Judge Excludes Evidence in Alaska Senator’s Trial

[Wretched Excess]

I think Stevens is as guilty as he can be, but he may be about to wriggle off the hook because of
over zealous federal prosecutors.

Judge Excludes Evidence in Alaska Senator’s Trial

WASHINGTON — The federal judge presiding over the corruption trial of Senator Ted Stevens dealt a sharp blow to the prosecution on Wednesday by excluding some evidence because he said Justice Department prosecutors used documents that they knew contained lies.

The judge, Emmet G. Sullivan of Federal District Court, declined to declare a mistrial or dismiss any of the seven felony counts, as had been urged by Mr. Stevens’s lawyers. But Judge Sullivan delivered a severe scolding to the prosecution and said he would bar the government from using two categories of evidence central to its case.

Perhaps more important, he said he would tell the jury on Thursday that he was excluding some of the prosecution’s evidence because “the government presented evidence the government knew was not true,” an instruction that is likely to undermine the credibility of the prosecution.

In a special hearing outside the presence of the jury, Judge Sullivan said, “The government knew the documents were lies.”

Mr. Stevens, a veteran Alaska Republican, is in the second week of a trial on charges that he knowingly failed to list on Senate disclosure forms some $250,000 in gifts and services he received from Bill Allen, an Alaska oil services tycoon and longtime friend. The judge had earlier admonished prosecutors for failing to turn over to the defense evidence about the gifts and services that were used mostly in the renovation of Mr. Stevens’s Alaska home.

Link

[Airwolf]

That could very well be.

[Duke Nukum]

I think using documents that the prosecutor knows to be untrue is a tad more then overzealous.

[DumbAss Tanker]

I think using documents that the prosecutor knows to be untrue is a tad more then overzealous.

Yeah, it's more like "Professional misconduct" and "Basis for a Bar disciplinary action."  I'm not rooting for Stevens, but at this point I'm so tired of the drumbeat press and the GOP having to lay there and take it like a zombie-drugged stripper at a biker party, that anything that raining on the Democrat parade is good news to me.