Why did the judge allow the state to present the personal side of George Floyd to the jury? I just saw the opening statements for the George Floyd case. At the end of the opening statement of the State, they presented a slide with several bullet points that gave personal information about George Floyd. For example, one being he's a father and brother, etc. All of the information on the slide was completely irrelevant to the case. The state is obviously trying to emotionally manipulate the jury into thinking that Floyd is a &quot;good guy&quot;. Why would the judge permit the State to present irrelevant information to the jury?
Opening and closing statements are to state the reason we are in court today and thus are more emotional appeals than factual summations. Consider writing a term paper or five-paragraph essay. You do not use your opening or final paragraph to present factual evidence or cite sources, but rather state your objective and core arguments and what you intend to show in your paper. The prosecution's listing of Floyd's positive qualities is to remind the jury that while the defense will rely on Floyd's criminal past and alleged engagement in unlawful activity immediately prior to his death, Floyd was still a human being and while his crimes did happen, Floyd was important to people and his death leaves a huge hole in the lives of those who knew him as more than just a criminal and the jury should keep this fact in their mind as they hear all sorts of nasty evidence. They are in effect reminding the jurors of a principle Shakespeare said way better than I could: &quot;The evil that men do lives after them; The good is oft interred with their bones;&quot; The Tragedy of Julius Caesar, Act III, scene 2 On the other side of the coin, the defense will have time to give counter statements to the effect of Floyds character as well as discuss the better angels of their client's nature as well. They are summing up the points they intend to show and the facts they wish to demonstrate for the jury so the jury is primed to know what to look for with the evidence.
That book provides advice on legal writing; it is not a source of rules for legal writing. Rather than repeatedly identifying themselves using their full name, parties customarily refer to themselves in the third person, e.g., &quot;The defendant refused to waive his Sixth Amendment right to a speedy trial.&quot; In practice, though, pro se litigants regularly refer to themselves in the first person, and there is no formal consequence for this.
There’s some truth in it When a matter, particularly a criminal matter, is before a court or sub judice, public comment is forbidden and may be contempt of court unless they are “a fair and accurate report of legal proceedings held in public, published contemporaneously and in good faith.” Technically, it only applies to media reporting (probably including social media) and only while the proceedings are active. Proceedings become active when there is an arrest, oral charge, issue of a warrant, or a summons. Notwithstanding, there is nothing preventing an organisation having a “no comment” policy on any matter once there is police involvement.
If a person A, speaking by telephone to an election official B in Georgia, attempts to influence that official to improperly alter an election result in a way that would constitute frauds or otherwise be a violation of Georgia law, then the person A has committed a crime in Georgia. There are various ways to commit a crime in a place without being physically present in that state. Since there is no question what was said on the telephone call in question (because it was recorded) the question to be determined would seem to be whether it constituted a crime under Georgia law, and whether the Georgia officials think it is worth prosecuting. It is true that a trial for a criminal accusation is normally held in the state where the crime was committed (or allegedly committed). But that need not be in a state where the person was ever physically present. If a person living in State C does business is state D, and is requires to file a tax return with the authorities in D, and it is alleged that the return was false, then the person is being accused of a crime in D, committed when the false return was received in D.
You are correct. A judge may only issue a warrant when it is supported by an affidavit, in which the officer seeking the warrant swears under oath to the facts supporting the warrant. Lying on the affidavit would constitute perjury. But judges very frequently just rubber-stamp the warrants without meaningfully reviewing the affidavits, so the primary form of oversight would be the defendant's Fourth Amendment challenge asserting that the warrant wasn't supported by probable cause. If a judge does review the warrant application and finds the officer's statements not to be credible, he can refuse to sign the warrant, and he is free to also carry that credibility determination to subsequent warrants sought by the same officer or other officers in his department.
“Anything you say can be used against you in court.” Is what the police say in the USA. “You are not obliged to say or do anything unless you wish to do so, but whatever you say or do may be used in evidence. Do you understand?” is what they say in New South Wales. “You do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defence if you do not mention, when questioned, something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.” is what they say in England and Wales. And so on. Whether Mark wants to mention that he was robbing a bank on the far side of town at the time is entirely up to him. If he does, and that can be verified it’s likely the murder charges will be dropped and armed robbery charges will be brought instead. Note that in many jurisdictions, if the defence intends to use an alibi defence, the prosecution must be told about it at a very early stage or it can’t be used at all.
To what cases is the judge referring to here? None: neither the quoted article (2023-06-02 05:57: Prozess gegen Lina E.: Stadt Leipzig verbietet Solidaritäts-Demonstration) given in the english version of Wikipedia nor the german Wikipedia version (Dresdner Linksextremismusprozess – Wikipedia uses the quote given in the english version. In the article itself, the name 'Hans Schlueter-Staats' is used only once: The arrest warrant against them will be suspended against conditions, said Hans Schlueter-Staats, presiding judge of the State Protection Chamber at the Dresden Higher Regional Court, on Wednesday evening at the end of the verdict. She only has to serve the remainder of the sentence if the verdict becomes final. Assume that, for whatever reason, someone added a fabricated quote, in the Wikipedia page, that is not contained in the given source hoping that nobody would notice (either because the reader can't read German or simply wouldn't look). It would be very strange for a judge whos primary duty, in a civil law system, is to read the law as written, to give a personal opinion about previous rulings (which was the reason I looked: to read the exact German text). Whoever fabricated that quote was obviously unaware of this or didn't care hoping that others would simply assume it to be correct due the given source of a newspaper that has a reputation as being a reliable source.
An indictment is issued by a grand jury when they are convinced, on the basis of evidence presented to them by the government, that there is probable cause to believe that the person committed a crime. However, the indictment only has to state the charges, i.e. the grand jury's conclusion; it doesn't have to describe the evidence that led them to this conclusion. In particular, the grand jury can hear the testimony of witnesses under oath, and has subpoena powers to compel testimony. But testimony before a grand jury is sealed and must not be revealed by anyone except the witness themself. A good source for learning more about the grand jury process is the Handbook for Federal Grand Jurors. The authoritative source is the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, Title III. So, there must have been some evidence that he committed a crime, at least in the grand jury's view. But we, the public, don't get to see it at this time. If the case goes to trial, evidence will be presented publicly at that time, though it won't necessarily be the same evidence that convinced the grand jury to indict. (Note that this answer is about the US federal criminal justice system, since that's what's involved in the Collins case. Some states may have a similar system; others may not.)