosecution, you may be concerned, but you are certainly not yet alarmed.”
Jurors began deliberating last Thursday morning. In the days since, the panel has largely kept to themselves in a secluded room on the ninth floor of the federal district courthouse in Alexandria, Virginia.
Special counsel Robert Mueller and his team of prosecutors secured an 18-count indictment on tax- and bank-fraud charges against Manafort, who faces more than 300 years in prison if found guilty on all counts, though legal experts tell ABC News that a far lesser sentence would be expected.
[…]
“Juries generally take their responsibilities very seriously and complicated, document intensive cases like this often require time to review and consider all of the evidence,” Mintz told ABC News. “The real question both teams of lawyers are asking themselves is whether this delay is a function of true disagreements brewing inside the jury room or merely a result of a diligent jury simply doing its job.”
Prosecutors entered 388 exhibits into evidence for the jury to review – with one exhibit alone totaling more than 700 pages. A careful consideration of these documents may understandably prolong any timeline for reaching a verdict. Jurors asked the judge of they could have a guide of which exhibits were tied to each charge, but Ellis declined.
Deliberations are expected to continue until the jury advises the court that they have reached a verdict, have a question for the judge, or are hopelessly deadlocked.
If the jury says they are unable to reach a verdict, that does not necessarily mean their deliberations are over.
“Even then, the Judge is permitted to give what is called an Allen charge (based on a US Supreme Court case Allen v U.S. from 1896) in which the judge urges jurors to continue to deliberate and try to reach a unanimous verdict,” Mintz told ABC News.
[…continues…]
wonder in what order the jury is proceeding. by the numbers starting off with 1st charge and working their way laboriously thru all 18 or getting the easy slam dunks out of the way first and addressing the head scratchers last?
and are those instructions really helping or causing more confusion, more time consuming argument?
meanwhile, they’re baaaack
the guardian:
Russian hackers targeting conservative US thinktanks, Microsoft says
Firm claims Kremlin-linked group created fake websites for Senate and thinktanks
The Russian group linked to the hacking of Hillary Clinton’s presidential election campaign has been launching fresh attacks in the US, including against two conservative thinktanks, in the run-up to the midterm elections.
According to Microsoft, which uncovered the new attempts, the hackers created fake websites that appeared to mimic the Hudson Institute and the International Republican Institute, two rightwing thinktanks broadly allied against Donald Trump. Three other fake domains were designed to look as if they belonged to the Senate.
Microsoft attributed the hacking attacks to a group that it calls Strontium, which is known to other security firms as Fancy Bear and APT28. The group was previously linked to the email hacking of the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton campaign. According to the US special counsel Robert Mueller, Fancy Bear has ties to the Russian intelligence agency, the GRU.
Brad Smith, Microsoft’s president, said: “We’re concerned that these and other attempts pose security threats to a broadening array of groups connected with both American political parties in the run-up to the 2018 elections.”
He said the company had shut down 84 fake websites associated with Fancy Bear over the past two years by obtaining court orders to transfer control of the domains. As to where responsibility for the hacking attacks lay, Smith said: “We have no doubt in our minds.”
According to the information shared by Microsoft, the fake websites were intended to mimic the company’s login pages for tools such as email, calendar and document sharing, with web addresses such as “hudsonorg-my-sharepoint.com” and “adfs-senate.email”. An inattentive user who was tricked by such a site may have entered their username and password, allowing an attacker to access their personal data remotely.
The revelation of the new attacks came just weeks after a similar Microsoft discovery led the senator Claire McCaskill, a Missouri Democrat who is running for re-election, to reveal that Russian hackers tried unsuccessfully to infiltrate her Senate computer network.
The hacking attempts mirror similar Russian attacks before the 2016 presidential election, which US intelligence officials have said were focused on helping to get the Republican candidate, Donald Trump, into office by hurting Clinton, his Democratic opponent.
The most recent activity, rather than helping one political party over another, was “most fundamentally focused on disrupting democracy”, Smith said in an interview this week.
He said there was no sign the hackers were successful in persuading anyone to click on the fake websites, which could have exposed a target victim to computer infiltration, hidden surveillance and data theft. Both conservative thinktanks said they had tried to be vigilant about “spear-phishing” email attacks because their pro-democracy work had frequently drawn the ire of authoritarian governments.
“We’re glad that our work is attracting the attention of bad actors,” the Hudson Institute spokesman David Tell said. “It means we’re having an effect, presumably.”
The International Republican Institute is led by a board that includes six Republican senators and the prominent Russia critic and Senate hopeful Mitt Romney, who is running for a Utah seat.
new book review in the guardian:Â Â Everything Trump Touches Dies review: a poison dart in the neck of the Republican monster
Political consultant Rick Wilson is horrified by what his party has done – and his book is much more than a brutally enjoyable roasting of those responsible
*
Ping, if you’re doing drive by reading, inflation adjusted wages dropped almost 1% over the past year. And the top 10% have been the beneficiaries  of most of the “gains”. And the top 10% is not average Americans. So is it grape or cherry you’re drinking?
l’m sorry. But bullshit is bullshit and Ping lays it down. Support your bs with links to research that supports it if you’d be so kind.
“Support your bs with links to research that supports it if you’d be so kind.”
pogo, a big amen to that – whether from the right, left or the center (if it still exists);
you must admit, tho’, ping does sport a nifty avatar.
reuters:
The following statements were posted to the verified personal Twitter account of U.S. President Donald Trump (@realDonaldTrump)
The opinions expressed are his own. Reuters has not edited the statements or confirmed their accuracy.
@realDonaldTrump :
– A Blue Wave means Crime and Open Borders. A Red Wave means Safety and Strength! [0638 EDT]
– Even James Clapper has admonished John Brennan for having gone totally off the rails. Maybe Clapper is being nice to me so he doesn’t lose his Security Clearance for lying to Congress! [0655 EDT]
— Source link: (bit.ly/2jBh4LU)
Blame it on someone else! Don’t take responsibility seems to be a growing standard.
The first error are the Sloppy Federal Prosecutors to not properly layout the evidence in a manner appropriate for the persona of the jury. Put the blame where it belongs on the fundamental failure of the government. Second error, And Paul Manafort is most likely guilty and this case should have been handed to the appropriate prosecutors is the second failure. The special counsels decision to squeeze Paul Manafort in a crazed attempt created a circus. A circus where the special counsel was trying to link this to POTUS.
There is NO LINK and the Judge was correct to shut this down, This threw off the prosecutors and put them into a tizzy.
Shame on the Special Counsel
Hello Pogo,
Very good points and mostly no disagreement on the individual metrics. However many more people are employed and the total payroll is growing. The key test must be measured on a longer period to create a valid trend.
Healthcare trends are longer and much more challenging to impact. There are new lower cost policy’s on the way and it least they are honest as to the coverage they provide. But the key is to continue the innovation in healthcare to lower the true cost of care. The focus must shift to the providers and away from payers.
And Patd – Love my German Das Brot avatar….
Craig – hope all is well with you..
how true this…
I have a question for the legal minds. Â Assuming that Manafort gets found guilty on at least one count and say it happens today. Â And tomorrow, trump issues him a pardon. Â His acceptance of said pardon means an admission of guilt. Â Can that admission be used against him in his upcoming state proceedings?
It’s only recently that I’ve seen people in the supermarkets visibly irritated by the upward tick in shelf prices of staples relative to their incomes. This is where the politics takes over–who is responsible for the upticks? The terrible Canadians and Chinese, for sure; or, without a doubt, SFB.
BTW Ping… Â Manafort was hired by trump to be his campaign manager. Â His personal lawyer and fixer, Michael Cohen is now being investigated for bank fraud. Â His former national security adviser, Michael Flynn has already pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI. Whatever happened to trump’s claim of hiring only the best people? Â Does this mean that trump’s “best people” are mostly criminals.
Ping, the lead prosecutor Greg Andres put 75 members of the Bonanno crime family in jail, including one convicted of a plot to kill him. Doubt they would call him sloppy.
Ping must be very wealthy and benefitting from the rich people’s tax cuts
and clearly has his head up Fox/IMPOTUS butt
If you practice law as a trial attorney you know how critical it is to have every exhibit explained to the jurors. That’s particularly true for financial and technical documents. Leaving the jury with the task of figuring out the relevance of documents is nothing but a source of manufactured error.
Oh, and if my 401k hadn’t experienced a 40% “correction” 9 years ago I might look at it to feel like the 2% reduction in my net paycheck (not inflation adjusted) wasn’t a problem.
could be a big news day: Manafort jury almost done, deadlocked on only one of the 18 counts, and Cohen plea deal could be announced this afternoon
yep Pogo, if there are guilty verdicts in this case it’ll be despite judge’s inexcusable efforts to destroy prosecution case
Hey Craig… Pogo…
would one of you please answer my 9:16 question…  I’d really like to know if Manafort would be effing  himself if he accepts a pardon from trump.
craig, not too sure that the jury meant they were only stuck on one count. the way the note is written could be interpreted that they cannot come to consensus on any of the counts. remember it has to be unanimous on each count so one pro-twit could be a purposeful hold out on each of the 18 and hang the whole thing
wapo:
[…]
Around 11 a.m. of the panel’s fourth day of deliberations, a note with a question came from the jury foreman, asking how jurors should fill out the verdict form “if we cannot come to a consensus on a single count,” said U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III. The jury also asked what that would mean for the final verdict, Ellis said.
Though the meaning of the note wasn’t entirely clear from its wording, the judge apparently took the panel’s note to mean that they are stuck on a single count, not all of them.
Ellis said the note was “not an exceptional or unusual event in a jury trial,” and he distributed to the lawyers an instruction he proposed giving to jurors.
[…continues…]
renee, if there’s a pardon, it will probably cover all the crimes Manafort ever committed or even thought to commit or will commit in the future. you know how the twit loves to do things in a yuuuuge way.
Actually, Pings numbers are pretty much spot on, But like usual he forgets to say “thank you Obama”
lol we are riding the crest of the Obama recovery/ bull market, most likely near the top. What has become obvious is that most companies are clueless what to do with their tax windfall. So they are buying back their stock supporting the price and protecting their bonuses and options.
Ping’s post last night made me go look at my investments and the annual returns. My portfolio averaged 10.7% return from 2010 to the end of 2017. Â It makes me feel like an investment genius.
This year started off good then lost all it’s gains and now with all the stock buy backs is returning a nice 6.7%. Not as good as the previous 2 years of 17 %and 19 % but I’ll take it.
So has this recovery/market reached the top? given its age the answer is probably close. Given that and Trump’s tariff threats, I decided it would be a good time to sell some stock and buy me a new pickup, there is a good chance the pickup will be a better investment.
Jack
Wages are stagnant, prices of almost everything have increased. Â Folks might not FEEL much impact of seeing their paychecks a tiny bit bigger.
BETO! Â I saw 6 signs in a really nice neighborhood & a few in my neighborhood.
So far, not a single sign for Tedious. Â And I do recall the local news interviewing Republican voters during the primary who said they liked Kasich, but that they were voting for Trumpsky because they hated Tedious.
RR, very creative question, much like some of the tricky professors I had. My first thought on your question is that Double Jeopardy could kick in if he’s been tried and pardoned, couldn’t be tried again, even in state court. Also, I don’t think accepting a pardon would impose any burden on the recipient, such as a presumption of a guilty admission. But I defer to Senior Counsel Pogo for a definitive response.
Agree with Poobah. There’s no downside to accepting a pardon
PatD, if the jury is moving through the counts in order, they appear to have quickly decided the first group of counts, which were tax fraud, because their questions at the end of first day related to the second batch, on foreign reporting etc. Now they might be deadlocked on one of the bank fraud counts, the last group and the weakest charges I’ve always thought. Anyway, my hunch is they’ve at least nailed Manafort for tax fraud.
ABC reporting Cohen has reached plea deal on campaign finance violations, bank fraud and tax evasion.
!!!
🙂
Mueller should have gotten everything Cohen  has before entering into a deal. IMPOTUS will rush to pardon him – he knows where the bodies are buried and if he’s pleading to campaign finance violations it comes back to IMPOTUS.
yep Pogo, and I’d argue that if the campaign violations are potentially impeachable Trump can’t pardon him, there’s no pardon power in “Cases of Impeachment”
RR,
Not being a legal mind, i’d venture that accepting a pardon isn’t an admission of guilt, certainly not as much as entering a guilty plea.  If you received a pardon for a crime you knew you didn’t commit, do you feel you’d be incriminating yourself?
That said, Trump has incriminated HIMSELF at least 4 times on twitter, and Guiliani has incriminated Trump at least twice on cable news, so…
…time’s running out, though, and the Republican fascists strengthen their chokehold on our democratic institutions by the day.  If the prospect of our criminal President facing justice is predicated solely on the Democratic party gaining a House majority, God help us all, as complicit Congressional Republicans have demonstrated they value unfettered power over justice and integrity.
Hey Ping!
Have we seen you in the crowd of any of those fun Trump rallies in Florida? Â Did you yell any good zingers at Jim Acosta?
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