Prosecutor Jeanine Pirro failed to secure a felony indictment against the woman three times, then lost a jury trial on a misdemeanor charge. Ouch.

A Washington, D.C., woman accused of assaulting a federal agent was found not guilty by a jury on Thursday, the latest embarrassment for Jeanine Pirro, President Donald Trump’s U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia.

Prosecutors had alleged Sidney Lori Reid kicked a Federal Bureau of Investigation agent during an altercation outside the D.C. Jail in July. Reid had been filming Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers while they were detaining a man who’d just been released from the jail.

Pirro’s office tried three times to indict Reid on a felony assault charge, but D.C. grand juries declined to return an indictment each time — a highly unusual occurrence that suggested the flimsiness of the government’s case.

After whiffing on the felony counts, prosecutors ended up trying Reid on a misdemeanor charge of assaulting or impeding a federal agent — but they couldn’t even win that case. The jury deliberated for less than two hours on Thursday before returning the verdict of not guilty, WUSA9 reported.

  • Jumbie@lemmy.zip
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    2 days ago

    She was never guilty. Accusing her and dragging her through the courts — further victimization — is a method of intimidation to other protesters.

    It’s the same tactic being used against Dotard’s political opponents as he “indicts” them.

    • explodicle@sh.itjust.works
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      18 hours ago

      It’s funny how they’ll prosecute people who didn’t do it, because I’ll vote not guilty even if they did do it.

    • N0t_5ure@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      This is exactly it. It costs a lot of money to hire attorneys and time, effort, and aggravation to fight charges. As a consequence, this weaponization of the justice system serves to chill the exercise of constitutional rights.

      • ReluctantMuskrat@lemmy.world
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        17 hours ago

        Yep. Many will feel compelled to take a plea because they don’t have the money to hire an attorney, and court-appointed attorneys are so over-loaded with cases they encourage the plea-route too.