I worked in the legal biz in Alaska for over 30 years.

[Blue_In_AK]

In all that time, I never heard of a potential defendant being allowed to testify at a grand jury proceeding or of exculpatory evidence being presented. Does this ever happen?

Other defendants could only dream of receiving the same considerations that Darren Wilson did.

[Nye Bevan]

1. "Defense lawyers are allowing many suspects to testify before grand juries" (NYT, 2004)

In a sharp departure for New York City's criminal justice system, defense lawyers are allowing many suspects -- from police officers to hardened street criminals -- to testify before grand juries, with notable success.

In years past, such risky testimony was considered nearly unthinkable because grand juries were deemed to be so willing to follow the wishes of prosecutors that they would, in the words of a former New York State chief judge, ''indict a ham sandwich.''

But this year, in Brooklyn alone, nearly 14 percent of felony suspects have testified before grand juries investigating their cases, and slightly more than half of those cases have ended with no charges, according to the district attorney's office. Citywide, the numbers vary, from about 5 percent of suspects going before grand juries in Manhattan to as many as 18 percent on Staten Island, but in every borough, what was once extremely rare is now commonplace, according to lawyers' accounts, district attorneys' data and descriptions by people who have served on grand juries.

Some prosecutors say the little-noticed trend means that glib defendants can spin yarns that sometimes literally allow them to get away with murder. But defense lawyers say the development simply shows that New York grand juries are doing their job, ensuring that people are indicted only if solid evidence exists.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/20/nyregion/new-trend-before-grand-juries-meet-the-accused.html

[Blue_In_AK]

2. I've been away from the procedures for about 8 or 9 years,

but that certainly wasn't the case with the dozens and dozens of grand juries that I transcribed or the criminal cases that I worked on back in the '70s and '80s. It was always my understanding that grand juries weren't meant to be mini-trials, and in fact the DA's would stress that they weren't in a position to present exculpatory evidence, that that would be the job of the defense attorney in any ensuing trial.

It just seems weird to me that this is going on.

[JimDandy]

3. Never heard of this happening before either

except on a fictional TV show.

The fix was in as soon as he was allowed to testify.

[no_hypocrisy]

4. It was supposed to be a convening of a grand jury.

Apparently they had a trial instead.

[moondust]

5. At what point did the "potential defendant" testify?

It seems to me that if the "potential defendant" doesn't testify until after the grand jury has been deliberating for a while, he could conceivably be coached as to the mood of the grand jury, what they are interested in, where their sympathies might lie, what kinds of things to highlight and what to avoid, what else might be advantageous when called to testify. In other words: stage managed.