All posts tagged "Juror"

Pro-Donald Trump corners of social media are already running wild with a new development in former President Donald Trump's criminal conviction in Manhattan, proclaiming this is the end of the verdict and it will be thrown out.

This comes after Judge Juan Merchan revealed that a reply to a Facebook post on the New York state court system page purported to be from a cousin of a juror and to have knowledge Trump would be convicted. If a juror did actually reveal verdict information to an outside person before it was handed down, it would pose a serious problem for the case on appeal.

But it is unclear whether this is actually a problem for the verdict, according to some legal experts, given that there's no public evidence the Facebook poster in question is actually related to a juror and actually knew the outcome beforehand, and the time stamp doesn't even definitively confirm the post dropped before the jury reached their decision. At least some reporters strongly suspect the whole thing is fake....

A new notice put out by New York Judge Juan Merchan notified both the Manhattan District Attorney's Office and former President Donald Trump's legal team about a post on the Facebook page from the New York court system, which purported to be from the cousin of a juror with knowledge of the verdict.

The comment in question came from a user identified as "Michael Anderson" around the same time Trump was convicted on 34 felony charges.

"My cousin is a juror and says Trump is getting convicted; Thank you folks for all your hard work!!!!" said the comment, which, according to Merchan, "responded to a routine UCS notice, posted on May 29, 2024, regarding oral arguments in the Fourth Department of the Appellate Division unrelated to this proceeding."...

With former President Donald Trump convicted on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records this week, his furious supporters are trying to expose the identities of the people who did it.

According to NBC News, "Advance Democracy, a non-profit that conducts public interest research, said there has been a high volume of social media posts containing violent rhetoric targeting New York Judge Juan Merchan and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, including a post with Bragg’s purported home address. The group also found posts of the purported addresses of jurors on a fringe internet message board known for pro-Trump content and harassing and violent posts, although it is unclear if any actual jurors had been correctly identified."

One user reportedly posted, "Dox the Jurors. Dox them now." Another wrote, “We need to identify each juror. Then make them miserable. Maybe even suicidal.”...

Despite his bluster about the process itself, former President — and now convicted felon —Donald Trump secretly confided to advisors that one juror in his Manhattan criminal trial would come to his rescue.

After he was found guilty on all 34 felony counts, Rolling Stone reported Thursday that Trump's hopes of a man on the jury he reportedly referred to as "my juror" were evidently dashed. Reporters Adam Rawnsley and Asawin Suebsaeng wrote that Trump had his eye on one male juror in particular whose body language he interpreted as friendlier than the rest.

"Body language from the juror throughout the trial, studied closed by the former president’s counselors, led some to believe that the juror was warming to the defense’s views," Rawlings and Suebsaeng wrote. "The warm smiles and tics, they hoped, suggested that there could be a hung jury that would help Trump evade conviction."...

The jury appears to be homing in on the "conspiracy" elements of the Manhattan criminal hush money case, said former federal prosecutor David Kelley on MSNBC Wednesday — and that's a disturbing sign for former President Donald Trump.

This comes after the jury asked Judge Juan Merchan for a refresher on testimony from David Pecker and Michael Cohen, former Trump associates who formed key parts of the prosecution's case.

"So, it might sound worse for Trump, better for the prosecution, because they're now going to hear it back and know that Hope Hicks and Trump's personal secretary and, yes, Cohen, whatever you think of him, a lot of other people added to Pecker's testimony," said anchor Ari Melber, himself an attorney. "I never heard — and again, I try to cover this as fairly as I can — I never heard anyone really undercut his core points. Here's what he said about his consciousness of all of this. Even while he's doing it, the defense is saying, it happens all the time. Pecker, whose direct testimony says, he told his own 'Enquirer' leadership, he told them, we're going to try and help the campaign. We're going to keep it as quiet as possible. I want it confidential. Is that bad?"...

The prosecution team may need to be wary of Juror No. 2.

Described as a married investment banker with a Master's degree is one thing. But the fact that he's read Trump’s bestselling book, "The Art of the Deal," and claims to track Trump's Truth Social posts — is another, according to one expert.

Elliot Williams, a former deputy assistant attorney general at the DOJ, flagged this particular juror as a potential concern for Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg to prove his case to a jury of former President Donald Trump's Manhattan peers. ...