So, exactly what is a federal indictment? I know more than a few of us pondered this the other night when placing our bets on who would be indicted and on what charges.
Apparently, an indictment "is a statement by the grand jury that says that they feel that it is more likely than not that a person has been involved in the commission of a crime and that a criminal trial is warranted based on the evidence they have seen."
This particular distinction being apparently necessary to separate it from other applications of law.
A single indictment can be issued to one person or many people for one charge or many charges. Therefore, you could have five indictments of five people on multiple and diverse charges or five people charged under one indictment on multiple charges or even one person indicted on multiple charges.
Apparently, in the case of a federal indictment for conspiracy, in particular, all those who are charged, regardless of the number of different counts, are wrapped into one indictment.
So tomorrow, it's very well possible that only one indictment is handed down, but it is applicable to a multitude of people on multiple charges.
I hope this helps Dems from not having heart attacks if they hear of only one indictment and I hope the Repubs need resusitation, defibs, Heimlich manevers, or whatever. ;)
If interested, you can read more here:
http://firedoglake.blogspot.com/2005/10/untying-few-legal-knots.html