I had a court date today, which I did not attend, as it was in California and I am in Minnesota. I had thought that I was starting retrial today, and had bought a ticket to fly to Los Angeles and rent a car, but it was just a court date that I didn't have to be there for, so I cancelled the ticket and stayed home.
My attorney went to the court date, and found that I have become a low priority to the prosecution. He wants to try 3 other people first, and has put my trial off into the indefinite future. This is the best piece of news I have heard in ages.
If I am retried at all, it sounds like it will be with my previous codefendant. The charges of riot, rout, and unlawful assembly will likely be dropped, which should leave me with only failure to disperse. However, they are trying to charge me with blocking rail transit, a charge that is perhaps even more ridiculous than the others. There are rail lines in the area where the demonstration was, but before the event started, the street was blocked off because there had been a problem, I think a minor derailment, of one of the trains. Point is, there was no rail transit to block, even had I been in the street.
We will find out whether this charge can stand up on February 6, 2002, and if so, my attorney is going to get us a new judge and try to get the charge dropped, as well as trying to get the case against me dismissed.