• Zeppo@sh.itjust.works
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    1 year ago

    ”It is one thing to indict a ham sandwich. To indict the mustard-stained napkin that it once sat on is quite another,” the lawyers wrote.

    Devastating legal argument, and beautifully written.

    • Boddhisatva@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      It’s one thing to indict a hamberder. To indict the ketchup stained wall it was thrown against is quite another.

    • Nightwingdragon@lemmy.worldOP
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      1 year ago

      How does this analogy even help them? Doesn’t the mustard stain put the napkin at the scene of the crime with the ham sandwich?

    • transmatrix@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I don’t quite get how this statement applies to their argument? Their argument appears to be that the DA doesn’t have “authority”?

      • Zeppo@sh.itjust.works
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        1 year ago

        I couldn’t really figure out what they meant, but apparently it is a reference to a famous statement made by a former Chief Judge of the New York Court of Appeals, Sol Wachtler, who said a DA could get a Grand Jury to ‘indict a ham sandwich’.

        • flipht@kbin.social
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          1 year ago

          The grand jury system is generally a joke. It’s just a smoke screen for prosecutorial discretion. The DA can present whatever they want (and leave out whatever they don’t want) and there’s no due process to the defendant since they haven’t actually been indicted at that point.

          That said, I hope every grand jury and regular jury viewing evidence against trump does their individual responsibility and throws the book at him.