Every judge does this differently, in my experience. Personally, I’m with you: Draw the regular jurors at the end.
In this particular case, the alternates were designated as alternates from the start of the trial. The oath for alternates is slightly different from the usual oath administered to regular jurors. (And damn, I still remember them both!)
– The number of J6 jury trials (2 or 3?) does not rise to statistical significance, and all were different from this one in that the defendant was physically placed in the Capitol
Others here will add that Smith’s case is unusually strong. I personally do not have a way to measure this and so put that aside.
So – High likelihood of conviction. But there will be a legitimate feeling of suspense while waiting for the jury to come back.
That’s probably always true in Federal criminal cases. There are no “sure things” in any litigation. That why the number of civil settlements and criminal plea bargains are so high. There’s always a risk that things don’t turn out as you expect. Always.
Just revealed that the special prosecutor subpoened Trump’s twitter account. For those of you who use twitter, are there “private messages” that could come to light? I assume so, because there would be no reason to subpoena the public stuff.
i was just about to post this many interesting tidbits.
The search was so secret that Twitter was barred from telling Trump the search warrant had been obtained for his account, and Twitter was fined $350,000 because it delayed producing the records sought under the search warrant.
The special counsel’s office, which is now working on the criminal case against Trump in DC District Court related to his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election, sought the warrant in January 2023.
Twitter and special counsel Jack Smith’s office spent several months litigating the question of whether Trump should be told about the search warrant.
The dispute came to light on Wednesday when the DC Circuit Court of Appeals unsealed a decision upholding a district court ruling in favor of prohibiting Twitter from telling Trump.
The district court, according to the DC Circuit’s opinion, “found that there were ‘reasonable grounds to believe’ that disclosing the warrant to former President Trump ‘would seriously jeopardize the ongoing investigation’ by giving him “an opportunity to destroy evidence, change patterns of behavior, [or] notify confederates.”
Sounds similar to financial money-laundering regulations. When I was working for a credit card processor if certain suspicious transactions – several transactions just below the $10,000 reporting limit or a small retailer suddenly having transactions for much larger amounts than usual to name a couple – we* were to report it to the Feds and not report it to the business.
*The collective we. The frontline workers would tell the higher-ups who would determine whether the bank I worked for would tell the Feds.
The district court also concluded the non-disclosure order was necessary because it “found reason to believe that the former President would ‘flee from prosecution’, it says.