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Witness tampering is the act of attempting to improperly influence, alter or prevent the testimony of witnesses within criminal or civil proceedings. Witness tampering and reprisals against witnesses in organized crime cases have been a difficulty faced by prosecutors; witness protection programs were one response to this problem.
Juror misconduct is when the law of the court is violated by a member of the jury while a court case is in progression or after it has reached a verdict. [1] Misconduct can take several forms: Communication by the jury with those outside of the trial/court case. Those on the outside include “witnesses, attorneys, bailiffs, or judges about the ...
Jury instructions are given to the jury by the judge, who usually reads them aloud to the jury. The judge issues a judge's charge to inform the jury how to act in deciding a case. [9] The jury instructions provide something of a flowchart on what verdict jurors should deliver based on what they determine to be true. Put another way, "If you ...
Jury nullification sometimes takes the form of a jury convicting the defendant of lesser charges than the prosecutor sought. [13] In the 21st century, many discussions of jury nullification center around drug laws that many consider unjust either in principle or because they disproportionately affect members of certain groups.
The former West Virginia Governor, William Wallace Barron was convicted of jury tampering in 1971. [10] George Pape, a jury foreman in a 1987 trial of John Gotti, sought out Gotti's underlings, who agreed to pay him $75,000 in exchange for a not guilty vote. Pape was later convicted of jury tampering and sentenced to three years imprisonment. [11]
Florida prosecutors have charged rapper YNW Melly with witness tampering ahead of his retrial on double murder charges even as his attorneys accused them of conspiring to hide evidence that the ...
An innominate jury, also known as an anonymous jury, is a jury whose members are kept anonymous by court order.This may be requested by the prosecution or defense in order to protect the jury from the media, potential jury tampering, or social pressure to return a particular verdict.
Tampering with evidence, or evidence tampering, is an act in which a person alters, conceals, falsifies, or destroys evidence with the intent to interfere with an investigation (usually) by a law-enforcement, governmental, or regulatory authority. [1] It is a criminal offense in many jurisdictions. [2]