By guest columnist Don Siegelman The prosecution of Derek Chauvin is an anomaly in American jurisprudence. The use of excessive force by police resulting in the death of black citizens, tragically, is not unusual; yet holding police accountable is. How did our legal system get to this point? First, because grand juries are a secret proceeding, prosecutors have free reign; there’s no judge or a lawyer present representing the victim’s family. Secondly, in 1976, the United States Supreme Court, in the Imbler v Pachman case, gave immunity to prosecutors to achieve convictions virtually by any means necessary. As a result, prosecutors cannot be held civilly liable even when knowingly and willfully presenting false evidence or false testimony or withholding exculpatory evidence to indictment or convict the innocent or to let the guilty walk free. On January 4, 2010, while President Biden was Vice President, the U. S. Solicitor General argued to the U. S. Supreme Court, in McGhee v Pottawattamie County Iowa (2010), that “U.S. citizens do not have a constitutional right not to be framed.” President Biden should repudiate that proclamation. No United States citizen should be framed by its government. President Biden, through an executive order, can provide a measure of justice for Black victims of the use of excessive force by police, first, by ensuring that families of victims have a lawyer present in the grand jury. The President should also direct the U.S. Attorney General to inform all federal agents and prosecutors that while, at present, they may not be held civilly liable for presenting false evidence or testimony or withholding exculpatory evidence, nevertheless, if they are found to have done so, they will be fired. Moreover, he should ask the U.S. Attorney General: 1. To ensure all interviews of witnesses and targets be recorded and those recordings along with any “body cam” video be turned over to a lawyer representing the family of a victim of the use of excessive force by police. 2. Because the grand jury is a critical stage of a criminal proceeding, the victim’s family should have the right to have a lawyer present in the grand jury as a check on truth. 3. The family’s lawyer should be able to voir dire, to question potential grand jurors to ensure fairness, just as is done in all civil or criminal jury trials. Currently no one insures that grand jurors are racially balanced or that grand jurors are neutral in their feelings toward the people that they are to consider charging with a crime. 4. Furthermore, the victim’s lawyer should be enabled to object to evidence or proposed testimony by the government and offer evidence or testimony for the victim. Such issues would be decided by a judge, the same as in a civil deposition. If this due process safeguard is important where monetary damages are at stake in a civil proceeding, surely this due process safeguard should be in place where someone’s life is an issue. Such an executive order would strengthen faith in our judicial system and help deter the use excessive force by police. (Don Siegelman is the only person to hold all four Alabama statewide elective offices: Secretary of State (1979-1987), Attorney General (1987-1991), Lieutenant Governor (1995-1999), Governor (1999-2003). |
Former Alabama governor, victim of GOP grand jury manipulation, shares his views on grand jury system
April 13, 2021 by tomaswell
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