Did he CWOF for some charge(s),
and get convicted with a sentence of probation for some other(s)?
Not that I know of, he only had CUI and he cwofed out on that, with some kind of condition for 3? 6? (I forget) months of probation. Basically he
was told "if you behave for X months, you will effectively get a cwof".
My friend with the "road rage" case got a similar deal.
I'm not sure what KIND of probation they got. There are different stratas to it, like theres also unsupervised probation which is basically just setting up a land mine if someone
f***s up again, and then there's "you have to check in with your probation officer every day week whatever" probation. I don't think either of the people I know had to do
that. I will ask.
Maybe simpler to increase the number/fraction of grand jurors
that have to vote to indict.
One wiseacre on a petit jury can FIJA any/all charges in a case,
but it takes more of them to find No True Bill.
(Doesn't help cases brought without grand jury indictments, of course).
IMHO any case that goes in front of a GJ should be unanimous. Doesn't matter anyways because most of these people
get jaundiced. I know two people who served on GJs and none of them seemed to have a hard time pressing the button.
Most of the trash cases we're talking about though, like paper gun crimes, CUI, etc, I don't believe ever sees a grand jury. Might be because in MA GJs only
operate at superior court level? Trash like DUI, CUI, etc might only be district court? Not sure.
Jeff Kuhner, is that you?
/sarc
-Mike