Whites Need to Practice Jury Nullification

John Morgan, The Jury (1861)

1,991 words

The political persecution of Rob Rundo of the Rise Above Movement, Thomas Rousseau of Patriot Front, and too many other outrages to name prove beyond all doubt that the legal system is the objective enemy of the American people. The purpose of a system is what it does, and the American legal system has a well-established pattern of anti-white hate.

A summary of Rundo’s case, which will be updated as events progress, can be found here, on Justice Report.

So, what are we to do about Rundo’s and Rousseau’s persecution in particular, and the anti-white justice system overall?

We have precious few options to use in order to resist, so we must make the most of those that we do have and always seek new, creative ways to non-violently sabotage the system. One option is boycotting woke companies, but choosing homebrewed coffee over Starcucks is not even close to what is called for. Businesses might boycott incorporating in woke states that indulge anarcho-tyranny, which is great, but again, not nearly enough. Boycotting military enlistments is also outstanding, but likewise still not enough.

We must strike at the judicial system itself — but this is difficult, because it is the most insulated branch of government by design. In practice, judicial independence has come to mean judicial unaccountability and tyranny — except for one critical Achilles heel: jury nullification.

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Jury nullification is when a jury returns a verdict of not guilty even if they think the defendant committed a crime beyond a reasonable doubt. If unanimous, the case is dismissed. If it is not unanimous, there is a mistrial and the prosecution can try a second time. Retrials tend to result in acquittals, however, because the defense has already seen the prosecution’s entire playbook and how it affects a jury in reality.

It is time to launch a campaign of widespread jury nullification as systematic, indiscriminate, and unrelenting as the judiciary’s campaign of anti-white hate. We must start acquitting white defendants even in cases that do not seem to be overtly political.

Is a campaign of jury nullification really justified, and will it be effective?

First, there is the issue of generic, seemingly apolitical prosecutorial misconduct. Prosecutors take an oath to pursue justice while defense attorneys are supposed to zealously defend their clients. But too many prosecutors pursue convictions and zealously defend the anti-white regime’s interests instead. Sometimes this is ideological, but oftentimes it is simply to pad their “batting average” in order to advance their career. The obsession with metrics leads to the quantity of a prosecutor’s convictions being valued over the quality of those convictions. Perverse incentives lead to perverse results.

For example, prosecutors will frequently withhold, destroy, or tardily turn over exculpatory evidence despite the fact that they have an affirmative duty to provide it to the defense. Chief Judge Alex Kozinski began his dissent in a 2013 appellate review of United States v. Kenneth R. Olsen with the terse admonition that “[t]here is an epidemic of Brady violations abroad in the land. Only judges can put a stop to it.” (Brady is a reference to Brady v. Maryland, which held that withholding exculpatory evidence violates due process.) Four other judges joined in Kozinski’s dissent.

Another common tactic in criminal proceedings is overcharging, in which prosecutors routinely throw every charge and enhancement, no matter how tenuous, at a defendant in order to extort a guilty plea to one of the lesser charges.

This is in stark contrast to civil cases, where there is generally greater parity in the balance of terror over going to trial, because both sides are free to advance claims and counter-claims. Also, prevailing parties in civil cases can sometimes pursue sanctions, such as collecting attorney’s fees if the losing side acted frivolously, in bad faith, was uncooperative in exchanging evidence in discovery, or engaged in other misconduct. In criminal cases, a defendant can prevail at trial against a dozen ludicrous charges, and yet the prosecutor will suffer very little in terms of consequences except for wasted time.

Yes, this undermines their precious batting average, but the prosecutor faces no significant pain similar to a hefty judgment for thousands of dollars or paying the other side’s attorney fees, as in a civil case, or prison time and a criminal record, as in a criminal case. The system’s safeguards against prosecutorial misconduct essentially only exist on paper. For example, in the aforementioned dissent Judge Kozinski observed that

[p]rofessional discipline is rare, and violations seldom give rise to liability for money damages. Criminal liability for causing an innocent man to lose decades of his life behind bars is practically unheard of.

The Innocence Project reported in 2020 that only a single prosecutor had ever had a taste of his own medicine and was jailed for misconduct which had resulted in a wrongful conviction. Again, in 2013 the Center for Prosecutor Integrity reported that 43% of persons nationwide believe that prosecutorial misconduct is widespread, and that in the exceedingly rare cases where judges refer prosecutors to the bar for misconduct, sanctions are only imposed about 1-2% of the time.

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The imbalance of terror in criminal proceedings is further exacerbated by the fact that the state has virtually unlimited resources, while the defendant must either pay for his own defense or throw himself upon the mercy of a public defender. Thus, almost no plea deal is free of coercion, despite the legal fiction to the contrary.

A common saying is that a trial is a failure when either one or both sides are being unreasonable and/or failing to accurately evaluate the situation if they cannot come to a settlement. Knowing the imbalance of terror and the corrupt nature of prosecutors, one should give the benefit of the doubt to a criminal defendant in the question of who is being unreasonable.

The epidemic of prosecutorial misconduct already merits ample discipline. But once we add the racial and political dimensions, it becomes even worse.

Apologists for Critical Race Theory (CRT) like to claim that it is only an academic legal theory. But this academic theory guides real-world actions.

If blacks and others are given leniency, whites by comparison will simply be treated more harshly. This inherent disparity in justice, in which like is not treated as like, is further exacerbated by the way in which soulless prosecutors are obsessed with their “batting average” to advance their career. If they are lenient to blacks, they must make up for that leniency by being harsher to whites if they want to keep their numbers up. Thus, the proliferation of Critical Race Theory in the justice system makes even seemingly apolitical cases political in nature. It is a zero-sum game.

This is all without considering overt instances of politically and racially-motivated anarcho-tyranny, which are only increasing in number and severity. Once we consider cases of prosecutorial misconduct, such as January 6, the various Charlottesville civil and criminal proceedings, and the Rise Above Movement, to name only a few, jury nullification becomes no longer merely justified, but is now an affirmative duty.

There may be some concerns about a campaign of jury nullification, but they can be addressed. The first issue is that us whites, unlike many blacks, don’t want criminals running around in our community. But I am not calling for jury nullification for heinous crimes.

Furthermore, whites are more receptive to correcting themselves via punishment, and the process itself is oftentimes ample punishment. Even if the defendant was granted bail, it may have been with restrictions. They have also been through multiple pre-trial hearings, which are a combination of the dentist’s office, the Department of Motor Vehicles, and the Principal’s office, all bringing months of extreme stress. Many cases take months or even years, because defendants will almost always waive their right to a speedy trial to conduct essential discovery, negotiate, track down witnesses, and so on.

Additionally, which is more dangerous: an entirely or mostly non-violent white defendant, or the American regime? The legal system has aggrandized black criminals, and while most crime is intra-racial rather than inter-racial, inter-racial black-on-white crime is oftentimes tragically violent. Who are you more likely to be mugged by: a white criminal, or a police officer who targets white drivers more than black drivers to meet his quota for frivolous tickets in order to reduce his risk of becoming the next Derek Chauvin? Which thief and is more morally culpable and economically damaging: a porch pirate, or Congress and the IRS? Also remember that the legal system stole our right to peacefully protest and assemble, which is more precious than any car stereo.

Second, even when there is a legitimate victim, he is not without remedy if the defendant prevails in a criminal trial. It is common for defendants to face both criminal and civil proceedings. In civil court, the victim does not have the overwhelming power of the state on his side, and if the defendant can’t pay, he is effectively judgment-proof. But this is offset by the fact that the standard for evidence is usually much lower — a preponderance of the evidence (just over 50%), or alternately clear and convincing evidence — as opposed to that of being beyond a reasonable doubt, as in criminal court. Jury nullification will not leave most legitimate victims without some form of relief.

The third issue is the fact that even though not all prosecutors and judges are woke or immoral, the good ones have been unable, or unwilling, to rein their colleagues in. The good ones, if they are wise, should welcome a campaign of mass jury nullification because it will help discipline their unethical colleagues, and thus in the long term bolster the legal system instead of undermine it. Judge Kozinski was absolutely correct when he wrote that “[t]here is an epidemic of Brady violations abroad in the land.” But he was wrong in saying, “Only judges can put a stop to it.” It has been over a decade since he wrote those words, and judges haven’t merely failed to put a stop to prosecutorial misconduct, but it has intensified. It is obvious that an outside force is needed. Jury nullification is that force.

Fourth, if someone is uncomfortable with standard jury nullification, which I will label as “hard” jury nullification, there is a “soft” version in which a juror can say that the prosecution failed to carry its burden. It’s not merely each crime that must be proved beyond a reasonable doubt, but each and every element of that crime. If a single element is missing, the legal argument fails. Further, beyond a reasonable doubt is an extremely high bar. It doesn’t require epistemological nihilism to say that the prosecution failed to carry its burden on each element. It’s also easy to say that you didn’t find a witness’s testimony to be credible, or at least not credible enough. Clamming up and failing to discuss the issues with one’s fellow jurors can lead to you being kicked off a jury, as is openly saying that you are pursuing jury nullification before a verdict is returned. Soft nullification is more like jury skepticism than jury nullification. Given the fact that all too many jurors are impressed by authority, some skepticism is well-warranted.

A retaliatory campaign of jury nullification is entirely justified due to the rising tide of lawfare, anti-white hate, and anarcho-tyranny. If the judiciary chooses to remain deaf to reason and morality, let us speak to them in the only language which they understand: power. If this causes chaos, so be it. As Angelo Plume has argued, we should be more focused on causing problems for the system than finding solutions, because it’s not our system.

We have a duty to fight back as best we can. Not everyone can be a front-line activist, donor, writer, or candidate. But jury nullification is something that everyone can do. As such, we should treat dodging jury duty as tantamount to draft dodging in the culture war.