Date: Thu, 10 Mar 1994 23:05:11 -0600 (CST) From: "William W. Hughes" <[w--g--s] at [lonestar.utsa.edu]> Subject: Branch Davidian Trial Update - SPECIAL EDITION - Thurs., 10 Mar 94 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Content-Length: 7115 Branch Davidian Trial Update - SPECIAL EDITION - Thurs., 10 Mar 94 [transcript] Page 1A BRANCH DAVIDIAN JUDGE RESTORES GUN CONVICTIONS Change affects 2 defendants thought cleared on all charges By Diana R. Fuentes Chief, Express-News Austin Bureau AUSTIN -- U.S. District Judge Walter S. Smith Jr. reinstated weap- ons convictions Wednesday of seven defendants in the Branch David- ian case, keeping in jail a woman who thought she had been cleared of all charges. Austin attorney Joe Turner, who represents Branch Davidian Ruth Riddle of Canada, said his client was "devastated" by the news. "I just finished talking to her on the phone, and she was on the verge of tears," Turner said. "She can't believe it. She was ready to go back to Canada, to try to resume her life after it's been pretty much devastated, and now she's looking at going to the penitentiary. "It hurts me as much as it hurts her ... and I don't have to do the time," he said. Turner said he planned to appeal the judge's decision. On Feb. 26, after a seven-week trial, a jury acquitted all 11 defendants on charges of conspiracy to murder federal agents, and aiding and abetting the murder of agents, but found five of them guilty of a lesser charge of involuntary manslaughter. Jurors also found those five, plus two others -- Riddle and Graeme Craddock of Australia -- guilty of possessing a weapon while committing a violent crime, which had been defined as the conspira- cy. At the time, Smith said the jury couldn't convict defendants of carrying a weapon while committing a crime if the jury found they hadn't committed the crime. He said in open court the verdicts would have to be set aside. But in his order issued Wednesday in Waco, Smith cited case law that allows inconsistent verdicts, and he ruled that the seven defendants are guilty of the possession charge, as decided by the jury. "The defendants are given the benefit of their acquittals on Count One (conspiracy), and it is neither irrational nor illogical to require them to accept the burden of conviction on Count Three (weapons possession)," Smith wrote. Legal briefs filed by Turner and attorneys for the other defendants argue, among other points, that once the judge announced his intention to set aside the verdicts and prosecutors agreed to it, the matter was settled. "Our argument was that once the prosecutors agreed to it, the prosecutors waived it and jeopardy attached," Turner said, refer- ring to the law that forbids "double jeopardy" -- that is, making a person go through more than one trial on the same alleged offense after a verdict has been issued on the offense. Smith's order states that he grants the prosecutors' motion to "reinstate jury's guilty verdicts on Count Three" and goes on to say he "never expressly set aside" those verdicts. Turner argued: "How do you reinstate something unless you set it aside previously?" In talking to defense attorneys at the time verdicts were issued, Smith said there was no need to ask the jury to reconsider the verdicts on Count Three. He said in open court: "So that portion of the verdict simply cannot stand, there seemed to be no point in asking the jury to retire and reconsider it because the only decision they would have made was to change that finding to not guilty. So the court will set that finding aside." Smith said in his order Wednesday that he "did not intend to set the verdict on Count Three aside at that time" and that before he could issue his order setting aside the verdicts, prosecutors filed a motion "unequivocally demonstrating the error of this court's prior reasoning." In the 11-page order, Smith wrote: "It is quite possible that the jury, convinced of the defendant's guilt, properly reached its conclusion on Count Three, and then through mistake, compromise or lenity, arrived at an inconsistent conclusion on Count One." Turner said he has talked to one of the jurors who indicated that was not the case. "She (the juror) told me she did not understand Count Three," Turner said. "It's a 66-page charge. It was complicated. They thought all they had to establish was whether she (Riddle) had a gun or not. Sentencing is expected to take place sometime in April. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= COMMENT Well, there we have it. The government has no intention of letting any of these people go, and is willing to twist the law into knots to avoid doing so. At the very least, this will set the precedent that nothing said in an open courtroom can be trusted. One wonders if this could be used to support a call for a mistri- al, or to support an appeal to a higher court on the grounds of judicial misconduct. Note that I am not a lawyer; I do not know all the legal ramifications of this incident. All I know is that it stinks to high heaven. I also know that this just reaffirms my opinion that the government cannot, and should not, be trusted. It strengthens my resolve to oppose all efforts by the government to control the citizen's access to weapons (Brady, Brady II, Feinstein, Metzenbaum, et. al.); to force citizens to use communications that may be monitored by the government at any time (Clipper); to institute a cradle-to- grave detailed tracking of every citizen's movement and activity (the so-called National Health Card); and so forth. Whatever happened to the United States of America formed by Jeffer- son, Washington, Franklin, Adams, etc.? What we have now certainly is not the "land of the free". We seem to be rapidly moving in the direction of the old Soviet Union, where every citizen owes his or her very existence to the whims of the government. Not while I breathe. I will fight such totalitarianism with every means at my command, be it the pen, the computer keyboard, or, if it comes to that, the rifle. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= This Update of the Branch Davidian trial is based on or transcribed from articles published in the San Antonio Express-News. The origi- nal articles, and any sections quoted herein are copyrighted by the Express-News. The remainder of the summary is copyright 1994 by William W. Hughes. Copying of these summaries, either by hardcopy or electronic means, is authorized and encouraged, as long as this notice remains attached and intact. "I do not work for or represent the San Antonio Express-News" =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= [w--g--s] at [lonestar.utsa.edu] (William Hughes) | In memory of 85 un-charged, UTSA doesn't agree with me. They're wrong. | un-convicted victims of the U.S. St. Dismas' Infirmary for the Incurably | government in Waco, Texas - Informed [_Synners_, Pat Cadigan] | including over 20 children.