Here I am again with a few more (I hope, the last)
questions. When one is a witness being questioned by the US Attorney for a special federal
grand jury can one insist upon having additional information not requested entered into
the record? Witness involved has a professional relationship to the subject of the
investigation and is aware of aspects of the investigation that the jurors may be ignorant
of, or said information may even have been intentionally withheld from them. Are there any
precedents in law related to this sort of thing? Are there any legal sanctions possible
against any US Attorney who might have intentionally withheld information from jurors that
could exonerate the citizen being investigated? Is there any way to prove such a
circumstance?
| Response: (1) Again, GET A LAWYER! You're raising some very complex
issues here, and you need someone to represent you. Anything I say is of necessity very
general information; you need someone to represent you and give you legal advice in terms
of how to deal with the specifics of this situation. (2) As to your questions about
additional information, you seem to be asking if you can be allowed to give/if you can
insist on giving the grand jury information which is exculpatory, e.g., which would show
that no crime has been committed. There is a U.S. Supreme Court opinion (U.S. v.
Williams–there’s a link to it in the federal part of the website) which says
that a court cannot force a federal prosecutor to produce such evidence for a grand jury's
consideration. That does not mean a prosecutor cannot do so if he or she wants to. GET A
LAWYER (Am I making myself clear, here?) and your lawyer can discuss this with the
prosecutor and see what he/she can accomplish. (The lawyer can argue to the prosecutor
that presenting such evidence can prevent the grand jury from indicting in an instance
when no crime has been committed; if the evidence shows that, the prosecutor should be
willing to produce it, as prosecutors normally do not want to get an indictment that will
only result in an acquittal (and defeat for them) at trial. |
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