SCLC #634 Grand-jury no-bill did not bar misdemeanor information · Catlette 1942

Under then-applicable practice, 18 U.S.C. § 242 was ordinarily a misdemeanor; prosecutors could file an information after a no-bill. Division practice still preferred indictments (oath testing, transcript, spare FBI agent as accuser). The Commission identified only one actual post-refusal information: the 1942 West Virginia Catlette case involving Jehovah’s Witnesses — not a 1958–60 brutality case.

Appendix Table 9’s 16 no-bills (5S/11NW) in Jan 1958–Jun 1960 are case closures, not acquittals. “Actually (though not legally)” unfairness rhetoric ≠ jeopardy at grand jury. Standing three hundred fifty-two.