Obstruction of justice is a criminal offense, in which an individual through his or her words or actions interferes with the operation of a court or with officers of the court. Examples include jury tampering, bribery or intimidation of a witness, and the destruction of documents. Here are some famous examples you may remember from the headlines.
Richard Nixon
Richard Nixon was accused of obstruction of justice from his alleged cover-up of the identities of the Watergate burglars or of his subsequent efforts to pay for their silence. Before the Senate impeached him, he resigned from office.
Scooter Libby
Scooter Libby, chief of staff to former Vice-president Richard Cheney, was convicted in 2007 of lying and obstructing a leak investigation regarding the exposure of CIA official Valerie Plume. Libby’s jail sentence was later commuted by President Bush, but Mr. Cheney’s efforts to persuade President Bush to grant Libby a full pardon were rebuffed.
Barry Bonds
Home-run king Barry Bonds has been indicted a number of times for his alleged false testimony given before a grand jury investigating Victor Conte and BALCO, the laboratory that allegedly prescribed illegal performance enhancing drugs to Bonds and a number of other athletes. Bonds was indicted in 2006 and again in 2007 for obstruction of justice based upon his alleged pattern of lying about his steroid use.
Martha Stewart
In a case roundly criticized by legal experts, Martha Stewart was convicted in 2004 of four counts of obstructing justice and lying regarding her sale of a stock based on insider information, though she was never charged with that offense. Some experts claimed that she did nothing to obstruct the SEC from charging anyone with insider trading.
Kwame Kilpatrick
In another political scandal, former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick pleaded guilty in 2008 to obstruction of justice charges and was later sentenced to prison after he violated the terms of his probation. Mayor Kilpatrick was one of the youngest persons ever elected mayor of a major city and was known for his flashy life-style. When e-mails linking him romantically to a female adviser became known, the ex-mayor was charged with lying under oath in a previous civil case in which he lied about the affair and was accused by several ex-police officers of attempting to force them from their jobs because their investigation might have led to exposure of the affair.
