The New Mexico Supreme Court issued a stay to a motion to allow a Doña Ana County juror who served in the trial of former Las Cruces police officer Brad Lunsford to testify if called by the defense.
The order effectively halts further district court proceedings in the Lunsford case, which is being appealed and includes post-trial motions alleging juror bias. The New Mexico Department of Justice continued to seek emergency relief in the court system, it said, to prevent juror intimidation and safeguard the integrity of the judicial process.
While the stay is in place, the State Supreme Court will consider whether the proceedings threaten the safety and privacy of the juror as they perform their civic duty, a news release from the New Mexico Dept. of Justice read.
More: Appeal hearing in Lunsford manslaughter conviction set for April 4
“America’s jury system demands that officers of the court maintain their commitment to a fair and equal application of the law, without regard to a citizen’s political beliefs,” Attorney General Raúl Torrez said. “Parties to a criminal case are afforded, as they were in this case, the opportunity to probe potential jurors for any potential bias and to strike a juror for cause based upon the record.”
“What is not allowed is an ideological witch hunt to discredit a juror’s service because a party does not like a verdict.”
Torrez said the Supreme Court’s ruling protects the Constitutional rights of any person who serves on a jury.
The State Department of Justice alleged that attempts by Lunsford’s defense to question the juror’s veracity opened them to online harassment and an alleged social media campaign meant to discredit the trial’s outcome.
“Attorney General Torres can continue to send out press releases from his desk in Santa Fe, and I will continue to fight for the constitutional rights of a wrongfully convicted police officer,” Lunsford’s attorney, Matthew Chandler, said. “The fact that the Court ruled it was error when his law clerk replaced two jurors prior to deliberations that were specifically selected by the Defense, in conjunction with what we believe was a concealed bias from another juror that was allowed to deliberate, is in our humble opinion plenty to cause any reasonable person to question the fairness of this jury trial.”
Chandler said the request for a retrial is not an attack on a juror’s past beliefs or opinions.
The New Mexico Department of Justice has maintained that to compel a juror to testify poses a significant risk to their safety and the impartiality of future jurors.
This article originally appeared on Las Cruces Sun-News: Juror on Lunsford case protected by New Mexico Supreme Court