Remember how the corruption conviction of HealthSouth's Richard Scrushy and former Alabama governor Richard Siegelman was called into question when it looked like the jurors were researching the case on line and E-mailing their findings to each other? Sure you do; I wrote about it here, a year ago tomorrow. One of the E-mails went:
....judge really helping w/jurors...
still having difficulties with #30
...any ideas???
keep pushing on ur side
did not understand ur thoughts on statute
but received links.
This is the rat, that ate the malt . . .
Or I should say "purportedly went," because the government is now saying that the E-mails are fakes. Or I should say "now saying they previously determined the E-mails were fakes," because -- man, this is complicated. Even tracking the cast of characters is complicated, long before you get to the substance of this story. Listen to the Birmingham News try to explain it:
According to the new information from the Justice Department, at least five co-workers of the two jurors in question received in the mail from unknown sources paper copies of what appeared to be e-mails between the jurors. Those co-workers notified the two jurors, who then notified the Marshals Service. The Marshals Service notified the lead prosecutor in the case, who asked the postal inspector to determine who mailed the copies to the jurors' co-workers. The prosecutor then transferred oversight of the e-mail investigation to another lawyer in his office not involved in the Siegelman-Scrushy prosecution.
Who lived in the house that Jack built. Wait, that's not it. What I mean is that the postal inspector decided last spring that the E-mails were fakes, and told the trial judge at the time, but no one told defense counsel until now. The Birmingham News again:
An investigation by a postal inspector found the e-mails purportedly exchanged by jurors during former Gov. Don Siegelman's 2006 criminal trial were forged, but the results of that investigation were shared with the judge and not the defense attorneys, according to the U.S. Justice Department.
In a letter to the defense team earlier this month, a top official in the appellate division of the Justice Department disclosed that a representative of the U.S. Marshals Service told the judge about the postal inspectors' findings in April 2007, a time when the prosecution and defense were arguing over whether the e-mails improperly influenced jury deliberations and warranted a retrial.
The Justice Department on July 8 sent the new information to the attorneys for Siegelman and co-defendant Richard Scrushy "out of an abundance of caution" and said it did not change the government's opinion that a new trial was unnecessary, according to the agency's letter.
Now the late disclosure itself is a defense argument, and the case goes on. In particular, Siegelman, a Democrat, claims the whole prosecution was politically motivated. TalkLeft is covering that aspect of things, for example this post today.
(Photo of a very cute rat by Phil at http://www.flickr.com/photos/asplosh/544454437/; license details there.)
