States with citizen-initiated grand juries
From Ballotpedia
(Redirected from Petitions to impanel grand juries)
A citizen-initiated grand jury is a process that allows citizens to collect signatures to call for the formation of a criminal grand jury. Six states have laws allowing citizens to impanel grand juries through the process of collecting signatures on petitions: Kansas, New Mexico, North Dakota, Nebraska, Nevada and Oklahoma. In these states, if citizens collect the required number of signatures, a judge must summon a grand jury to investigate the alleged crime. Grand juries decide whether or not charges can be brought against a suspect.[1]
Grand jury
- See also: Grand jury
A Grand jury is defined as "a group of people who look at the evidence against someone who has been accused of a crime in order to decide if there should be a trial."[2]
Prosecutors present evidence to a grand jury, which decides whether there is probable cause to believe that a crime has been committed. Grand juries are made up of 16 to 23 people, who serve for a period of one month up to one year.
Grand jury sessions are held in private, usually not in the presence of the alleged criminal. Grand juries may request additional evidence such as witness testimony or documents to investigate on their own unimpeded by outside influence.[3]
The Supreme Court case United States v. Williams (1992) said that a grand jury is "a kind of buffer or referee between the Government and the people."[4] It decides if there is enough evidence to formally charge a suspect with a crime.
Requirements by state
The following table outlines the signature requirement to compel a judge to summon a grand jury in each state as well as the law governing the citizen-initiated grand jury process in each state.
| State | Signatures required for grand jury | Law |
|---|---|---|
| Kansas | 100 plus 2% of the total number of votes cast for governor in the county in the last preceding election | Kansas Code 22-3001 |
| New Mexico | 2% of the registered voters of the county | Article II, Section 14, New Mexico Constitution |
| North Dakota | 25% of the number of votes cast in the county for the office of governor of the state at the last general election | North Dakota Century Code 29-10-1 |
| Nebraska | 10% of the number of votes cast in the county for the office of governor of the state at the last general election | Nebraska Revised Statutes 29-1401.02 |
| Nevada | 25% of the number of voters voting within the county at the last preceding general election | Nevada Revised Statutes (NRS) 6.130 |
| Oklahoma | To convene a grand jury in any county, the minimum number of signatures required in any of Oklahoma's 77 counties is 500 and the maximum is 5,000. Within those limits, the number of signatures required is equal to the number of signatures required to propose legislation by a county by initiative petition as provided in Section 5 of Article V of the Oklahoma Constitution | Article 2, Sec. 18 of the Oklahoma Constitution and Oklahoma Statutes Title 38 |
States with the ability to convene grand juries with citizen petitions
The following map shows states that provide a process for citizens to collect signatures to compel a judge to convene a grand jury.
Examples of citizen-petitioned grand juries
Kansas
- 2018: In 2018, Madison Smith collected signatures to convene a grand jury to investigate an alleged rape. To convene the grand jury, Smith needed to submit 212 signatures. She collected 329 signatures. The grand jury was convened. In 2021, the grand jury declined to bring forth any charges in the case.[5]
- 2018: Former Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach was investigated by a citizen-petitioned grand jury. The effort was led by Steven Davis, a Democratic candidate who unsuccessfully ran for the Kansas House of Representatives for District 44 in 2016, who alleged that Kobach failed to process online voter registrations and thus prevented residents from voting in the 2016 election.[6]
- 2008: The Kansas Supreme Court ruled on May 6, 2008, that a citizen-petitioned grand jury could proceed to investigate George Tiller's Women's Healthcare Services clinic, but needed do so with oversight from a trial judge. Lawyers for Tiller had asked the Supreme Court to nullify the 1887 law that allows citizen-impanelment of grand juries. A total of 7,000 signatures had been collected to impanel a grand jury in Wichita by Troy Newman of Operation Rescue West. The grand jury impaneled through this process issued a subpoena to the Tiller abortion clinic seeking 2,000 medical records. This action of the grand jury was contested by lawyers for the abortion clinic, leading to May's ruling from the Kansas Supreme Court. In January 2008, the Tiller grand jury issued a subpoena for records of every woman at least 22 weeks pregnant who had received or sought an abortion at the clinic for the past five years. The opinion of the court said, "The court should satisfy itself that the grand jury has not engaged in an arbitrary fishing expedition" and imposed oversight by a judge of the inquisitive grand jury in order to ensure future compliance with the high court's view of the matter. The grand jurors did not return an indictment against Dr. Tiller or Women's Healthcare Services. [7][8]
- 2006: A citizen-initiated grand jury was convened to investigate Dr. George Tiller's abortion clinic. The grand jury did not return an indictment.[9]
- 2005: In November 2005, a grand jury impaneled in Kansas through a citizen petition indicted an adult bookstore in Wichita on one misdemeanor charge for violating obscenity laws. The grand jury did not return indictments against six other adult bookstores that it investigated under the terms of its impanelment. Operation Southwind, a group that objected to the bookstores, collected 7,500 signatures requesting that the grand jury be convened.[10]
New Mexico
- 2022: In 2022, the New Mexico Supreme Court ruled that petitions calling for a grand jury to investigate Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham (D) for allegedly violating state law by issuing COVID-19 emergency orders were invalid. Chief Justice Michael Vigil wrote that the grand jury could not be called to investigate the governor's public health orders, writing, "This Court previously has held that [Lujan Grisham] acted lawfully and within the scope of her executive authority when she declared a public health emergency due to the COVID-19 pandemic and delegated power to the Secretary of Health to issue further emergency orders to protect public health and safety."[11]
Oklahoma
- 2008: In 2008, signatures were collected to convene a grand jury to investigate the death of Jarret Clark, who disappeared and, four days later, was found deceased in Fort Gibson Lake in 2006. In 2007, the grand jury declined to issue an indictment.[12][13]
Arguments
The following is a list of claims and arguments about citizen-initiated grand juries.
Support
Below is a selection of claims and arguments that have been made in support of citizen-initiated grand juries.
Claim: Citizen-initiated grand juries offer access to the justice system
- Arguments in favor of citizen-initiated grand jury processes were summarized by University of Kansas School of Law J.D. candidate Marissa Hotujac, who wrote, "The process allows ordinary people to attempt to obtain justice when they feel as though the judicial system has failed to prosecute someone who should be criminally charged. This is valuable in situations where public officials are allegedly engaging in criminal activity but, because of their positions of power, may escape accountability if the courts are reluctant to prosecute them. If appropriately utilized by the people, the citizen-initiated grand jury allows ordinary people to hold public officials accountable for their actions."[9]
- Bart Crabtree, president of the Montana Citizens Council on Judicial Accountability and sponsor of a proposed 2024 ballot initiative to create a citizen-initiated grand jury process in Montana, said, "The grand jury is the body of truth and power, inferior to no one but the Legislature itself, which is of course, 'We the People.' A grand jury, bottom line, is the peoples' law enforcement ... [A grand jury] is the People’s sword and shield because it WORKS for the People to arrest evildoers and to PROTECT any individual against corrupt, vindictive and overzealous governments. Citizens impaneled on Grand Jury are top of the pecking order, not judges or attorneys! WE THE PEOPLE have the authority and lawful power to arrest corrupt actors.[14][15]
Oppose
Below is a selection of claims and arguments that have been made in opposition to citizen-initiated grand juries.
Claim: Citizen-initiated grand juries have a low barrier for entry, can become politicized by special interest groups, and are costly
- Arguments against citizen-initiated grand jury processes were summarized by University of Kansas School of Law J.D. candidate Marissa Hotujac, who wrote, "One of the leading criticisms of the citizen-initiated grand jury is that it empowers biased activist groups to politicize the judicial process. The judiciary was designed to be an independent, non-political branch of government that does not respond to popular whims but rather responds to the rule of law. Allowing citizen-initiated grand juries injects politics into the judicial system by permitting citizens to commandeer the system. ... Providing citizens with an outlet to hold public officials accountable for their alleged crimes may be a noble idea, but the beneficial aspects are tainted when special interest groups abuse the citizen-initiated grand jury system. Grand juries are costly, and if activist groups continuously petition for grand juries to investigate allegations that ultimately have little merit, it wastes tax-payer dollars. Additionally, summoning grand juries to investigate frivolous or politically charged claims will clog up the courts and waste the judiciary's resources. Citizen-initiated grand juries may consist of only a small group of disgruntled people, but their efforts can cost the state thousands of dollars and hamper judicial efficiency."[9]
See also
- Changes in 2024 to laws governing ballot measures
- Changes in 2023 to laws governing ballot measures
- Petitions to impanel grand juries
Footnotes
- ↑ National Center for State Courts, "Reforming the Grand Jury Process: Recent Efforts to Improve Public Confidence in Cases Involving Police Use of Lethal Force," accessed October 19, 2023
- ↑ Merriam-Webster.com, "Grand jury," accessed October 16, 2015
- ↑ Legal Information Institute, "Grand jury," accessed October 16, 2015
- ↑ Legal Information Institute, "United States v. Williams (90-1972), 504 U.S. 36 (1992)," accessed October 16, 2015
- ↑ KWCH, "Grand jury declines new charges in groundbreaking Kansas rape case," accessed October 19, 2023
- ↑ Law Journal, "THE JURY IS STILL OUT: SHOULD KANSAS CONTINUE TO ALLOW ITS CITIZENS TO INITIATE GRAND JURIES?" accessed October 19, 2023
- ↑ Wichita Eagle, "Court limits citizen-petitioned grand juries," May 7, 2008
- ↑ Kansas Supreme Court, "Tiller v. Corrigan, Text of the decision," May 6, 2008
- ↑ 9.0 9.1 9.2 Law Journal, "THE JURY IS STILL OUT: SHOULD KANSAS CONTINUE TO ALLOW ITS CITIZENS TO INITIATE GRAND JURIES?" accessed October 19, 2023
- ↑ Associated Press, "After citizens petition, grand jury indicts adult business," November 30, 2005
- ↑ NM Political Report, "NM Supreme Court rules citizen grand juries on state emergency orders are invalid," accessed October 19, 2023
- ↑ Tulsa World, "OK given to circulate petition for grand jury," April 18, 2008
- ↑ KTUL, "Woman Arrested for Death of Broken Arrow Teen in 2006," accessed October 19, 2023
- ↑ Helena Independent Record, "Lawmakers won't support 'citizens grand jury' ballot initiative," accessed October 6, 2023
- ↑ Montana Free Press, "Bills seek to permit citizen grand juries in Montana," accessed October 19, 2023
