Legal Ethics
Va. Attorney Charged with ‘Embracery’
Posted Nov 6, 2007 6:41 PM CST
By Martha Neil
A Virginia civil rights attorney is now defending an unusual criminal case in modern-day America.
Accused of improperly attempting to influence an Albemarle County grand jury, Deborah Wyatt is charged with five misdemeanor counts of embracery, an English common-law crime that dates back to the Magna Carta and was incorporated into Virginia law when the commonwealth was established, reports the Daily Progress, a Charlottesville newspaper.
The case resulted from conversations Wyatt had with grand jurors who were considering indicting a client of hers who had been involved in an auto accident. Wyatt—who wanted to be called as a witness to explain that the client had had an epileptic seizure—apparently doesn't contest the conversations, just the prosecution's interpretation of them, according to the newspaper. She and her lawyer say she did nothing wrong.
“There’s no corrupt intent,” says John Zwerling, an Alexandria attorney representing Wyatt. “Just saying that, ‘so-and-so is available to be a witness’ is OK.”
A graduate of the University of Virginia School of Law, Wyatt has twice argued before the U.S. Supreme Court. She has previously clashed with local authorities because of her work on civil rights cases, the newspaper reports.
(Hat tip: Virginia Lawyers Weekly law blog.)
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Comments
Allan Huss
Nov 9, 2007 10:00 AM CST
What bothers me here is that counsel is attempting to represent a client and still wants to testify as a witness. See Rule 3.7 of the Rules of Professional Conduct.
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Jason
Nov 9, 2007 10:55 AM CST
Huss, that rule only applies at trial. And it only applies where there the trier of fact might be confused by the lawyer’s switch of roles. The rule is much narrower than most lawyers think it is.
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Marc
Nov 9, 2007 11:11 AM CST
reminds me of song:
Embrace me
My sweet embraceable you
Embrace me
My irreplaceable you
Just to look at you
My heart grows tipsy in me
You and you alone
Bring out the grand jury iin me
Dont be naughty lawyer
Leave the juirors alone
My sweet embraceable you
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W.R. Chambers
Nov 9, 2007 12:07 PM CST
I don’t think the charge should have been brought because, on the facts as reported in the newspaper, Wyatt was not trying to influence the grand jury. Rather she was asking for the opportunity to influence the grand jury by testifying as a witness. She asked grand jurors to call her as a witness.
Any influencing that she might have been able to do would have come under oath from the witness box.
In her conversations with the grand jurors, Wyatt did not give the grand jurors any information about the subject matter of the grand jury. She merely alerted them to the availability of a witness. Apparently she did not tell them anything about what her testimony would be.
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Philip L Marcus
Nov 9, 2007 1:55 PM CST
In resorting to a supposedly ‘received’ common law crime that most attorneys never heard of (I certainly didn’t), the Commonwealth’s Attorney appears to be trying to influence grand juries himself, outside the grand jury room, and even to be trying to frighten off witnesses who might exculpate targets.
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Robert T. Garnett
Nov 9, 2007 3:04 PM CST
Note: In a county election this past Tuesday the Commonwealth’s Attorney who initially asked a judge to appoint a special prosecutor to look into this matter was not re-elected. He had served three terms. The story breaking the news of Mrs. Wyatt being charged was a front-page banner headline in the local paper the day of the election.
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Bryan
Nov 9, 2007 4:19 PM CST
Jason, that’s incorrect regarding the Rules of Professional Conduct. Rule 3.7 would be applicable.
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Jonathan Gordy
Nov 14, 2007 12:34 PM CST
Rule 3.7 in VA applies to any “adversarial proceeding”, not just trials (unlike the original ABA Rule). Perhaps that’s where Jason became confused. I still wonder though, is a grand jury “adversarial”? After all, there’s no opposing arguments presented during a grand jury, and the defense attorney wouldn’t be able to question witnesses.
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