Case: 25CI1:16-cr-00836-LER Document #: 224 Filed: 07/07/2017 Page 1 of 4

IN THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE FIRST JUDICIAL DISTRICT

OF HINDS COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI

STATE OF MISSISSIPPI

VS. CAUSE NO. 16-836

ROBERT SHULER SMITH DEFENDANT

MOTION FOR SEQUESTRATION OF TRIAL JURY

COMES NOW, the State of Mississippi, by and through the Office of the Mississippi

Attorney General and moves this Court, pursuant to Rule 18.8(b) of the Mississippi Rules of

Criminal Procedure, for sequestration of the trial jury when this case comes on for trial,

commencing on July 31, 2017. In support of its Motion for Sequestration, the State of Mississippi

would show the following:

(1) As the Court is aware, this case was tried in late December 2016 and early January

2017 and terminated on January 4, 2017, when the Court declared a mistrial and later set this matter

for retrial in June 2017. The case was continued and is now set for retrial on July 31, 2017.

(2) In order to permit the orderly process of the trial, and to prevent undue outside

influences upon the jurors who will try this case, the State moves this Court to sequester the petit

juror which will hear and decide this case throughout the entire trial.

(3) As the Court is aware, this matter has been a subject of intense and sustained publicity

since the Defendant was initially charged in this case back on September 7, 2016. Media coverage

has included newspaper articles see Exhibit A attached hereto (excerpt from Clarion Ledger

article) as well as television coverage see Exhibit B attached hereto (MSNEWSNOW story from

WLBT-TV) and even social media commentary on the LinkedIn website see Exhibit C attached

hereto (excerpt from article on LinkedIn). Indeed, as recently as May 25, 2017, the Clarion Ledger
Case: 25CI1:16-cr-00836-LER Document #: 224 Filed: 07/07/2017 Page 2 of 4

carried an article about the mistrial in the identity fraud case against Christopher Butler, but the

article also addresses Butlers role in this case against Smith. See Exhibit D, attached hereto.

(4) After the earlier trial of this case, the Court permitted counsel for the State and

defense counsel to interview some of the jurors who served in the earlier trial to determine whether

there was juror misconduct which needed to be investigated further. One of those jurors, Anna Scott,

indicated that she had become friends on Facebook another social media platform with one of

the other jurors during the trial of this case back in December and January. See Exhibit E, attached

hereto (excerpt from Interview of Juror Anna Scott).

(5) The Court will also recall that media representatives sat through the entire trial in the

balcony of the courtroom back in December and January, and that complete updates were given daily

both in the Clarion Ledger newspaper and on one or more of the local television news stations,

including WLBT-TV and WAPT-TV. The prosecutors received repeated requests for comment. The

Court may also recall that at the outset of the jury selection process, one of the prospective jurors in

the venire was even live tweeting from her cell phone and those tweets were being picked up and re-

tweeted by members of the press who were in the courtroom. The prospective juror was dismissed

for cause by the Court.

(6) It is essential that the parties and the Court be confident that the jurors who try this

case beginning July 31, 2017, will be free from any and all outside influences on their consideration

of the evidence and the charges in this case. That can best be accomplished by sequestering the jury

and precluding them from having access either to local newspapers or to local news coverage of the

trial from start to finish.

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Case: 25CI1:16-cr-00836-LER Document #: 224 Filed: 07/07/2017 Page 3 of 4

(7) The trial of this case is not set to commence for approximately three weeks from now.

Thus, the State of Mississippi is making a timely request for sequestration, as mandated by Rule

18.8(b) of the Mississippi Rules of Criminal Procedure and prevailing law on this issue. See

Baldwin v. State, 732 So.2d 236 (Miss. 1999). The State is making this request well in advance of

the 48-hour mandate of Rule 18.8(b) and well before the commencement of the trial, lest any

suggestion be made that the State waited too late. See Shelton v. State, 728 So.2d 105, 112 (Miss.

App. 1998) (trial court properly denied request for sequestration made well into the trial).

(8) The State understands that the decision whether to sequester the jury is committed

to the sound discretion of the trial judge. Since this case concerns an elected pubic official, the State

urges the Court to exercise its discretion in favor of sequestration. Once the trial has commenced,

or once one or more jurors should be subjected to improper outside influences, it will be too late to

un-ring the bell or to remedy the problem with sequestration at that point. The time to act is now,

and the Court should act in favor of protecting the jurors from undue outside influence from the

beginning of the trial and throughout the duration of this important trial.

WHEREFORE, premises considered, the State of Mississippi respectfully requests this

Court issue an order directing that the petit jurors selected to hear this case be sequestered and that

they be precluded during their sequestration from having access to local newspapers, television,

social media or any other means of outside influence upon them throughout the trial and until such

time as they have heard all the evidence and completed their deliberations in this case.

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Case: 25CI1:16-cr-00836-LER Document #: 224 Filed: 07/07/2017 Page 4 of 4

THIS the 7th day of July, 2017.

Respectfully submitted,

JIM HOOD, ATTORNEY GENERAL

BY: s/ Robert G. Anderson

Robert G. Anderson
Special Assistant Attorney General
MS Bar # 1589
Post Office Box 220
Jackson, Mississippi 39205
Telephone: (601) 576-4254
E-mail: rande@ago.state.ms.us

CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE

I, Robert G. Anderson, hereby certify that I have this day filed the above and forgoing Motion

via the Courts electronic case filing process, which caused a copy to be served upon Jim Waide,

Attorney for the Defendant, Robert Shuler Smith, at his usual e-mail address of

waide@waidelaw.com and upon Sharon D. Gipson, Attorney for the Defendant, at her usual e-mail

address of sdg_esq@yahoo.com.

This the 7th day of July, 2017.

s/ Robert G. Anderson
Robert G. Anderson
Special Assistant Attorney General
MS Bar No. 1589

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