Fifteen Houstonians called for jury duty filed into a courtroom Thursday afternoon. They were there for an unusually high-profile case for municipal courts, known for hearing traffic violations and facilitating weddings.
Three of the 15 would be selected to decide the outcome of a case alleging that a woman had violated Houston law by feeding the homeless without the city’s permission.
Roughly an hour later, the jury pool filed back out — all 15 of them. The lawyers had been unable to fill an unbiased jury.
Too many of the potential jurors said that even if the defendant, Elisa Meadows, was guilty, they were unwilling to issue the $500 fine a city attorney was seeking, said Ren Rideauxx, Meadows’ attorney. A few jurors were also struck because they could not stay late that afternoon to serve on a jury.
The busted jury panel illuminates the potential difficulties the city could face in enforcing its controversial law through a jury of peers. Roughly 90 tickets have been issued since March to volunteers with the loosely organized Food Not Bombs, which serves meals to people in need near Central Library. The city has yet to win a single case. The one case that reached a verdict was decided for the plaintiff. City attorneys have repeatedly asked for the other cases to be reset, according to the defendant’s lawyers. On Thursday, two other cases against Food Not Bombs volunteers were dismissed, said Remington Alessi, who represented the volunteers, because the city had not filed responses to motions.
In an emailed statement, City Attorney Arturo Michel said that because a dismissal was in response to complaints of delays, there was “nothing to read into the dismissals regarding strategy, policy decisions, or an overall view of the cases by the judiciary.” He did not mention whether he intended to refile and did not comment on the failure to assemble a jury panel.
It’s common for jury panels to be “busted” when it comes to controversial laws and issues, said Wade Smith, a criminal defense attorney and partner at Looney, Smith & Conrad. He pointed to murder and sexual assault as cases involving issues that a lot of people have strong feelings about. People who already have their minds made up can be struck from a jury.
Smith’s partner, Clay Conrad, thought the issue of feeding the homeless could intersect with deeply held values so much that those values could express themselves even after an “unbiased” jury is selected. He’s written a book on jury nullification, which happens when jurors believe in the defendant’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt but still acquit.
“A lot of times, a jury will nullify the law while thinking they followed it. Because they’re interpreting the facts and the law in a way to get to a verdict that they feel they can be proud of,” he said. “At the end of the day, the jury has to decide: Is this guy a criminal, or is he a good neighbor? I could see the jury saying, ‘This guy is a good neighbor.’”
City attorneys can choose to refile the dismissed cases; they did so during former Mayor Sylvester Turner’s administration after previous cases were dismissed because city witnesses did not appear in court. Phillip Payter, an associate attorney at Sullo & Sullo, said that the city also had the option to drop Meadows’ case if attorneys took the busted jury as a sign it wasn’t a good case to prosecute, though he did not find it likely. The city can reschedule the case for trial once more, with a new jury panel to choose from.
When asked whether he intended to continue taking action against Food Not Bombs volunteers for serving free meals outside the library, Mayor John Whitmire told the Chronicle Thursday, “I’m sensitive to the homeless issue. We will be addressing it in a different conversation. But, in the meantime, we need better public safety to encourage people to feel welcome.”
When speaking with the Houston Regional Business Council, Whitmire said people do not have the right “to camp out on our streets” and that “activists” should not “interfere with sound, safe, healthy plans for the homeless,” according to a Wednesday Fox26 report. It was unclear whether, by “activists,” he was referring to Food Not Bombs volunteers serving meals outside the library.
Food Not Bombs’ website frames the distribution of free meals to those in need as a form of activism against society’s moral failings, and in Houston, they’d been doing so outside Central Library downtown for roughly two decades. In 2012, the city passed a law against giving free meals to people in need without permission, but Mayor Annise Parker’s administration gave permission to Food Not Bombs. That position was reversed by former Mayor Sylvester Turner.
The three Food Not Bombs volunteers with court dates arrived at the municipal court, which overlooks a police lot where Houston has asked good Samaritans to feed the homeless instead of near the library, at 8 a.m. Thursday. That day marked Nick Cooper’s seventh time missing work and having to arrange childcare for his two-year-old daughter for a case that reset for a later date. When his case was dismissed, he stayed to watch Meadows’ case.
Meadows spent most of the day waiting for her trial to start and reading “The Year of Magical Thinking” by Joan Didion. That morning, she was told to return at noon for the trial. But the courtroom didn’t open until 1 p.m., and then the court reporter was held up in traffic. At around 1:40 p.m., when proceedings began, Erica Schwam, the city’s attorney, said the city was still checking to see if it had any evidence that would prove Food Not Bombs had not received permission from Mayor Annise Parker. She asked to either exclude any discussion of such permission during the trial or to reset the case until they had time to look for mitigating evidence.
Judge Imelda Reyes-Castillo denied the motion, pointing out that the issue of permission was given in another case about six months prior “and so there would have been sufficient time.”
The jury pool walked in, single file. A wedding party came and went in the hallway outside, heels and cameras clicking, bride beaming.Then, the men and women, too biased about the ordinance to hear the case, filed back out.
“That was crazy,” one rejected juror said to another.