Attorney General Jim Hood gave the distinct impression last week that the juror who allegedly caused the mistrial in his prosecution of Hinds County District Attorney Robert Shuler Smith was biased in favor of acquitting Smith.
Not so, says the juror who tipped off presiding Judge Larry Roberts that one member of the panel had prior knowledge of Smith and failed to disclose it during jury selection.
Juror Anna Scott told The Clarion-Ledger of Jackson that the juror in question, Sharron Sullivan, who works as a dispatcher in the Jackson Police Department, was predisposed to convict Smith of hindering the prosecution of a criminal defendant and was trying to persuade other members of the panel to follow her lead.
It will be interesting to see what Hood, who was in high dudgeon over the mistrial and the attendant waste of taxpayers’ money, will now do with this information.
What he should do is open an investigation into whether Sullivan committed perjury during jury questioning. It is possible that she misunderstood the questions posed to her and the other possible jurors. It is also possible that she intentionally lied.
If she did the latter, she should be prosecuted for it. That’s the only way to send the message to the public that sitting on a jury is serious business, and intentional deception — whether designed to get off a jury or on it — cannot be tolerated.
Too often in the criminal justice system, there are no personal consequences for lying under oath. Perjury prosecutions are rare. As a result, not just jurors but witnesses, too, get the message that perjury is no big deal.
It should not matter to Hood, if he is living up to the responsibilities of his office, that the juror in question was supposedly on his side. A prosecutor is supposed to look at the evidence, without favor, and determine whether a crime has been committed.
To just let this matter of alleged juror deception die would taint Hood’s prosecution of Smith and reinforce the embattled district attorney’s claim that the attorney general is misusing his office to purse a personal vendetta.
