The bar to proceed to a criminal indictment is much lower with a grand jury than in an actual criminal trial.
A simple majority of a grand jury is all that is needed to secure an indictment, unlike a trial jury which requires a unanimous vote to convict.
Grand jury proceedings are tools that lead to indictments; however, the protections guaranteed to defendants, which entitle them to a speedy trial under the Sixth Amendment, do not apply until the grand jury has voted to indict.
Former Republican politician and chief judge of New York's Court of Appeals, Sol Wachtler, told CNN, "A grand jury is an almost entirely one-sided process.... Close to every time a prosecutor seeks an indictment from a grand jury, he or she will get an indictment from the grand jury."
The prosecution's power over grand jury indictments is not simply limited to criminalizing defendants, either.
Following the indictment of two officers on misdemeanors, the judge dismissed the charges citing the grand jury proceeding as insufficient-that was purposeful by Sini, and such actions to protect law enforcement are relatively common.
The grand jury indictment process must be reevaluated to minimize such abuses, especially now that the lead Republican presidential candidate has been indicted.
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