Just when the day's news on jury trials is starting to seem like one depressing story after another, along comes a great trial. A trial whose substantive lessons are broadly relevant. A trial with a compelling story, rich with politics and rage. A trial whose facts are almost endlessly joke-worthy.
It's the Colorado dog poop trial, which began and ended this week.
Our story begins
I've never been able to tell dog poop jokes well, so I'll just tell this straight, resisting considerable temptation along the way. The defendant was Kathleen Ensz, a retired French professor in Greeley, Colorado. Apparently she had been trying for some time to get her Congresswoman, Marilyn Musgrave, to stop sending her campaign literature. In May of last year, Prof. Ensz says she got one leaflet too many, and she took action. She scooped some dog poop from her back yard, put it in the leaflet, and left it in the vestibule of Rep. Musgrave's local office.
Prof. Ensz was charged with a misdemeanor called "Criminal Use of a Noxious Substance." "She thought she was expressing her freedom of speech," the deputy district attorney told the Greeley Tribune, but "[a]t the same time she made that message, she committed a crime." No she didn't, said the jury, which acquitted Prof. Ensz at day's end Wednesday.
News you can use
You wouldn't think a dog poop case could teach you much about other kinds of trials, but it can. Consider these topics from the Greeley Tribune's article on the seven-hour jury selection:
- Voir dire questions in political cases. The jurors got a short questionnaire (I'm trying to get a copy), asking good questions about their political attitudes. Remember, if you ask directly about jurors' attitudes, the answers may or may not be helpful; but if you ask about the behaviors that flow from those attitudes, you're bound to learn something. The Ensz questionnaire followed that wisdom, asking if jurors "had written any letters or posted online comments about [Musgrove's] campaign," and "whether they have donated any money or put up campaign signs for the 4th District in the past eight years."
- Voir dire questions about icky things. The Tribune article ends with a list of "Synonyms used for dog excrement in court Tuesday:" Feces, Doodoo, Doggie doo, Poop, Dog crap. Clearly the lawyers struggled with a tough issue. There are words some people don't like to hear, and if you're the one who speaks the word, you're the one they'll dislike for it. If your trial requires you to say unpleasant words, you need to think about what words you'll use and how you'll carry it off without appearing coarse, on the one hand, or squirmingly apologetic, on the other.
- Do I smell jury nullification? (Darn. I really thought I could do it.) As I write this, there are no interviews yet with the jurors who acquitted Prof. Ensz, but even before the voir dire was over, at least one dismissed citizen was telling the Tribune that the trial was a waste of time. "'I just think it's a waste of taxpayer money,' [the potential juror] said in the hallway afterward. 'This is something that kids do as a prank. This is not something I see as worth getting 50 people out of work, four expensive lawyers ... I'm sure it was an imposition, but come on. Get a janitor with a poop scoop and spray the air.'" (True nullification seems unlikely, since a jury who agreed with this view could have found that the required "intent to interfere with another's use or enjoyment of the . . . building" was missing. But it's a bad sign for the prosecution to have made such a poor impression so early.)
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Political note: It's awkward that Prof. Ensz's trial came on the same day Monica Goodling was testifying before the House Judiciary Committee on the U.S. Attorney firing scandal. The elected district attorney responsible for the case against Prof. Ensz is also, according to the Tribune, Rep. Musgrave's campaign chairman. The defense has suggested the prosecution was politically motivated.
Update: It looks like the Greeley Tribune has taken down their voir dire article. Checking on it.
(Photo by dro!d at http://www.flickr.com/photos/lecates/423460439/; license details there.)
