merry christmas — 4 years ago(January 07, 2022 05:36 PM)

https://archive.md/MFR3V
The juror at the centre of Ghislaine Maxwell’s bid for a retrial incorrectly told the court he had not been a victim of sexual assault, The Telegraph understands.
The revelation increases the chance of Maxwell being granted a new trial in her sex-trafficking case, particularly if the judge finds it prejudiced the verdict.
The juror, who used the name “Scotty David”, gave a series of media interviews in which he admitted to swaying deliberations by recounting his own trauma from childhood sexual abuse.
Scotty, who spoke using his first and middle names, said he could not remember whether he revealed the information during jury selection, as was required, throwing Maxwell’s conviction into uncertainty.
A source with knowledge of the case told The Telegraph that the juror had answered “no” to the question of whether they had ever been a victim of sexual assault.
Judge Alison Nathan has accepted to hear Maxwell’s motion for a new trial, giving the defence a deadline of Jan 19 to file a motion to vacate the sex-trafficking conviction.
Scotty told various outlets that he used his personal experience of abuse to assuage doubts that other jurors had about some of the accusers' testimonies.
Prosecutors requested an inquiry because they had an ethical duty to flag to the court concerns of possible prejudice, said Neama Rahmani, the president of West Coast Trial Lawyers and a former federal prosecutor. But they also took the unusual step of requesting that Scotty be appointed an attorney, which Mr Rahmani said might suggest they believed he could have acted criminally by committing perjury.
He said if Scotty purposefully gave a false answer to sit on the jury then there was precedent for the judge to grant a new trial.