Time: Fri Jul 04 04:58:41 1997
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Date: Fri, 04 Jul 1997 04:54:51 -0700
To: (Recipient list suppressed)
From: Paul Andrew Mitchell [address in tool bar]
Subject: SLS: Rocky Flats Grand Jury Speaks (fwd)
<snip>
>
>Denver Post
>July 2, 1997
>Email: letters@denverpost.com
>
> Grand jury could change much
>
> Many observers uneasy
>
> By Howard Pankratz
> Denver Post Legal Affairs Writer
>
> July 2 - The grand jury that intensely probed wrongdoing at Rocky
> Flats and now wants to take its findings public is pushing into
> "uncharted" legal waters that could dramatically change the federal
> grand jury system, experts said Tuesday.
>
> The jurors, who have for months asked for a closed hearing with a
> federal judge, apparently will outline their investigation Wednesday
> and Thursday behind closed doors.
>
> That "confidential, closed proceeding" - either with U.S. District
> Judge Richard Matsch or U.S. Magistrate Patricia Coan - is
> unprecedented.
>
> The jury investigated alleged environmental crimes at Rocky Flats for
> 2 1/2 years and wanted to return indictments against several officials
> of the Department of Energy and Rockwell International Corp., which
> managed the plant.
>
> But the U.S. Justice Department accepted a plea bargain from
> Rockwell, which paid an $18.5 million fine.
>
> The grand jurors have pushed ever since for a full airing of their
> deliberations.
>
> If Matsch or Coan goes a step further and grants jurors' requests
> that transcripts of the two-day hearing be released and they be
> permitted to address Congress and the public, the federal grand jury
> system may undergo profound change, said the experts.
>
> The historically airtight secrecy of grand juries could be a thing of
> the past. Conceivably, grand jurors could end up writing books, just
> like jurors in sensational civil and criminal trials, one expert said.
>
> "I think it would change the nature of the grand jury," said William
> Pizzi, a former federal prosecutor in New Jersey and now a University
> of Colorado law professor. "We might see books like 'Why We Didn't
> Indict the President' ," he said.
>
> "I have enough trouble with trial jurors writing books - I think some
> things should be protected. I don't know how Matsch could limit the
> impact to this case," Pizzi said.
>
> Lawyer Jonathan Turley, who represents the grand jurors, has argued
> in court documents that the public has a "great need to know" about
> the jury's findings of misconduct at Rocky Flats.
>
> Most of the lawyers interviewed by The Denver Post believe in the
> secrecy of the grand jury system - a veil that dates from the start of
> grand juries in 11th century England.
>
> The lawyers believe that the secrecy protects those under
> investigation, the investigation itself and the witnesses who testify.
>
> Grand juries often investigate rumors and other thin allegations
> which may turn out to be untrue, they explained.
>
> At other times, as in the case of former Vice President Spiro Agnew,
> the rumors may be true and lead to high places.
>
> Grand juries usually only hear the prosecution's side of a case.
>
> Several local lawyers said they don't expect Matsch, who has a
> reputation for rigidly enforcing grand jury secrecy, to allow the
> Rocky Flats jurors to go public.
>
> One lawyer, who asked that his name not be used, said the jurors may
> actually have made a secret appeal to the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of
> Appeals after U.S. District Judge Sherman Finesilver refused earlier
> requests to release their proposed indictments and report.
>
> The lawyer said the timing is right for such an appeal to have been
> taken to the 10th Circuit. The resulting opinion could have directed
> Matsch or some judge in the federal district court in Denver to hold
> the closed hearing the jurors sought, the lawyer speculated.
>
> Bob Miller, a former U.S. attorney for Colorado, said he has never
> seen anything like the Rocky Flats grand jury.
>
> "The whole situation is unusual," said Miller. "I've never quite
> heard of anything like this before." Miller is a strong believer in
> grand jury secrecy, saying "too many lives can be harmed" if the grand
> jury's operation becomes public.
>
> "Innocent people are investigated and exonerated," said Miller. "If
> the grand jury stuff got out, it would damage reputations."
>
> Bruce Black, a former assistant U.S. attorney in Denver, said he had
> never heard of a grand jury "gaining this kind of notoriety and trying
> to do something so out of the scope of the normal process." Only in
> the "rarest of exceptions" is anything ever released from the actual
> workings of the grand jury, Black noted. And there is absolutely
> nothing in the rules surrounding grand juries that gives the public a
> right to know what went on if certain criteria are met, he said.
>
> Under legal rules, the Rocky Flats grand jury was a "special" grand
> jury, Black said. And under highly limited circumstances, such
> "special" panels can make reports to judges.
>
> Those circumstances include cases of:
>
> Noncriminal misconduct, malfeasance or misfeasance in office involving
> organized criminal activity by an appointed public officer or
> employee.
>
> But Finesilver rejected the grand jury's report, saying it made
> assertions of organized crime "that are unsupportable as a matter of
> law and stray far afield from the special grand jury's charged and
> sworn task."
>
> Black said that "it would be remarkable for that report to be made
> public. What you have here is a situation where the jurors disagree
> with the prosecution."
>
> "We are in an area that is totally uncharted," he said.
>
>Denver Post
>1560 Broadway
>Denver, CO 80202
>Phone: (303) 820-1010
>Fax: (303) 820-1369
>Email: letters@denverpost.com
>--------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Re-distributed by the:
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>
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Paul Andrew Mitchell : Counselor at Law, federal witness
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