Recording: Fattah jury hit snag after deliberations began

The dismissal last week of a juror in U.S. Rep. Chaka Fattah's federal corruption trial came after the panel told a federal judge it had hit a snag just hours into its deliberations, according to an audio recording obtained by the Inquirer.

The exact contents of the jury's note Thursday to U.S. District Judge Harvey Bartle III remain undisclosed. But in a sidebar conversation with the judge that afternoon, lawyers in the case referred to trouble in the jury room, and discussed whether the panel should be read the instructions typically given to jurors who report that they are deadlocked.

"The question is: Are we at the point where we're at a deadlock as opposed to whether someone isn't deliberating?" Bartle asked the lawyers Thursday after sending the jury home.

That recorded conversation, previously shielded in open court but made part of the court record, sheds light on Friday's mysterious dismissal of a juror for reasons Bartle has not disclosed publicly.

Lawyers for Fattah and his codefendants have said Bartle told them not to discuss the matter.

The newspaper obtained the recording Monday as the panel quietly deliberated the case for a second full day without reaching a verdict.

By early Thursday, it was clear something was amiss. Prosecutors and the defense team spent most of that day in Bartle's chambers.

Bartle dismissed the jury early, and by Friday morning - the next time the panel was seen in open court - an alternate had replaced one of its members.

The dismissed juror was later seen being escorted from the federal courthouse by security officers.

In the recorded sidebar conversation from Thursday, the lawyers and the judge mentioned discussions they had had earlier in the day in the judge's chambers, an exchange not included on the audio.

The exact nature of the problem was not mentioned. In debating how to respond, however, defense lawyer Robert Welsh, who represents Fattah codefendant Herbert Vederman, cited a 2007 decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit on the legal standard for dismissing jurors for misconduct in the midst of deliberations.

That ruling stemmed from the 2005 corruption trial of Corey Kemp, a former Philadelphia treasurer, in which a juror was dismissed after several colleagues on the panel told the judge she was not deliberating in good faith and had made statements such as "the government always lies." Asked by her fellow jurors to review certain pieces of evidence in the case, she reportedly replied, "Show it to someone who cares."

The Third Circuit upheld Kemp's conviction and, in deciding the appeal, set a standard for federal courts within its jurisdiction for dealing with the dismissal of jurors due to bias or refusal to deliberate.

Under those rules, a judge may not dismiss a juror if a refusal to deliberate stems from doubts held in good faith about the evidence in the case. If there is no "reasonable possibility" that the juror's unwillingness to participate is based on the evidence, however, the juror may be dismissed even after deliberations have begun.

Bartle did not directly address the dismissal of the Fattah juror in speaking to the newly reconstituted panel during a brief court session Friday morning.

Instead, he instructed jurors to begin their deliberations anew, and stressed the importance of being open to discussing the evidence with fellow jurors. He warned, however, that jurors should not feel pressured to change their individual decisions on the case based on the will of others on the panel.

"The important point is to reach the just verdict," he said. "There is no specific time frame. Take all the time you need to reach a just verdict."

Fattah, 59, is accused of accepting bribes and misusing charitable donations, campaign contributions, and federal grant funds under his control to pay off his personal and political debts.

He and four codefendants, all longtime political allies, are charged with crimes including racketeering conspiracy, fraud, and money laundering.

Jurors are expected to resume their deliberations Tuesday.

jroebuck@phillynews.com

215-854-2608

@jeremyrroebuck