You’d be forgiven if you thought a story about a $125,000 attempt to bribe a juror had occurred abroad. Or in a Trump trial.
But it happened in suburban Minneapolis this weekend in a $250 million Covid-related fraud case.
The jurors are supposed to be anonymous to all but the lawyers for defense and prosecution, yet a woman dropped a bag of cash off at the home of the juror’s father in law, calling her by first name, promising more for acquittal.
Dressed in black, a mysterious woman arrived at a juror’s suburban house late Sunday night, clutching a party bag stuffed with wads of cash, nearly $120,000 in all.
It was a present for the 23-year-old juror in the Feeding Our Future federal trial, the woman explained to the juror’s father-in-law, who answered the door just before 9 p.m. If the juror voted to acquit the seven defendants in the fraud case, there would “be more of that present tomorrow,” the woman said, handing over a white floral gift bag filled with $100, $50 and $20 bills, according to an FBI search warrant filed Monday.
The young woman fears retribution.
Reportedly, bribery is not common here. In 1998, the CSM reported that when 562 judges responded to a survey, they “reported only three cases of jurors being bribed, out of more than 26,000 trials in a three-year period.” But how often might a hung jury be the result of a bribe or a threat? And how would we know?
