CHICAGO _ Former Gov. George Ryan's lawyers made a fresh effort Friday to have his racketeering conviction thrown out, declaring that the six-month trial was awash in legal errors and juror misconduct.

"These jurors distinguished themselves by their willingness to engage in blatant misconduct and by their failure to follow the simplest and clearest instructions from the court," the lawyers said in court papers.

Ryan, 73, and businessman Larry Warner, 67, were convicted in April of racketeering, mail fraud and other offenses. They are due to be sentenced Sept. 6. The trial was marked by stormy bickering over jury deliberations.

U.S. District Judge Rebecca R. Pallmeyer bounced two jurors who failed to disclose their arrest records, and the bickering intensified after it became known other jurors also had brushes with the law or misstated facts on their court-required questionnaires.

One juror, after hiring a lawyer, tearfully admitted bringing a legal article she found on the Internet into the jury room and using it warn a fellow jury member that she might be expelled.

Still another juror hired a politically connected law firm and sent a lawyer into court to try to stop any further investigation of the jury.