Durham’s senior District Court Judge Orlando Hudson is upset that two members of the grand jury that indicted the three Duke lacrosse players have talked to the media. He’s thinking about holding them in contempt. Here’s what he said to the N&O:
“I saw the interview that morning, and I think what the grand jurors did was clearly against the laws of the state of North Carolina,” Hudson said. “The grand jury is to discuss nothing about what went on in the grand jury proceedings, nor anything about the grand jury proceedings.”
Which brings up the question: do grand juries really need to be secret? Isn’t there something, well, un-American about a group of people sitting in a room doing Lord knows what, coming out and ruining lives with their indictments and then not answering for it? I, for one, would like to know exactly why people say a prosecutor could get a grand jury to indict a ham sandwich.
Originally, secrecy was to provide a buffer from the power of the king’s prosecutors and his subjects, but, hey, we got no king anymore. Witnesses can’t bring lawyers, grand jurors can’t talk about what goes on, no record is kept, jurors aren’t questioned for bias. With those kinds of rules it’s a wonder we haven’t had more Nifong-like travesties. Well, maybe we have but we just don’t know about it.
