Posted on 09/15/2008 10:49:45 AM PDT by Domandred
Boise prosecutor will move forward with misdemeanor charge against David Ferdinand. The first trial in August ended with a hung jury.
Canyon County Commission Chairman David Ferdinand, who was stopped at the Boise Airport Feb. 28 with a gun in his carry-on luggage, faces a second trial on the misdemeanor charge.
But the juror who reportedly triggered a mistrial in Ferdinand's case two weeks ago says she believes the charge never should have gone to court.
A court-imposed gag order "to stop prejudicial extrajudicial statements to press" prevents the prosecution and defense from publicly discussing the case. Boise City Attorney Cary Colaianni, whose office is prosecuting Ferdinand, would say only that the court has rescheduled the trial for Dec. 12 and his office will be ready.
But former juror Kisha Majors has come forward, identifying herself as the person who prompted a hung jury Aug. 29. At the end of about seven hours of deliberation, Majors said, she was the only one of six jurors - the normal jury size in misdemeanor cases - who argued that the commissioner was innocent.
"I was so frustrated I told the bailiff to tell the judge I was done," the Garden City resident said Friday.
(Excerpt) Read more at idahostatesman.com ...
In the previous thread I was mistaken btw. The civil penalty is what he already paid willingly, this was the criminal trial portion. I had it backwards. My apologies.
It’s page three, but hey, I got quoted in the news paper. ~_~
YAY!
PS. Keep up the good fight Ferdinand! You are innocent and that I had no doubt of. The paper does fail to mention that all of the jury was in agreement that he didn’t “knowingly” have a gun in his back pack. What they were confused on was the definition of “knowingly”! Go figure!
One lady wanted to convict simply because he “had a gun”.
You can thank the Prosecution for that, who argued that... once you know something, you will always know it.
Tell that to my algebra teacher... I couldn’t do algebra now if there was a gun to my head. And I’m not sure but I think I got an “A” or “B” in algebra.
There was zero evidence that he knew he had the gun when he walked up to FAA with metal detecting equipment. One FAA witness said that he would have detected a gun, 100% of the time.
We love our guns here in ID. Good luck finding a jury to convict this guy. Although, Canyon County is swamped with illegals, and thus may be a bit more liberal than the rest of the state... Hmmm...
Being tried in Ada County. I would love to share your optimism on finding a jury to convict, but the first trial was 5-1. Hopefully the second trial the jury will see through the prosecutor’s word ploy of redefining “knowingly”.
Assuming he had the gun in his carry-on accidentally, and there is no evidence of criminal intent, what is the issue here?
Exactly... “crime” in the “law” and “judges instructions” it was defined that in order to commit a “crime” there must be an act and an intent! Neither could be mutually exclusive or it was not a crime!!!
In another portion of the instructions it defined what law that was possibly broken. Intending to bring a firearm into the sterile area of an airport.
Then the last portion of the judges instruction stated that he must “knowingly” bring a firearm into the sterile area of the airport. If all of these were not proven, then he is not guilty. In this country it’s “innocent until PROVEN guilty.”
In this case there was zero evidence that he had “intent” to commit a “crime”. Therefor he is innocent of the crime accused!
I dont know for sure... But it seems pretty darn open/closed case to me!
May common sense prevail!
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