People of the Republic of Atlasia vs. Midwest Governor LeBron FitzGerald

[ZuWo]

The office of the Attorney General has obtained evidence which suggests that Midwest Governor LeBron FitzGerald may have committed a crime against Atlasia and hereby charges him with voter intimidation as outlined in section 2, clause 7 of the Re-Consolidated Criminal Justice Act:

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For public convenience, the constitutional provisions regarding trials are as follows:

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Keeping in mind the other pending cases and the heavy workload of the Justices in general, the office of the Attorney General kindly requests the Supreme Court to grant certiorari in this case.

[ZuWo]

I am glad to see the court has designated one of their Justices to preside over the trial and await the defendant's first steps.

[ZuWo]

*bangs gavel*

Alright everyone, we're officially back in session. I will begin arranging the jury selection. I trust both sides have used the recess period to prepare their arguments.

I have.

I guess I will present my case once the jury empanelling process has been completed and the members of the jury have sworn in.

[ZuWo]

The prosecution has obtained its evidence through former Attorney General and current at-large Senator Bacon King, who has expressed his willingness to testify under oath. The evidence consists of at least one IRC chat log, which shows a brief conversation between Midwest Governor LeBron FitzGerald and a citizen of the Midwest who voted in the recall election. The conversation has been saved and can be viewed here.

Furthermore, I am in possession of another IRC chat log, which displays how Bacon King and Flo confront the Governor with his allegedly illegal act and the Governor admits to having made a "slight error". If the Court wishes to see the conversation in full in this thread, I will post it as well.

As for the prime evidence in this case, i.e. the conversation between the Governor and the Midwest citizen mentioned in the first paragraph, I contend that LeBron FitzGerald committed a crime against Atlasia as described in section 2, clause 7 of the Re-Consolidated Criminal Justice Act. Clause 7 states that it is unlawful to contact voters "with disinformation about the election process in order to prevent casting of a valid ballot".

In fact, there was no plausible reason for the defendant to message a citizen of his region who voted for the Governor's recall in the first place, and there was no legal basis whatsoever for him to ask the voter in question to "check the recall vote" and, most importantly, alert him of an alleged "error", namely the positioning of the X on the ballot. In fact, the prosecution is not aware of any ballots which have ever been declared invalid in any Atlasian election for the reason mentioned by Governor LeBron FitzGerald. As evidenced by the citizen's immediate rejection of the Governor's claim it can be safely assumed that this is common knowledge, especially among elected officeholders. Therefore, the defendant's remarks, and his misleading claim that there was an "error" in the ballot in question, constitute a clear case of disinformation. The act of spreading disinformation about the election process is rightly considered a serious offense in the Republic of Atlasia, and it seems all the more reprehensible when it is committed by a Governor who is also the administrator of the voting booth at the same time. Finally, it cannot be ruled out that other voters of the Midwest have been approached by the Governor in a similar manner.

As I said earlier, I am ready to present the second chat log to which I referred and call Bacon King as a witness of the prosecution. The court may have taken notice of the fact that the Senator has posted a brief leave of absence.

[ZuWo]

This is the chat log in question:

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As can be gleaned from this exchange, the Governor not only did not deny that he contacted a Midwest citizen after the voter's ballot had been cast, but he also admitted his mistake.

[ZuWo]

The prosecution will be able to deal with the arguments made by attorney windjammer as soon as the witness, Senator Bacon King, is ready to be questioned. I will be able to react to the attorney's remarks on my own if necessary but, understandably, it would be preferable to have a witness present.

[ZuWo]

I will ask my question to my witness as soon as Justice Oakvale directs me to do so. I could ask my question tomorrow at the earliest.

[ZuWo]

My question to witness Bacon King is quite straightforward:

Can we be certain that the person named "LeBronFitzGerald" in the chat logs is the Midwest Governor rather than someone trying to impersonate him?


For the record, Gustaf may be the second witness of the prosecution. If he is willing to testify I will pose my question to him as soon as I have heard back from him.

[ZuWo]

Thank you, Bacon King.

While it is generally possible to impersonate other users of the Atlas Forum on the IRC, this has not been the case in the chatlogs in question. Based on the evidence we have seen we can say with near-absolute certainty that the person posting as "LeBronFitzGerald" was, in fact, the Midwest Governor.

My second and probably last witness is Gustaf, the Midwest citizen and voter who was approached by Governor LeBron FitzGerald. I want to ask him if he could verify that the person posting as "Gustaf" in the first chatlog was actually him.

[ZuWo]

I can confirm that Bacon King sent me the PM on December 4. The insinuation that he simply looked up the Governor's IRC host address a few days ago for the purpose of this trial and, in other words, has committed perjury, is moot; he hasn't.

[ZuWo]

In other words, the argument of the defense hinges on the assumption that witness Bacon King (and possibly the Attorney General himself) committed perjury because the IRC host address that was posted is undeniably LeBron FitzGerald's.

Sorry if I say this prematurely but, in my humble opinion, unless there are new questions which don't simply make Bacon King repeat the exact same thing over and over again I think we are ready to enter the next stage of the trial.

[ZuWo]

Mr. Attorney, while you didn't explicitly state that Bacon King (and myself, the Attorney General) lied to the Court when it was revealed that the Midwest Governor posted from the above-mentioned IRC host address during the chats, this is the only plausible explanation as to why the witness's testimony under oath should be dismissed.

And frankly, I don't see what we and the Court gain from making Bacon King answer your latest question and those questions that are likely to follow; I see the point you are going to try to make, which is that because Bacon King made a mistake nearly two years ago he must be an unreliable witness, but I consider this line of questioning to be frivolous and irrelevant.

I apologize to the Court for speaking up but I thought it was necessary. This is all I have to say for now.

[ZuWo]

Several of us have spent the last weeks debating whether Governor LeBron FitzGerald did or did not contact voters of his region with disinformation about the election process, which is explicitly mentioned as a crime against Atlasia in the Re-Consolidated Criminal Justice Act, during last year's gubernatorial recall election in the Midwest.

I am convinced that the evidence the prosecution has presented undeniably shows that the Midwest Governor is guilty of that crime. Indeed, two chatlogs were presented, the first of which highlights that the Governor attempted to mislead Midwest citizen Gustaf by alerting him of an alleged mistake in his ballot, which, if Gustaf had tried to correct his "error", would have invalidated his vote. As has been pointed out, the "error" the Governor referred to was a negligible aspect concerning the layout of Gustaf's ballot that is very widespread in Atlasian voting booths and has never rendered a vote invalid. The second chatlog then suggests that the Governor, when confronted with the first chatlog, admits his guilt by saying that he made an error.

The defense, opting not to respond to the first part of the argument I outlined in the previous paragraph, has claimed that Governor LeBron FitzGerald was impersonated by an anonymous Atlasian citizen and was not responsible for the content of the chatlogs. However, this assertion was disproven when witness Bacon King testified under oath that the IRC host address of the person posting as "LeBronFitzGerald" clearly identified that person as the Midwest Governor. I was able to confirm that Bacon King sent me all the evidence including the Governor's IRC host address the same night the two chatlogs were created. Indeed, to doubt his testimony is tantamount to insinuate that Bacon King committed perjury and that I, the Attorney General, may have given false testimony as well. Importantly, the manner in which the witness chose to present the information he obtained, i.e. whether it was presented as part of a personal message or a screenshot, is ultimately irrelevant to the quality of the evidence.

I conclude my summary by thanking Justice Oakvale, Attorney Windjammer, the witnesses and the members of the jury for their time and attention.

[ZuWo]

Frankly, I'm getting impatient too. After all, this is just a closing summary, and I think it should be in everyone's interest to conclude this trial as soon as possible.

[ZuWo]

Your computer problems are unfortunate and I'm sorry to hear about them. But, to put things in perspective, since I presented my closing summary 9 days ago you have made more than 50 posts, some of them quite long, on various sub-boards on a wide range of topics. That's why this delay seems unnecessary to me.

[ZuWo]

I thank the members of the jury for their efficient work.

[ZuWo]

Thanks, everyone. The jury is dismissed.

*bangs gavel*

We'll now progress to the conclusion of this matter. Does either party wish to be heard in regard to sentencing?

I do not have any specific preference in regard to the length of sentencing. Indeed, I believe we have discussed the offense that was committed in great detail so I trust the court to hand down a reasonable sentence.