[don-o]

If you are associated with a group, and somebody else in that group commits a crime, then you are a criminal too.

And that association is assumed by the patches you have sewed on your clothing. This continues to boggle my mind.

If these conspiracy cases go to trial, would a defense attorney dare to venture into challenging that by planting into the jurors the ideas of how such criteria, applied to other groups, is a Pandora's Box?

[Cboldt]

-- If these conspiracy cases go to trial, would a defense attorney dare to venture into challenging that by planting into the jurors the ideas of how such criteria, applied to other groups, is a Pandora's Box? --

Defendant need not do that. If it gets as far as jury instructions (even if it doesn't), the specificity of findings necessary to conclude a person conspired precludes conviction unless the jury practices jury nullification - and if that happens, the convict has a right to appeal.

Mere presence at the scene of an event, or mere similarity of conduct among various persons and the fact that they may have associated with each other, and may have assembled together and discussed common aims and interests, does not necessarily establish proof of the existence of a conspiracy. Also, a person who has no knowledge of a conspiracy, but who happens to act in a way which advances some object or purpose of a conspiracy, does not thereby become a conspirator. Source: Pattern Jury Instructions (Criminal Cases), Fifth Circuit, No. 2.21 (1990) (modified). Court's instruction in United States v. All Star, et al., Crim. No. H-88-29 (S.D. Tex. 1990), aff'd, 962 F.2d 465 (5th Cir. 1992) (modified).

Government's Proposed Jury Instructions (in an unrelated case)

[Cboldt]

Here is the core of the pattern jury instruction to find conspiracy:

For you to find the defendant guilty of this crime, you must be convinced that the government has proved each of the following beyond a reasonable doubt:

First: That the defendant and at least one other person made an agreement to commit the crime of _______ (describe) as charged in the indictment;

Second: That the defendant knew the unlawful purpose of the agreement and joined in it willfully, that is, with the intent to further the unlawful purpose; and

Third: That one of the conspirators during the existence of the conspiracy knowingly committed at least one of the overt acts described in the indictment, in order to accomplish some object or purpose of the conspiracy.

Pattern Jury Instructions - Fifth Circuit Library System

I realize this a federal pattern instruction, but the principles of conspiracy are everywhere the same. The exact wording in Texas pattern instruction likely departs from the above, but the state has to prove an agreement, which is more than proving association.