Trial continued for a third day in the perjury case against former Hopkinsville Police Lt. Jefferson Alexander, with Judge John Atkins denying a motion for a directed verdict.
Defense attorney Eric Eaton represents Alexander—whose charges stem from an FBI investigation which brought allegations that on August 17th, 2012, he gave false testimony on three occasions when he was the only sworn witness before a grand jury that indicted former Hopkinsville City Councilmember Ann Cherry—and says the Commonwealth has yet to prove that his client intentionally lied to a grand jury that indicted Cherry.
Special prosecutor Jim Lesousky argued that not only did Jefferson give false testimony to that grand jury, he had chances to correct the error later and never did.
Circuit Judge John Atkins ruled that while he denied the motion for the directed verdict, the defense is welcome to enter it again for his consideration after all the evidence has been presented in trial.
Former Christian County Commonwealth’s Attorney Lynn Pryor took the stand in the afternoon, explaining how reached the conclusion on what charges her office would pursue against Ann Cherry. Cherry would go on to be indicted for tampering with a witness, tampering with public records, and second-degree official misconduct.
She says she had asked a serious of compound questions to Alexander during that grand jury hearing, and it resulted in Alexander trying to answer multiple questions with one answer.
She admitted that her line of questioning at that time was not ideal, and she could see how Alexander or any witness would have become confused over her use of repetitive pronouns and compound questions.