Edwards Jury Instructions Defy Supreme Court Ruling
The Center for Competitive Politics (CCP) today harshly criticized the final juror instructions, issued Friday, in the trial of former president candidate John Edwards.
“If Edwards goes to prison, we will have an Alice in Wonderland world where conduct that would not be punished by a civil fine can result in jail time,” said Allison Hayward, vice president for policy of CCP.
The juror instructions say in part that “You will consider … whether this money was given by Ms. Mellon for the purpose of influencing an election…. If you find beyond a reasonable doubt that one of her purposes was to influence an election, then that would be sufficient.”
Hayward notes that in the landmark Buckley v Valeo case, decided in 1976, the Supreme Court wrote that “Due process requires that a criminal statute provide adequate notice to a person of ordinary intelligence that his contemplated conduct is illegal, for ‘no man shall be held criminally responsible for conduct which he could not reasonably understand to be proscribed…’ There is no legislative history to guide us in determining the scope of the critical phrase ‘for the purpose of . . . influencing.’ It appears to have been adopted without comment from earlier disclosure Acts.”
“The Supreme Court said the phrase ‘for the purpose of influencing’ is so vague and broad that it cannot be constitutionally applied to define campaign spending. That Bunny Mellon’s own internal ‘purpose’ could mean the difference between freedom and jail for John Edwards is a deeply troubling example of the government doing just that,” said Hayward.
“If Edwards is convicted in part due to these defective instructions, he has a good chance of winning an appeal,” Hayward predicted.
