we have freedom of speech and other freedoms we allegedly invade small foreign countries to protect, unless its speech that offends those in charge as you can discover reading the post below;
A former pastor from Michigan discovered the hard way that informing
people of their rights under the law as jurors doesn’t sit well with the
U.S. government when a judge sentenced him
Friday to eight weekends in jail, six months of probation, and fines —
all for passing out pamphlets discussing jury nullification.
Keith Wood contends passing out the information is well within his
constitutional rights to inform potential and selected jurors that,
enshrined in the Bill of Rights lies the potent abilityto
find a defendant not guilty if the law in question is unjust, flawed,
or otherwise untenable — even if the accused indeed technically
violated.
Jury nullification thus arguably acts as citizens’ access to checks
and balances: When legislators craft worthless, harmful, inequitable, or
just plain ‘bad’ laws, jurors can, in essence, refuse to enforce any
punitive measures — refusing to find a person guilty of breaking a law
that never should have been inked into the books.
This tool shines most prominently when used consistently to thwart
oppressive policy. Illustrative of this principle is continued federal
prohibition of cannabis and transformed public sentiment, as
anti-marijuana propaganda falls apart at its politicized roots for the
incarceration nightmare it created — among many others. Jurors faced
with a choice in guilt of sending a nonviolent drug offender to prison
might instead find the concept of incarcerating this petty ‘criminal’
who had done no harm to another unethical and ill-conceived — and choose instead a finding of not guilty to compensate for the unjust law.
But most judges refuse to or have strict rules against informing
jurors about the little-known nullification right; so, Wood’s education
activism, handing out pamphlets from the Fully Informed Jury
Association (FIJA), entitled “Your Jury Rights: True or False?” in front
of the court in Big Rapids, led to a verdict of guilty for attempting
to influence a jury in Mecosta County....https://fromthetrenchesworldreport.com/flashback-father-of-8-sentenced-to-jail-for-distributing-jury-nullification-pamphlets/237349
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