The first of 200 prospective jurors are scheduled to report to the DeKalb County Courthouse on Monday for the retrial of suspended county CEO Burrell Ellis, accused of using the power of his office to strong-arm vendors into making a contribution to his campaign.
Last October, a jury failed to reach unanimous verdicts on any of the 13 counts of extortion, theft, perjury and bribery filed against Ellis.
Last week, prosecutors dropped four of the counts. DeKalb District Attorney Robert James decided not to move forward with charges alleging Ellis ordered county employees to create lists of contractors that he then used to solicit campaign contributions.
Legal experts say when a case ends in a hung jury, prosecutors and defense attorneys often make a deal. But that hasn’t happened so far in Ellis’ case, and both sides have been preparing to bring the case back to court.
A guilty plea to lesser charges could cost Ellis, a real estate attorney, his license to practice law. And “he’ll forever be a political pariah,” said Michael Mears, who teaches at John Marshall Law School.
Ellis is accused of running a pay-for-play scheme in which contractors were pressured to donate to his 2012 re-election campaign under the threat of losing work.
While Ellis didn’t pocket any of the money from contractors who agreed to give, he would have been personally responsible for retiring any debt that contributions didn’t cover, James told jurors in the first trial.
It took almost a week to seat a jury of 12 women for the first trial. After six weeks, including 11 days of deliberation, Judge Courtney Johnson declared a mistrial.
After they were released from duty last October, some jurors said they didn’t believe the prosecution’s key witness against Ellis, former DeKalb Purchasing Director Kelvin Walton. Walton testified that he lied to a special purpose grand jury to avoid criminal charges in the investigation that led to Ellis’ indictment.
He secretly recorded conversations with Ellis in which the two discussed vendors and campaign contributions.
Some jurors were swayed by Ellis’ testimony that he didn’t order work withheld from vendors who refused to help his campaign. Ellis said he decided to not give work to those vendors wouldn’t return his telephone calls.
Court officials said they are allowing a week to find a second panel of 12, plus alternates.
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