Legal News

Is a Florida Sheriff Too Friendly With Prospective Jurors?

By Nathan Koppel

Florida Sheriff David Morgan (pictured) has developed a pleasant-sounding tradition: He greets prospective jurors and thanks them for their service as they board a trolley bound for the federal courthouse in Pensacola.  The sheriff also hands out his business card.

But defense lawyers have complained about the Sheriff’s greeting and so have some Florida judges, according to this article in the Pensacola News Journal. (HT: Juries blog.)

Judges Roger Vinson, Casey Rodgers and Lacey Collier wrote a letter earlier this month to the sheriff, which said: “Your interactions with these prospective jurors raise legitimate concerns about the court’s ability to seat fair and impartial juries, especially when considering the majority of those selected will serve on criminal juries.”

The matter might have died there, but for the fact that Morgan has decided to stand his ground, the News Journal reports.

That’s right. Morgan is invoking the First Amendment in arguing he has a right to, well, pleasantly greet people.

“I retain the First Amendment protection of my rights to freedom of speech and freedom of association,” Morgan wrote in a March 17 letter to the judges. “I consider the greeting of jurors an exercise of these rights.”

He added: “Has any prospective juror ever testified that he/she was unable to follow the Judge’s instructions, or was unable to sit as a fair and impartial juror, simply because he/she met the Sheriff and shook the Sheriff’s hand earlier in the day? Or has his business card?” If so, he said, “I submit that such a juror was merely seeking any excuse to be excused from jury duties.”

Morgan told the News Journal that he’s prepared to take the matter to court.  “I’m not doing anything illegal, immoral or unethical,” he said. (Here’s an AP article on the brewing controversy.)

Judge Collier told the News Journal that many cases allege wrongdoing by Morgan and his office.

“Let’s assume Gulf Power was being sued for something and the CEO went down and greeted jurors,” the judge said. “Those cases where the sheriff is a defendant in his official capacity, you can see the difficulty that could bring up.”

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on March 24, 2011 (boomark / email).