By HANNAH MEISEL
Capitol News Illinois
[email protected]
CHICAGO — The jury considering state Sen. Emil Jones III’s federal corruption trial indicated late Wednesday that it may be deadlocked on two of the three counts Jones is charged with after 18 hours of deliberations.
The news came in a note to U.S. District Judge Andrea Wood, which she read to attorneys gathered in her courtroom around 5 p.m. Wednesday — the second full day of deliberations in Jones’ trial. While the jury sent a series of notes both logistical and substantive on Monday afternoon and Tuesday, there was silence from the jurors until the end of the day Wednesday.
“At this point, it doesn’t look like the jury can reach a unanimous agreement on counts 1 and 3,” the note read. “Is there any assistance that can be provided?”
Count 1 accuses Jones, D-Chicago, of having agreed to accept bribes from red-light camera entrepreneur-turned-FBI cooperator Omar Maani in the form of a $5,000 campaign contribution and a job for his former intern. The government alleges Jones agreed to the bribes in exchange for limiting legislation he’d proposed that would affect Maani’s industry. The feds argue it doesn’t matter that Maani never paid the $5,000 and Jones never amended his bill.
Count 3 alleges that Jones lied to the FBI about the purported bribes when agents showed up to his house on Sept. 24, 2019. During that interview, which was secretly recorded, the agents told Jones they were investigating his colleague, then-state Sen. Martin Sandoval, D-Chicago. Sandoval would later plead guilty to bribery and tax fraud charges related to Maani and the red-light camera industry but died in late 2020.
Wood told the attorneys she likely would give the jury what’s referred to as a “Silvern Instruction,” which is dictated by case law and encourages the jury to keep trying to reach unanimity. But that will wait until jurors return on Thursday morning.
The jury also asked whether they’d be able to take Friday off or leave early that day if deliberations were still ongoing by Thursday evening, intending to come back on Monday. The judge said she’d be amenable to the jury taking Friday off so long as progress was being made.
In a third note, jurors asked a substantive question about Count 1: Whether they needed to agree that both the $5,000 contribution and the job for Jones’ former intern were accepted to reach a verdict. Lawyers indicated loose agreement that the law states only one of the alleged bribes need be proven.
If the jury does deadlock, Jones’ would be the third high-profile federal corruption trial in seven months to end in a hung jury. In February, jurors deliberating former Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan’s case deadlocked on six of the 23 counts while convicting him on 10 and acquitting on seven. And in September, a judge had to declare a mistrial after jurors deadlocked on all five counts alleging the former president of AT&T Illinois bribed Madigan in 2017.
Jones, whose father Emil Jones Jr. had a decadeslong career in the General Assembly capped by a six-year stint as president of the Illinois Senate, was charged in 2022 but declined to resign, despite pressure from Senate leadership and Gov. JB Pritzker. He won another four-year term to the Illinois Senate in November of that year, although the senator has remained barred from his previous leadership roles, including chairing a committee. In January, Jones surpassed 16 years as a lawmaker.
The senator last week made the risky decision to testify in his own defense, which opened him up to grueling cross-examination. In closing arguments Monday, prosecutors contrasted Jones’ statements on the witness stand with other testimony and what was heard on hours of secret recordings of dinners with Maani and the FBI interview.
Capitol News Illinois is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news service that distributes state government coverage to hundreds of news outlets statewide. It is funded primarily by the Illinois Press Foundation and the Robert R. McCormick Foundation.
