A third day of jury deliberations in the campaign finance trial of former presidential candidate John Edwards passed without a verdict Tuesday, with the jurors due back in federal court Wednesday morning.
The
jury of eight men and four women requested two more prosecution
exhibits, bringing to more than a dozen the number of exhibits sought
by jurors since deliberations began Friday.
The documents
requested Tuesday were letters to or about Rachel "Bunny" Mellon, now
101, a billionaire heiress and Edwards supporter who gave $725,000 that
was used to help hide the candidate's mistress during his failed
campaign for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination.
Edwards,
58, a former U.S. senator and the 2004 Democratic vice presidential
nominee, is charged with accepting $925,000 in illegal campaign
contributions from Mellon and Edwards' campaign finance chairman, the
late Fred Baron, a wealthy Texas lawyer.
Jurors must decide
whether Edwards "knowingly and willfully" engaged in a scheme to use
the money to cover up his affair with videographer Rielle Hunter
and save his campaign from collapsing in scandal. Among the six counts
against him are conspiracy to accept illegal campaign contributions and
to conceal them from the Federal Election Commission.
Edwards' lawyers say the payments were private gifts intended to help hide the affair from his wife, Elizabeth Edwards, who was dying of cancer.
Witnesses have testified that she was increasingly suspicious of her
husband, monitoring his phone calls and bank transactions.
Much
of the trial testimony has focused on attempts to keep the affair
secret by paying Hunter's living expenses and flying her — and later
the daughter born to Hunter and Edwards — around the country to escape
pursuing reporters from the National Enquirer, the tabloid that broke the story of their relationship during the campaign.
But
the verdict in the monthlong trial will rest on the interpretation of
complex federal campaign finance laws. Jurors must decide whether the
payments were campaign contributions intended to influence the election
outcome or private gifts not directly related to the campaign.
In
her instructions to the jury, U.S. District Judge Catherine Eagles said
prosecutors didn't have to prove that the sole purpose of the payments
was to influence the election — only that there was a "real purpose or
an intended purpose" to do so.
However, Eagles told the jurors:
"If the donor would have made the gift or payment notwithstanding the
election, it does not become a contribution merely because the gift or
payment might have some impact on the election."
Edwards, who
made millions as a successful personal injury lawyer, could face up to
30 years in prison and $1.5 million in fines if convicted on all
charges.