Aug

Maybe Biskupic’s Rhetoric was a matter of Jury Strategy…

The Wispolitics.com CourtWatch blog reports a response to a motion filed by US Attorney Steven Biskupic in the Georgia Thompson case. Commentator Jessica McBride was quick to note that the name Doyle was used 14 times in the filing, showing the clearly political nature of the case in a way we didn’t see at trial.

During the trial and its immediate fall-out spin session, Democrats were quick to stress that the trial was about one employee, not the administration. They relied heavily on this comment in the opening statement of Biskupic: “This case is not about the politicians you’re going to hear about.”

His filing this week, though, used Doyle’s name multiple times, talked about the clearly political nature of the case, etc. What gives? Let me toss out one theory.

Biskupic and his crew are all very smart people. And their goal as prosecutors was to get a conviction. That means convincing a jury of twelve Wisconsin citizens, a jury drawn from registered voter lists, that Georgia Thompson was guilty.

Now, recall that 45% of Wisconsinites approve of the job Jim Doyle is doing as governor and intend to vote for his reelection. So if Biskupic made the case about Doyle, he would tick off 45% of his jury, and it might cost him the conviction.

In other words, Biskupic HAD to say in the opening statement that this case is NOT about Doyle, because he had to open the minds of jurors, telling them they could vote to convict without voting against the man they intend to vote for for governor.

So during the trial, the Biskupic team downplayed the Doyle connection as part of its jury strategy.
Now that the trial is over, in the appeals filing the Biskupic team doesn’t need to limit itself as much.

From today’s Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:

“The evidence at trial established that Adelman Travel had significant contacts with and connections to the Administration of Governor James Doyle,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Greg Haanstad wrote in a pleading filed Monday.

“Georgia Thompson was aware of that relationship, perceived Adelman Travel to be the politically favored choice of the Doyle Administration, and as a result took extreme affirmative steps to rig the bid in favor of Adelman Travel,” he wrote.

Last 5 posts by Daniel