Time: Libby Trial: Anti-Bush Jurors Excluded

[Kadie]

Libby Trial: Anti-Bush Jurors Excluded

Tuesday, Jan. 16, 2007 By AP/MICHAEL J. SNIFFEN Article ToolsPrintEmail WASHINGTON -- Two potential jurors who expressed negative views of Bush administration officials were dismissed on the opening day of the perjury trial of former White House aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby.

The start of jury selection in the CIA leak case provided a potentially crucial victory for Libby's defense lawyers. They were allowed to ask potential jurors in detail about their opinions of the Bush administration, Vice President Dick Cheney, a group of high-profile reporters and whether the administration had lied to push the country into war with Iraq. The defense faces a key challenge in picking a jury for this highly political case in a city where registered Democrats outnumber Republicans more than 9-to-1. Cheney is expected to be a defense witness.

Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald objected repeatedly, but to no avail, that Libby's lawyers were going beyond the more general opinion questions that U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton asked the entire jury pool when the proceedings began Tuesday morning.

Fitzgerald complained that defense attorneys Theodore Wells and William Jeffress were turning jury selection into "an open-ended Rorschach test into how you feel about the Bush administration, Vice President Cheney" the Iraq war and various reporters. "They're trying the case" in jury selection, he argued.

But Walton ruled the defense lawyers have a right to know if "somebody has a very negative attitude to the Bush administration."

more...
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1579421,00.html

[Kerrytravelers]

1. With such a low approval rating, they'd be hard pressed to find 12 people in one rom who do like *.

[Kagemusha]

2. It'll be slow but hardly impossible.

I've read estimates jury selection will last until Thursday.

[Kerrytravelers]

5. I'm sure, at some point, the trial will have to begin.

:rofl:

[murielm99]

6. How many challenges does each side get? nt

[Kadie]

9. I found this in the article...

snip...

Six jurors were qualified to serve on the jury, which is expected to have 12 members and four alternates. Once the number of qualified jurors reaches 37, the judge will allow lawyers to exercise their peremptory strikes (12 for the defense and eight for the prosecution) to send jurors home. Walton said the trial should last four to six weeks.


it may take awhile to get to that first 37. :shrug:

[Kerrytravelers]

10. !!!! 37 !!!! I doubt they'll find 12 !!!!

Well, ok, there are at least 37 misguided idiots on the planet. Now, what are the chances they'll finally all be herded into the same room?

:sarcasm:

[Mind_your_head]

3. On the positive side, there will probably be twelve more people on the

planet who, after hearing all of the evidence, will not like AT ALL what the * administration has done/perpetrated.

They're about to get an 'edjamacation', as it were....

[Patsy Stone]

4. This is gonna take forEVer.

Is this woman a DUer? If not, get her a login PRONTO:

"By comparison, one young woman swiftly sealed her own disposition by announcing right off the bat that she was 'completely without objectivity' and 'there is nothing they could say or do that would make me think anything positive about them.'"

[B Calm]

7. I guess they'll have to move the trial to San Francisco....

[mmonk]

8. Fitz needs to throw out anyone

who watches false news and listens to hate radio.