Mistrials

A federal judge Monday denied former Los Angeles Police Sgt. Mark Arneson's request for a mistrial on charges of racketeering and illegal access to law enforcement databases to get information for private detective Anthony Pellicano. Arneson is one of four co-defendants on trial with Pellicano. The private eye faces numerous counts of wiretapping and racketeering.

In a Perry Mason-like turn of events, federal prosecutors in the criminal trial of private detective Anthony Pellicano put a witness on the stand Friday to further impeach Pellicano's co-defendant, former Police Sgt. Mark Arneson -- only to have Arneson's attorney impeach the witness and raise the specter of a mistrial for the former cop. Pellicano is facing multiple counts of wiretapping and racketeering. Arneson, one of four co-defendants, faces charges of racketeering and illegal access of law enforcement databases to get confidential information for Pellicano.

The failure of federal prosecutors to convict any members of an alleged South Florida terrorist cell after two trials highlights the obstacles in a legal strategy of arresting terrorism suspects before they strike. The preemption approach has been the Justice Department's mandate since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

The controversial terrorism prosecution of six South Florida men again ended in uncertainty Wednesday after the second jury selected to hear the case became so divided over the evidence that it could not agree on any verdicts. Weary prosecutors gave no immediate indication whether the government would try the case a third time.

The federal judge hearing the criminal case against Los Angeles private detective Anthony Pellicano denied a request Tuesday for a mistrial from one of his co-defendants, former Los Angeles Police Department Sgt. Mark Arneson. But before she ruled, U.S. District Judge Dale S. Fischer stopped the trial for the day and sent the jury home so she could hold a hearing on Arneson's motion.

A federal judge in Tucson declared a mistrial in the case of a U.S. Border Patrol agent charged with fatally shooting an illegal immigrant from Mexico. Jurors who had been deliberating the fate of agent Nicholas Corbett since late Tuesday told the judge they were hopelessly deadlocked. Corbett was charged with second-degree murder, manslaughter and negligent homicide in the 2007 death of Francisco Javier Dominguez- Rivera, 22. Jurors could convict on only one charge.

An Orange County jury deadlocked Wednesday on whether an aging pedophile who admitted he molested 10 boys should be released from a state mental facility. It was the second time a jury had failed to reach a decision in the case. Sid Landau, wearing a hearing aid, showed little reaction as jurors reported that they were at an impasse after 3 1/2 days of deliberations, leaning 8 to 4 in favor of the petition by prosecutors to keep him hospitalized because he remained a danger to society.

The trial of a prominent birdwatcher accused of animal cruelty for shooting a cat ended in a mistrial Friday after jurors couldn't reach a verdict. Jim Stevenson, founder of the Galveston Ornithological Society, has admitted he killed the cat last fall because he saw it hunting a threatened species of bird near the San Luis Bridge Pass. If convicted, he would have faced up to two years in prison and a $10,000 fine.

While the U.S. Justice Department ponders how it will retry its troubled terrorism finance case against a now- defunct Muslim charity, debris from the recent mistrial here shows signs of piling up at the White House doorstep. The nation's biggest terrorism finance case ended so badly for the government that it has thrown into question the Bush administration's original order to shut down the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development six years ago.

The U.S. Justice Department suffered a major setback in another high-profile terrorist prosecution Monday when its criminal case against five former officials of a now-defunct Islamic charity collapsed into a tangle of legal confusion. U.S. District Judge A. Joe Fish declared a mistrial, but not before it became clear that the government's landmark terrorism finance case -- and one of its most-costly post-9/11 prosecutions -- was in serious trouble.