>Actually, I have an even better idea - jury nullification of any
>charge involving property. They underlying logic is that contrary to
>what that bunch of clowns on the SCOUTS say, corporations are not
>people, and it is not possible to steal anything from a non-human. So
>next time you sit on a jury in a case involving some poor grunt who
>"stole" something from a store or his employer - refuse to pass the
>guilty verdict regardless of the "evidence" on the grounds that the
>charge is as nonsensical as a charge of "stealing" milk from a cow, or
>eggs from a chicken.
Unfortunately, such an opportunity is unlikely to arise, since (and we've discussed this here recently, don't people listen and learn?) actual trials are few and far between in the USA. Instead of trial, by jury or otherwise, prosecutors blackmail the accused into pleading guilty to a "lesser" charge, by threatening to otherwise prosecute them for a more serious charge (that the prosecutor presumably believes the accused is not actually guilty of.)
In fact this is probably the very crux of this issue, I recall seeing in one news report that the family of the deceased had made mention of "prosecutorial over-reach", which I took to be a reference to the usual practice of prosecutorial blackmail.
The technical term for this is perversion of the course of justice. The remedy of course would be a campaign of prosecuting the prosecutors. Unfortunately, as I understand it, the USA doesn't have any provision for private prosecution for criminal offenses. But some jurisdictions do have popularly elected prosecutors don't they? Perhaps an electoral campaign where the candidate for prosecutor promises to prosecute his/her predecessor for perversion of the course of justice might have an impact? Even if either the electoral campaign and/or the prosecution were unsuccessful, the very threat might have an effect, (so making the punishment fitting the crime so to speak.)
Bill Bartlett Bracknell Tas