| Jury Convicts Ernest
Murphy On Drugs and Guns Charges Despite
SDNY Discovery Snafus
By Matthew
Russell Lee, @SDNYLIVE
SDNY COURTHOUSE,
August 20 -- A jury returned
guilty verdicts on drugs and
gun charges on August 20
against Ernest Murphy, one of
15 defendants in a
Brooklyn-based narcotics
conspiracy case brought by the
U.S. Attorney for the Southern
District of New York.
It
came after some electronic and
laboratory evidence was
suppressed by Circuit Judge
Richard J. Sullivan, who
rather than re-assigning has
kept many of his criminal
cases in the SDNY.
Murphy's
two Criminal Justice Act
lawyers, Patrick Joyce and
Robert Moore, complained to
Judge Sullivan on the eve of
trial that they had only then
been given 16 gigabytes of
audio and video recordings and
lab tests on crack cocaine.
Rather
than delay the trial, Judge
Sullivan ordered much of it
suppressed. During the five
day trial the government still
had a number of NYPD lab
technicians testimony, and
played wiretaps of cell phone
calls and calls from Riker's
Island, whose location in The
Bronx was cited as a basis for
venue in the SDNY.
In the
intercepted calls, there was
discussion of cooking,
packaging and selling crack
cocaine. Several times
reference was made to bringing
firearms to protect turf. A
government slang expert
witness said that "Shaquille"
jersey meant .32 caliber
pistol.
After the
jury got the case, they asked
to examine the drugs. Judge
Sullivan declined to send the
crack and ecstacy pills into
the jury room. Instead the
juror came out and passed them
hand to hand, in evidence
bags, in the jury box.
On the
second day of deliberations
the jury through the Court
Security Officer passed a note
that they wanted all audio
recordings and transcripts.
Judge Sullivan sent them in a
thumb drive and three binders,
as well as a menu to order
lunch.
But barely
an hour later, the jury
returned with its guilty
verdicts. Judge Sullivan
polled them, sent December 6
as the sentencing date -
Murphy faces a minimum of 15
years in prison and perhaps
more - then joined the jurors
for their lunch. The case is US
v. Ernest Murphy,
18-cr-373 (Sullivan).
The US
Attorney's Office, which had
sent senior AUSA Michael D.
Maimin over to try to put out
the fire occasioned by the
late discovery, must have
breathed a sigh of relief.
Inner City Press will continue
to cover this case - and, we
hope, Judge Sullivan's
sentencing in another case he
kept, US v. Rodriguez
(05-cr-221), which the
government is asking, under
seal, to have sealed.
Watch this site.
Judge
Sullivan several times during
the trial pointedly noted that
it is an open courtroom, a
strength of our system, anyone
can just walk in -- except for
US
v. Rodriguez,
apparently, on which Inner
City Press will have more, as
well as on the differences
between the SDNY's and EDNY's
boiler plate plea agreement
letters. Watch this site - and
see
also @InnerCityPress
and the new @SDNYLIVE.
***
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