November 5, 2005
Lying in Court

To the Editor:
In his Nov. 1 column, "Let's Have a Big Hand for...," John Tierney discussed the perjury indictment of I. Lewis Libby Jr. While "perjury is extremely common," Mr. Tierney quotes me as saying, "perjury prosecutions are incredibly uncommon."
I did say that. But I added an important qualification: The most common perjury cases that are prosecuted, at least in federal courts, are for perjury before an investigative grand jury - the type of perjury with which Mr. Libby is charged.
I am troubled by the fact that we do little to enforce the laws against perjury in depositions, in civil trials and even in criminal trials. Federal grand jury hearings, however, seem to be an exception to this pattern of neglect. If you lie in court as a witness in a murder trial, you'll probably never have to answer for it. If you lie to a grand jury in an important federal investigation, you're taking a big risk.
Samuel R. Gross
Ann Arbor, Mich., Nov. 1, 2005
The writer is a professor of law at the University of Michigan.