In another stunning example of the fallibility of juries, HealthSouth Corp. founder Richard Scrushy walked away a free man Tuesday after a jury cleared him of all charges in a stunning setback for federal prosecutors who sought to add his name to a list of CEOs convicted of fraud.

Scrushy’s exoneration probably won’t sit well with the 15 former HealthSouth executives who have already pleaded guilty and essentially ended up taking the fall for their former boss.

The prosecution’s case was built on the fact that as CEO of a company operating an Enron-like fraud, he was responsible for the mis-statements and malfeasance at the company. There were also witnesses who testified that fraud was committed at Scrushy’s direction.

But this was no match to the defense’s response of appealing throughout the trial to the sympathies of the jury. In closing arguments, Scurshy’s attorney reminded the jury of the struggles of the civil rights era in Alabama and how juries helped the movement succeed. Despite the fact that this had absolutely nothing to do with the case, the jury responded to such appeals.

Black ministers were also visible supporters of Scrushy in the courtroom throughout the trial highliting the important message of this trial to prosecutors. Don’t confuse juries with all those messy facts. Play to their emotions because that’s what the defense is going to do.

As an editorial aside, I don’t expect that we will see book deals offered to the members of this jury, primarily because I don’t think anyone will really believe that they are capable of writing or thinking for themselves.

Hat tip: SocCalLawBlog

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 28th, 2005 at 10:06 pm by Insider and is filed under How Not To Succeed In Business, Nemesises ... Nemesi?. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.