Jury "at a standstill" in ex-BP engineer's trial
Source: Associated Press
Jury "at a standstill" in ex-BP engineer's trial
AP foreign, Tuesday December 17 2013
MICHAEL KUNZELMAN
Associated Press= NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Jurors have adjourned for the night after saying they are having difficulty reaching a unanimous verdict in the trial of a former BP engineer charged with trying to obstruct a probe of the company's 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
In a note that U.S. District Judge Stanwood Duval Jr. read aloud in court Tuesday, jurors said they have been "at a standstill" and deadlocked for several hours. Duval instructed them to continue deliberating.
About an hour later, they asked to go home. Their deliberations are scheduled to resume Wednesday.
Mix is charged with two counts of obstruction of justice. Prosecutors claim the 52-year-old resident of Katy, Texas, deleted text messages to and from a supervisor and a BP contractor to conceal them from a grand jury.
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What's being claimed as so special that a unanimous verdict is required rather
than a simple majority?
(I can understand the need for this in the case where a death sentence may
be passed but for this already-proven liar?)
> The verdict has to be unanimous in all criminal trials.
> Otherwise a hung jury results in a mistrial.
No wonder corporations get off scott-free so much of the time: all they need
to do is spend some petty cash on one or two jurors and they're home & dry.
