supreme court majority finds the jury trial of jeffrey shilling was fair but Decides Shilling's 'Honest Services' Posture on Behalf of Enron Was Not Proscribed by a Key Fraud Statute

摘要

A lengthy slip opinion issued by the Supreme Court of the United States on Thursday, 6/24/10, held, first, that pretrial publicity and community prejudice did not prevent former Enron CEO Jeffrey Skilling from obtaining a fair trial in Houston, Texas. Skilling did not establish that a presumption of juror prejudice arose or that actual bias infected the jury that tried him. The District Court did not err in denying Skilling's requests for a venue transfer. The Sixth Amendment and law provides for criminal trials in the state and district where the crime was committed, but these place-of-trial prescriptions do not impede transfer of a proceeding to a different district if extraordinary local prejudice will prevent a fair trial. In Skilling's case, "no actual prejudice contaminated Skilling's jury." The Court's majority (excepting Justices Sotomayor, Stevens and Breyer) rejected Skilling's assertions that voir dire did not adequately detect and defuse juror prejudice and that several seated jurors were biased.