DA asks judge to reconsider denying request for grand jury
Fayette County District Attorney Jack R. Heneks Jr. filed a motion late Thursday asking a judge to reconsider a petition to convene an investigating grand jury to look into alleged election and criminal violations.
The move came after President Judge Gerald R. Solomon, earlier in the day, denied Heneks’ request, citing a “lack of commonality.”
Heneks’ filing noted that the last grand jury, which was convened in 1999, “contained recommendations for prosecutions of violation of both the election code and the criminal code.”
He went on to argue that “under the statute the district attorney is only required to state ‘that the convening of a county investigating grand jury is necessary because of the existence of criminal activity within the county which can best be fully investigated using the investigative resources of the grand jury’.”
Heneks told Solomon during a motions hearing Tuesday that he believed a grand jury could best investigate numerous topics, including election fraud, unsolved homicide, copper thefts, Internet fraud, child pornography, and burglary and car thefts.
Solomon expressed reservations that some of what Heneks wanted to investigate was specific, while others were vague and said the far-reaching nature made it seem as though the prosecutor wanted to investigate “every possible unsolved crime that can be investigated.”
“There is nothing in the statute which raises the issues of commonality and investigating grand juries across the commonwealth have not been limited by any concepts of commonality,” Heneks wrote.
He said previously that some witnesses are reluctant to talk to police, and they could be offered immunity to testify before a grand jury, or be compelled to do so.
“That is precisely the method that the Commonwealth can use to build evidence necessary for the proper prosecution of individuals engaged in criminal activity,” Heneks wrote.”The inability of the Commonwealth to have the grand jury would limit and potentially undermine completely the capacity of the district attorney to ferret out criminal activity and bring the offenders to justice.”
In the event that Solomon still believes that the different crimes lack common ground, Heneks proposed having two separate grand juries. One would investigate election issues, and the other would investigate the crimes outlined in his original application, according to the filing.
The grand jury would meet for 18 months, at a minimum of twice monthly, Heneks said earlier this week. They would have a core jury of 23, plus between seven and 15 alternates, and would need a quorum of 15 to hear testimony. Heneks said that the grand jury can only recommend charges based on what they hear, but police file the charges.