All White Jury Reaches Verdict Over Lunch
Judge Leon Holmes’ Courtroom
I never get used to this. Alvin Clay and I spent a couple of hours together last night. He had spent a grueling day telling his story to the jury and I knew he was drained. He seemed surprisingly quiet and resigned as we considered the “what next” question. Part of him, I suspected, was eager for some closure.
Alvin asked me how I was feeling about the trial. “I have never seen an all-white jury do the right thing,” I said. “Maybe this time will be different.”
It wasn’t.
I don’t blame the jurors. They looked like pleasant, well-intentioned people; but they had obviously achieved consensus by the time the box lunches were cleared away. This wasn’t a difficult decision for them.
Steven Snyder is a deliberate, painstaking prosecutor with a mind-numbing attention to detail, but his opening and closing remarks to the jury were incendiary. The evidence presented at trial may have been all-smoke-and-no-fire, but his closing statements burned the courthouse down. Almost trembling with righteous indignation, Snyder derided the heartless greed on display in the Nealy-McCuien real estate scam. The fact that the only witness to suggest Alvin Clay knew what was going on was a pathological liar wasn’t mentioned. It was easy to forget that the US government told this man how to testify and then pretended to believe him.
After closing arguments I went to lunch with Alvin’s parents, his brother, and Sharon Christianson, a good hearted woman from New Jersey who answered my call to attend Mr. Clay’s trial. We ate our meal, dissected the closing statements, looked for rays of hope and found none. By the time we made it back to the courtroom the jury had its verdict.
Alvin Clay needs a world class appeals attorney.
If you fit the bill, or if you know of someone who might, please call me (817-688-6765). Alvin already has compentent counsel; what he needs is someone who is exceptionally skilled at writing appeals. This case will give you plenty to work with.
When the white jurors had delivered their verdict, Judge Holmes announced that there was a fire alert so the courthouse had to be vacated immediately. The jury hurried out of the building.
When I arrived at street level a small crowd of twenty supporters was numb with grief. The fire alert had been cancelled, but a fire truck was still waiting at curbside. There hadn’t been a real fire; they were just being careful.
It seemed appropriate somehow. There hadn’t been any fire in the courtroom either, but the jury decided to err on the side of caution. Donny McCuien may have told a few lies. In fact, every word he uttered was impeached by more credible witnesses. But you couldn’t side with the government unless you believed McCuien. Mr. Snyder believed him. So did Mr. Hays, the clean-cut FBI agent. So the jury went along for the ride.
They almost always do.
When a jury without a single black juror convicted Ann Colomb and her sons of selling millions of dollars of drugs from their FHA bungalo, I printed an angry diatribe called “The end of the innocence” (based on the popular song Tucker Melancon played during sidebar conferences). The local paper printed my piece in their web blog. A young Latina, the only non-white juror, called me up the next day. Her initial reaction had been the same as mine, but eleven white folks disagreed and she lost her nerve.
If any of the jurors in the Clay trial read this please know that I’m not angry with you. I only ask that you read my Vindictive Prosecution piece before laying this exhausting chapter of your life to rest. You owe that much to Alvin Clay.
Friends of Justice is just getting started with this case. Every intervention we have ever performed began with a conviction; it’s just a painful part of the process. The Alvin Clay case demonstrates, in real time, how and why innocent people are convicted in these United States.
If we hope to build a new civil rights movement in this country we must learn to engage the courtroom. Alvin Clay is the closest thing to Rosa Parks we are going to find. The Old Jim Crow (Jena notwithstanding) is largely an artifact of history.
But the New Jim Crow is just as frightening. Check into any courthouse in America and you will quickly learn what I mean.
We need to transcend the “Sharpton Syndrome” that has sucked energy and credibility from the faded remnants of the old civil rights movement. We wait passively for a sign of unequal treatment, then we intervene before the media loses interest–often without checking our facts. The goal is to lure in the cameras even if this means standing with irresponsible prosecutors like Mike Nifong in North Carolina. We go for the spectacular cases that have already grabbed the headlines.
Instead, we need to seach out the anonymous tragedies unfolding under our noses.
Alvin Clay has been subjected to a vindictive prosecution and investigation stretching over five long years. The government’s behavior has been outrageous and criminal; but nobody knows because hardly anyone is paying attention.
A mature movement will focus on folks like Alvin Clay.
The courthouse really is on fire, folks. It’s time to grow up and get real.
Friends of Justice 
What a shame. I’ll keep on praying for Alvin Clay and his family.
As I read this, I wondered how our country can still be so odd – how we can, on the one hand, nominate an African-American person for President, and on the other, find people guilty who should not be found guilty. I will search my friends for a strong appeals lawyer. I have to have some hope.
In the meantime, what can we do for Mr. Clay and his family?
It’s very hard to understand this. So sorry for Alvin Clay. Will there be an appeal?
Sitting herereading Martin Luther King speeches as your email has come in late tonight.
Bless your energy, strength and courage and commitment
I like your attitude, Alan. It reminds me somewhat of Atticus in To Kill a Mockingbird, but this event like the Tulia drug sting will have a better ending. As you said, it just takes time and the right people to take an interest. I too remain in prayer.
While you seem to be understanding of the system the white jurors were in, I ask how can they live with themselves. Can they really think they were just and honorable? Having power should put a healthy dose of fear in a person. I say, may what they’ve done to others be done to them, unless there’s a better way for them to wake up. Our justice system and prison system shows that we’ve failed as a culture. Only we can bring back a worthy system.
I never get used to it. I remember how Dwight McDonald shredded the credibility of Tom Coleman in the Kareem Abdul Jabbar (aka Creamie) White trial. I remember how Terry McEachern would emphasize each syllable of Creamies name–Kareem-Ab-dul-Ju-Bar White, being sure the jury saw a black man with a name unlike any of theirs in the defendant’s chair. Nevertheless, after Tom Coleman’s credibility was torn to shreds and the jury was dismissed for deliberation, I thought they would be out long enough to pick a foreman, take a vote, and return with a not guilty verdict. But they were out a long time, and I began to worry. But McEachern was not worried. I overheard him say, “It’ll be alright. Bewley’ll bring ’em around.” And Bewley or somebody brought ’em around. I understand it was not an easy decision, and that one of the women who was holding out suffered physical illness in the days to follow. After the guilty verdict was announced, there was a recess before the jury began deliberations on the punishment phase. I refused to stand when the judge reentered the room. I nudged Brad sitting next to me, and told him I was not standing. Brad nudged whoever was sitting next to him, and so on down the line, and a whole row of us remained seated when the judge reentered. The bailiff later asked Alan why I didn’t stand. Alan told him to ask me, so he did. I told him the judge puts on his britches one leg at a time, just like I do. He said you stand out of respect. I told him I didn’t have any respect for the court system which had made such a travesty of justice.
Dwight McDonald, the young black defense attorney, was totally devastated. A few days later we were at a meeting at Texas Tech in Lubbock. Dwight and Alan and maybe another person or two were seated at a table in front taking questions. Dwight remarked that once a jury makes a decision, it can almost never be overturned. He was of the opinion that in this case nothing could be done. Nancy was seated on the front row. She got up and strode to the table and banged her fist on it and said. “No! We’re going to get all of them out!” People can debate who got them out, but they got out.
I was not at the Colomb trial in Louisiana, but I remember how devastated, almost to the point of illness, I was when I heard of the guilty verdict in that trial. But that verdict was not the end, it was overturned, thanks in great part to Alan’s continual prodding.
Then I heard of the Alvin Clay guilty verdict just yesterday, a verdict based almost entirely if I understand it correctly on the testimony of a witness as badly tainted as Tom Coleman in Tulia. It seemed there should have been an acquittal, but I am no longer surprised. This verdict too, will probably be overturned.
But how long O Lord, how long? How many more will be vindictively charged and convicted before the system can be changed?
My heart hurts. Please keep trying and all I can do is keep praying. My most sincere, deepest feelings go to Alvin and his family. Please keep plugging away at this. How can we get national coverage on this travesty of justice?
What a story! I want to throw a wrench into the “lost of hope” Scenario. We fought for our fourth amendment rights, took 4 plus years but it made it’s way to Justice. Keep the faith, and Friends of Justice, keep on it. I still believe in the Judicial System however the more noise you make the better off you are. Keep it going! I wish our organization had the influence it would take to help on this. Keep the Faith, and we will keep watching and post anything we can do to help.
Yours in Justice,
21st Century REP Squad, Inc….That stands for Reasonable Expectation of Privacy. We are Non Profit. We care!
Thanks, susan. We are still on this story, but aren’t ready to comment further at the moment. There have been important developments and more are soon to come. More later. Thanks for caring.
Alan Bean
I have been reading this story because it involves George Vena who indicted a close friend of mine who owned a Large scale Mortgage Company here in West Little Rock. He was recently found guilty and sentenced based on lies from former employees who were cut deals and also found guilty and given lesser sentences to lie on the stand. These two cases are so similar that it is shocking to me. However I can assure you that the claims that Alvin Clay was found guilty because he is Black is a mistake and certainly untrue. My friend is not Black and he was alos convicted based on pergery from the witness box. The problem is that jurors do not understand the intricasies involved in the mortgage industry. You can own a company and not have a clue what your employees or business partners are doing. I have seen alot of things happen in this business they get away with murder and then point the finger at the owner and the prosecutors paint the picture to the juror and thats all she wrote.
Val:
Thank you so much for posting your comment. I have written an update on the Clay story and will be driving to Little Rock this afternoon to attend another hearing in the case. You are certainly right that Mr. Clay isn’t being persued because he is black and the US Attorney’s office is racist. But all white juries think and deliberate differently than mixed-race juries, a fact that deepens the problem for black defendants. That being said, the mechanics of wrongful conviction (as I call them) work perfectly well against white defendants. Jurors assume that the federal government wouldn’t be going after the defendant if he wasn’t guilty. US Attorneys are held to a remarkably low evidentiary standard. Unless there is clear proof of innocence the defendant will almost always lose. Of course, if there is strong evidence of innocence charges are generally dropped. It is the intermediate case where the fact issues are murky and neither guilt nor innocence is obvious where there is the greatest potential for wrongdoing.