I guess I just can’t keep the outrage going all the time. Every day, it’s something else to get mad about. Yesterday my husband told me I’m so negative after being on the blogs, and he’s right. I can’t do anything about most of it, including this verdict, and it’s terribly frustrating. I think I need to take a deep breath every now and then and find some peace. I know that being angry solves absolutely nothing, but it feels good momentarily. Not good enough.
I should have just stayed away from this topic last night.
Horrifying. At this point, it might as well be written into our Constitution: “No one shall impede access to the means of fossil fuels production or transport. To do so demands swift and violent government and corporate action.”
An absurd decision that indicates: 1) incompetent prosecution 2) Sovereign citizen sympathizers on jury 3) Hell froze over.
Let’s all hope that the trial in Nevada gets better results. Although a friend pointed out that a jury of peers from Bunkerville would likely have the same bias…this may be a dangerous precedent.
Yeah. Bad goddamn lawyering. I am so irked with the federal prosecutors responsible for this. In the first place they should have held out for a mistrial when that juror was dismissed.
Secondly - do not charge someone with something you have no evidence to support, goddamn it. They killed the whole thing with the conspiracy charge they couldn’t prove. GRRRRRRRRR!!!
The case was tried in Portland. As a federal case, it drew from a state-wide jury pool. Quite a few jurors came from rural or conservative areas of Oregon.
Oregon can expect more crackpots and nutcases with guns coming to their state to terrorize small communities. I guess some people have to learn the hard way.
The double jeopardy protection is limited: an individual cannot be tried for the same crime twice by the same jurisdiction. It’s not double jeopardy to be tried for the same murder (say) by both the state government and the federal government.
If the US Attorney wanted to file charges of criminal trespassing (say), I think that would be constitutional: criminal trespass is a different crime than conspiracy to impede federal officials in pursuit of the duties.
In practice, that would probably not go over well. It would smack of persecution to many people and (I suspect) likely result in an acquittal of a crime the occupiers clearly did commit. I think they’re done in Oregon.
The question now is, what happens in Nevada? I think the Bundy clan is on much thinner ice there.
Fox News is playing up the verdict as if it were a Supreme Court decision: “jury acquits ranchers in major land rights victory for rural America.” This will not end well.
The replacement juror should have been drawn by lot from among all the alternates. I think (but don’t know) that “from Central Oregon” is a misplaced descriptor.
The prosecution team in NV should be able to strike any RWNJs in the jury pool for cause during voir dire.
The trial had to be held in the jurisdiction in which the crime is committed. If the LA dealer was caught holding in Kansas, then that’s where he’s tried. That is the VI Amendment:
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.
He said the plan was to take ownership of the refuge by occupying it for a period of time and then turn it over to local officials to use as they saw fit.
That’s from the testimony of one of the defendants.
There was a plan to take over the refuge from the federal government and turn it over to the locals. What is a conspiracy but a plan made by two or more people to perform an illegal act? And I don’t see that there is any question that they took actions in furtherance of that plan. How is that not committing a conspiracy?
Ammon is also pretty unclear on how ownership of real property is handled in this country. You can squat on it for years, and ownership isn’t transferred.
