Tennessee Grand Jury Says it Has No Jurisdiction to Review Charges of Voter Fraud and Public Corruption pb

THEN WHAT IS THEIR FUNCTION?

by Sharon Rondeau

(Nov. 22, 2012) — At 8:00 a.m. on November 20, 2012, Walter Francis Fitzpatrick, III entered the McMinn County, TN courthouse to bring evidence of voting irregularities, military voter disenfranchisement, local public corruption and Obama’s alleged lack of U.S. citizenship to the McMinn County Grand Jury.

Fitzpatrick has long maintained that a properly-functioning grand jury could restore constitutional governance and freedoms if it were functioning as the Founders intended as stated in the Fifth Amendment.  Grand juries were intended to act as a buffer between an accused and his government accusers.  Several states no longer convene grand juries, and of those that do, the grand jury does not resemble the independent body of earlier days in U.S. history when citizens convened without input from a prosecutor and brought their findings in the form of a presentment to law enforcement officials for further investigation.

The grand jury has its origins in English common law. According to 20th century American precedent, “grand jurors could act on their own knowledge and were free to make their presentments or indictments on such information as they deemed satisfactory. Despite its broad power to institute criminal proceedings the grand jury grew in popular favor with the years. It acquired an independence in England free from control by the Crown or judges. Its adoption in our Constitution as the sole method for preferring charges in serious criminal cases shows the high place it held as an instrument of justice. And in this country as in England of old the grand jury has convened as a body of laymen, free from technical rules, acting in secret, pledged to indict no one because of prejudice and to free no one because of special favor.”

Obama’s long-form birth certificate and Selective Service registration card have both been labeled forgeries by a law enforcement investigation which spanned more than a year.  The literary agent, in anticipation of Obama’s first book, Black and White, published his biography in a booklet which stated that he had been born in Kenya, not the United States.  Obama claims to have a father who was not an American citizen.  In 2007, at about the time he announced he would run for president, Obama’s biography was inexplicably altered to state that he had been born in the state of Hawaii.  No conclusive proof of that claim has ever been produced.

Many have hypothesized that Obama attended college as a foreign student by either misrepresenting his citizenship at the time or actually having possessed a foreign passport.  Prior to the November 6 election, Obama was offered $5,000,000 as a donation to the charity of his choice if he made public his passport and university applications, an offer to which did not respond.

The duties of the grand jury as stated in Tennessee court rules include investigating “any state or local officers’ abuse of office.”   However, Fitzpatrick and other residents of the Tenth Judicial District have witnessed malfeasance on the part of public officials without scrutiny by the grand jury, which functions as an extension of the presiding judge and prosecutor.  Instead of protecting the accused, grand juries throughout the state of Tennessee and the country have become a tool of the prosecutor’s office.  Fitzpatrick has proved that in Tennessee, grand jury members are often not chosen at random in violation of the law.

Fitzpatrick discovered three years ago that the Monroe County acting grand jury foreman had served in the position for at least 20 years, and later, that his period of service was 28 years.

Fitzpatrick’s complaint sought an injunction from the McMinn County grand jury “prohibiting Tennessee Electors to the federal Electoral College from voting in the Electoral College until such time as the integrity of the military vote is reconciled.”  It was widely reported that a significantly lower number of military votes were received during the 2012 election cycle, and as in previous elections, many of them are not counted or included in the final tabulations.  The Obama regime failed to enforce its own law when it did not establish military voting locations to ease difficulties experienced by military members, particularly those serving overseas.

While researching Tennessee election law, Fitzpatrick found that instructions for those voting with absentee ballots state that a voter can cast two ballots in any given election.  The pertinent wording reads (bottom of page 2, right column):

If you do not receive your State absentee ballot by October 2, 2012, use the Federal Write-in Absentee Ballot.  If you receive your State absentee ballot, vote and return it.  If both ballots are received by the deadline, only the State ballot will be counted.

In other states, voting more than once is prohibited by law.

Despite complaints and ballot challenges in numerous states during the primary season as allowed by law contending that Obama had not proved his constitutional eligibility or citizenship status, Obama’s name appeared on the ballot in all 50 states and purportedly won re-election on November 6.  Fitzpatrick’s complaint contained a list of highly-publicized voter fraud incidents occurring both before and on the day of the general election and requested that the grand jury issue a presentment enjoining Tennessee Secretary of State Tre Hargett and his assistant from certifying the state’s votes because Obama “is not a United States citizen.”

It has been widely claimed that the Obama campaign carried out a variety of deceptive practices to make it appear that he had won the 2012 election and might have done the same in 2008.  Prior to the 2012 election, Obama’s Department of Justice sued the state of Ohio about its law which allowed three extra days specifically for members of the military to vote early.  The case reached the U.S. Supreme Court, which declined to intervene after a federal appeals court opined that the three-day period should be open to all voters.

The Department of Justice has also sued several states as a result of their having passed voter identification laws requiring photo ID in order for an individual to cast a vote.  Before and on Election Day, there were reports of people from one state traveling to another to vote, illegal aliens attempting to vote, and non-English-speaking residents receiving physical instruction on how to vote for Democrats “all the way down” the ballot.  Fitzpatrick cited instances of highly unusual, if not impossible, voter turnout in Ohio and Pennsylvania with votes skewed heavily toward Obama; instances reported in the press wherein a Romney vote was changed to one for Obama on the computer screen; and voters going to the polls only to be told that they had already voted when they had not, all of which Fitzpatrick said were “an attack on the Integrity of the Vote everywhere.”  He contended that “Voter and ballot fraud discovered anywhere in Tennessee State, the United States, any U.S. Territory or in the District of Columbia represents a crime against the Citizen’s [sic] of McMinn County [sic] Tennessee.”

Read the complaints here:

McMinn County Voter Fraud Complaint

McMinn County Tennessee Grand Jury submission – formal criminal complaint (20 November 2012 term)-1

While the total voter turnout for both Obama and Romney was reported to be lower than in 2008 for Obama and McCain, respectively, the Tennessee Secretary of State reported that “The overall total of 1,456,824 voters represents the second-highest early voting turnout in Tennessee history…”  Other states had reported four-hour waiting periods for early voters and record turnout. The number of voters has increased for every presidential election since at least 1996.

Some are asking how millions of votes seem to have disappeared.

After arriving, Fitzpatrick waited 30 minutes for the clerk’s office to open at 8:30 a.m.  The clerk arrived and Fitzpatrick attempted to file his complaints with her, but she declined on the basis that “there was no open case wherein she could accept a document filing.”  When Fitzpatrick asked the clerk to give the complaints to the grand jury foreman, Jeff Cunningham, she “refused” and advised Fitzpatrick to deliver them himself.  He went to the second floor of the courthouse where the grand jury normally meets.  He was able to hand the complaints to the foreman, Jeff Cunningham, who is an attorney and President and CEO of Athens Bancshares Corporation.  Cunningham was chosen by Judge Amy Reedy, having succeeded Joe Riley, who had been accused of exerting undue influence on the grand jury and was dismissed in 2010.  Grand juries in Monroe County have admittedly been “chosen” by the judge rather than by automated means as mandated by Tennessee law.

Appointing orders for the foreman are often not completed, contain misspelled names and lack effective and ending dates.

On several occasions, Fitzpatrick has attempted to submit criminal complaints charging Obama with treason against the United States to two federal grand juries seated in Knoxville, TN, but the prosecutor, William C. Killian, who acts as a gatekeeper to the grand jury, did not allow the grand juries to review them.

Last May, Fitzpatrick had discovered that laws passed almost three decades ago had ordered that Tennessee’s criminal courts be reorganized into districts, but the statutes were never implemented.  In August, he had approached Cunningham, provided copies of the laws to him, and asked whether or not the McMinn County grand jury was operating lawfully, a question which Cunningham was unable to answer.

Cunningham handed Fitzpatrick an “Immunity Waiver” and asked him to complete it, stating that “state law” required it of anyone bringing evidence to be presented to the grand jury.  Fitzpatrick had been asked to sign a similar document in Monroe County when he brought criminal evidence to the grand jury there during the summer of 2011.  Cunningham was unable to to cite a pertinent statute, and Fitzpatrick therefore did not sign it.

Both McMinn County and Monroe County are part of the Tenth Judicial District, whose prosecutors are reportedly under investigation by the state Attorney General, Comptroller’s Office, and the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation (TBI).  There have been no public updates since the announcement of the commencement of the investigation in late August by The Chattanooga Times Free Press, and District Attorney General R. Steven Bebb continues to operate in his position despite an announcement that he would step aside while the investigation proceeded.

The TBI itself has recently broken state law by refusing to respond to an Open Records request for more than two months when the statute commands a seven-day response time.

After the Times Free Press exposed the allegations of corruption, State Senator Mae Beavers voiced her concern about longstanding grand jury “chairmen” placed in their positions by judges for years and sometimes decades, the practice of which Fitzpatrick had pointed to as a crime when he attempted a citizen’s arrest on April 1, 2010, of the acting Monroe County grand jury foreman, Gary Pettway.  Instead, Fitzpatrick himself was ordered arrested by a judge not present at the time and jailed for five days.

Some of the charges Fitzpatrick asked the grand jury to investigate were reported by The Times Free Press and include “civil rights violations,” “withholding evidence,” and “witness tampering.”  Fitzpatrick also accused prosecutors, judges, Riley and others of “manipulating the justice system,” “assembly and operation of illegal grand juries and trial juries,” “suborning perjury,” and “official tyranny.”

After taking the documents and meeting with the 12 grand jury members for approximately 15 minutes, Cunningham returned Fitzpatrick’s documents, stating that it was his “personal opinion” that the grand jury did not “have jurisdiction” over the matters cited in his complaints.

McMinn County Tennessee Grand Jury ruling

Fitzpatrick further elaborated:

Cunningham told me that he read the entire 11 pages to the grand jury members, which was really ten pages because the last page is a signature page, and they claimed to not have jurisdiction.  The first issue that I raised was about the things that The Chattanooga Times Free Press reported on back in August, and they clearly have jurisdiction in that.  Cunningham said, “There’s an ongoing investigation already,” and I said, “Well, it’s going nowhere; it’s not being done publicly.”  They didn’t want to touch any of this with a barge pole.

It was a very professional exchange; there was no drama, although there were a lot of cops there, of course.  It wasn’t held in the congressman’s office this time; it was a couple of doors down.    I went by myself after telling a few people that I was going.

There is nothing left for me to do.  On Monday I received the two green return receipt cards for the filings I made on November 8.  Robert Mueller has the documents dated 8 November, and William C. Killian has the documents for each of the two grand juries.  I worked hard on that submission for the grand jury; it took me a week to put that together.  Do I believe that the grand jury system is operative here?  Obviously, the answer is “no.”

We are in real trouble.  All 13 members said today, “No.”  You don’t get that kind of unanimous agreement without the foreman having said, “Hey, folks…”

They had an opportunity today to take a position that would have been historic.

Bebb is known to have committed perjury in the trial of Darren Wesley Huff with the others.

The corruption here locally certainly falls into the gambit of a grand jury, and they walked away from it.

When Cunningham came out to talk to me, he said that the voter issues were federal.  I said, “No, sir, read this very carefully,” and I pulled out that document that says you can vote twice in Tennessee.  We found that out last week.  There is no law which prevents someone from voting twice on an absentee ballot and then voting a third time at the polls.  Not many people know that.

I spoke with Secretary of State Tre Hargett back in July, and I talked to his Commissioner of Elections, Mark Goins in September.  I told them that if they put Obama’s name on the ballot, I will advance a criminal complaint naming you.  And that’s what happened today.

The grand jury had a chance to take a look at that information, but they didn’t. Cunningham said to take it to the Chancery Court in Nashville.  I said, “I don’t live in Nashville; my jurisdiction is right here.”

Steve Morgan was around today, and people said, “You need to talk to him,” and I said, “No, he’s one of the people I’ve accused in this criminal conduct.”

I don’t know what else I could possibly do at this point.