The Supreme Court took the unusual step on Dec. 20 of granting bail on an emergency basis to a multimillionaire pharmaceutical executive previously convicted of manslaughter in the death of her young son.
In 2014, Gigi Jordan was convicted of administering a fatal dose of drugs to Jude Mirra, her 8-year-old autistic child, in 2010 and was given an 18-year custodial sentence in 2015. Her defense characterized what happened as a mercy killing. Jordan is currently at liberty, subject to a secured bond and court-imposed curfew.
However, after her conviction, a Manhattan court determined that Jordan had been imprisoned unlawfully because there were irregularities during her trial.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit disagreed, finding that the lower court’s ruling that her imprisonment was unlawful was wrong. On Dec. 19, the 2nd Circuit ordered Jordan to report to prison immediately.
Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who oversees emergency applications from New York, unilaterally stayed the order late on Dec. 20.
Sotomayor didn’t explain why she granted the order.
Her lawyers argue that Jordan was deprived of her Sixth Amendment right to a public trial because of what they called “a shocking courtroom closure in the middle of the guilt phase of … Jordan’s closely-watched criminal trial.”
During the trial, the judge misbehaved and “abruptly declared” that “everyone” had to leave the courtroom for several minutes and directed court security to keep the courtroom closed to spectators, according to the petition.
During the unusual closed-door session, “the judge heard repeated defense objections to the closure, contentious allegations by the prosecutor of misconduct by Jordan and the defense team, a motion for corrective jury instructions, and a motion for clarification on a gag order. For his part, the judge made direct inquiries of the defense team, admonished the defendant (just four days before she was to give testimony in her own defense) for what he believed were ‘improper’ statements published on a website, and instructed the prosecutor to conduct an investigation.”
The petition states that the New York Appellate Division affirmed the trial court’s overruling of Jordan’s objections to the closure and misapplied legal precedent, finding her public-trial right wasn’t violated because what was discussed in the absence of the public was the same kind of material that would be raised in a sidebar with lawyers or in a conference in chambers.
Jordan’s attorney, Michael B. Kimberly of McDermott Will and Emery LLP, and prosecutor Steven Chiajon Wu of the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office didn’t respond by press time to a request by The Epoch Times for comment.
