The quality of the jury pool and lynch-mobbing a presumed-innocent person of color as a legitimate way to grieve in Oneonta, New York

Update: Terence Triutt has been released from prison as innocent, charges dropped.

In my previous article about the criminal case People v Terrence Truitt, started in Oneonta, NY, Otsego County, I mentioned the history of racial profiling in that predominantly white area in criminal cases, and posted one attack on me by a potential juror from the area who called me an asshole simply for mentioning that the defendant charged with arson (in a fire where a former firefighter John Heller died after he saved his 4 young nephews and his fiancée) is presumed innocent.

That is part of standard jury instructions usually given to potential jurors by the court, and that is a fundamental constitutional right.

But no.  Not in Oneonta, New York.  Not in Otsego County.

In Otsego County white men and women come to comment on posts made in local newspapers by all-white police and all-white prosecution in order to "grieve" and "mourn" the victim, and their mode of mourning and grieving is - lynch-mobbing a person of color picked by the police for a crime, and, yes, presumed innocent at the time.

Anybody who mentions presumption of innocence is:

• meddling;
• harassing people;
• deliberately hurting people - that is what I read in comment I was doing by mentioning Terrence Truitt's presumption of innocence

Go away, a@@hole.

You only have to pay taxes to support our local government, including racist police and prosecution, but you have no right to criticize them.

Many, many commentators tried to shoo me away from the thread where people were "grieving" by listing the ways they want the presumed-innocent colored man to die because he was already ruled guilty-by-news release.

Here are some of the comments - any criminal defense attorney worth his salt would have a galore reviewing these comments from potential jurors and likes and loves posted to those comments.

So, here is the perception of white people about the colored (and presumed-innocent) defendant Terrence Truitt charged with a crime of arson in a case where a former firefighter died - charged by local law enforcement that, by virtue of obvious conflict of interest (investigating circumstances of the death of "one of their own") should not have been allowed any place close to the investigation.

Here is my comment.

Here is the reaction to that comment of the potential jurors.

So, all these nice white people 

• want a person of color charged with a crime to die - because they are sure he is guilty, because the police said so in a press conference designed to inflame the jury pool; and
• are viciously attacking anybody who so much as mentioned the very basic concept of presumption of innocence, from their own Constitution.

Here are people who considered it necessary, in response to my "inappropriate" mentioning Terrence Truitt's presumption of innocence, to attack me (and my husband) personally:

And, many people tried to tell me to stop commenting about presumption of innocence and go away from the thread, and even "back to Russia", for various reasons:

One person - a FB friend of a FB friend, approached stalking me on Facebook as a result of my comment about presumption of innocence, quite seriously, to the point of asking to join my group "Independence of Human Rights Defenders" - but then lashing out at me in comments on the Daily Star thread, after I mentioned Otsego County's history of racial profiling:

So, this person presumes the truth in anything the police say to the media before trial - which is the reason why the police conducted the press-conferences, to firmly embed the presumption of guilt in the minds of potential jurors.

Remember, this person, Marshall Kruse, believes that to burn a man of color accused of a crime and presumed innocent is too easy a death for him:

Because I interfere with how people grieve and mourn (and lynch-mob a presumed-innocent man of color):

Only two other commentators out of many, many commentators on that thread mentioned presumption of innocence not in a derogatory fashion:

The comments demonstrate the chances of the accused to get a fair trial in this case in this area - or, possibly, anywhere else, since all this publicity is readily available from any place on this planet.

This area appears to be hopelessly racist - specifically because they consider it a legitimate way to grieve the loss of a loved one to invent ways how to kill in the most horrible manner and inflicting the most torture upon a presumed-innocent man of color before seeing any evidence against him in the court of law, and before any jury verdict.

I will address the contents, and impropriety of those contents, of the police video press-conference and the right of the accused to an open fair trial, in the next articles.

Stay tuned.

So should we boil those criminal defendants - slowly? To save our tax dollars?

I wrote on this blog about a judge from Mississippi who thinks that all criminal defendants are criminals while they are still covered by the presumption of innocence.

If judges are that illiterate as to the concept of the presumption of innocence, what can be said about the public, especially during our Internet and especially social networking age. 

Here are some comments from Facebook as to what needed to be done immediately to criminal defendants accused of crimes and covered by presumption of innocence.

The defendant in the case was accused of allegedly burning children by allegedly bathing them in water that was too hot.

The defendant's picture, name, age and accusations/charge were published in the newspaper article.

Here are the suggestions of the public, the potential jurors:

That is quite a range of options.

Remember, children are alive, and the criminal defendant is only ACCUSED of committing a crime at this stage.

Yet, we can:

1. boil him;
2. boil him specifically in oil;
3. kill him without a trial or death row if he intentionally hurt a child - how that can be verified without a trial, is not suggested;
4. "do the same thing to him";
5. allow a commentator to run the defendant's next bath since prison is too good for him - with the obvious results that he will not survive that bath;
6. "eye for an eye" - whatever that means in this context;
7. hang him by the neck until dead;
8. shoot them between the eyes on the date of publication of the accusation;
9. throw him in a pot;
10. put him in a cauldron over open fire;
11. let 25 Moms corner him, and put him in scalding water, till he goes to the regional burn center;
12. burn him at the stake;
13. torture him and then hang him.

Once again, quite a range, and imaginations and creativity run wild of how exactly to torture and kill the defendant (an identified specific person, whose name, age, face and location are described in the publication).

Here is another set of comments, about a mother accused of having neglected her children or having caused burns on her children because ALLEGEDLY burns were found on children - and in a string of comments to that publication, a voice of reason appeared, a person who knew about the case who said that not only the children were alive, but that social services misrepresented insect bites on children as burns - and such misrepresentations, I can attest to it as an attorney representing parents in cases brought against them by social services - happens ALL the time.

So, here are the comments about the mother following a publication stating that the mother is ACCUSED of allegedly having caused the burns on the children - while the mother remains presumed innocent:

Once again, the commentators got creative and suggested that:

1. that the defendant's "smirk" should be beaten off her face;
2. that the defendant's face must be burnt;
3. that the defendant should be given a life sentence in prison;
4. that the defendant's children should be taken away from her;
5. that the defendant should be sterilized for free, "no more babies";
6. that the defendant should be set on fire;
7. that the defendant should be burnt with cigarettes "and keep burning her";
8. that the defendant should be instantly sentenced to death without wasting taxpayer dollars on her;
9. that the defendant should be burnt slowly and let to suffer, then she will burn in hell;
10. that the defendant should be burnt at the stake on live TV, and that her children - who are very much alive and only suffered insect bites (certainly not from their mother) - should "RIP".

Of course, all of these commentators should be spotted and taken out of jury pools, for cause, permanently, and such publications provide a galore for criminal defense attorneys in OTHER cases in creating a whole database of potential jurors to be stricken for cause.

Yet, for the particular defendant about whom the comments are made, publicity turns in a nightmare.

Of course, there is not even a hint of possibility for a fair trial left for such a defendant after just one publication, and there is no point telling anybody that the publication is just "local", not when all local media sources are on the Internet - and specifically, on Facebook, and not when Facebook has recently introduced search inside Facebook by keywords.

What is the remedy?

A radical solution is to prohibit ANY pre-trial publicity and to RIGOROUSLY punish police and prosecutors for making press-releases about charges being filed.

That is an especial necessity because such publicity triggers the need for the defendant and his attorney to try to undo the harm caused by such publicity - which may be impossible once the publication is made, since first impressions (from the publication and what was fed to the newspaper by the police and prosecution) may have the most lasting effect on the public.

Part of the solution is, of course, education of the public.

Drilling from kindergarten about the meaning of presumption of innocence.

Of course, that will make the work of the police much more difficult, with less people to be duped about their rights, but otherwise criminal defendants cannot have the right to a fair trial, and may be steered into plea bargains, especially in really bad cases in death penalty states, simply to avoid execution IF convicted - by a biased jury where, from the time the person was accused, and the accusation was plastered all over Facebook, the verdict was already there - burn him.  Slowly.