While that would certainly create a lot more paperwork, I don’t see that it would stop jury nullification. What’s to keep Joe Murderer’s jury from finding him not guilty and saying it’s because the prosecution didn’t prove its case, when really the jury just doesn’t believe in punishing people for murder? Since jury deliberations are private, you only have their word for what goes on in there.
We, the Good Ol’ Boys of the Jury find the following:
- That the coroner’s report showing that Rufus “Uppity Black” Washington was strangled is correct.
- That the testimony of the thirteen witnesses purportedly establishing Billy Joe Jim Bob’s presence at the scene was not convincing.
- That the DNA evidence linking spittle found on the victim to Billy Joe Jim Bob is not compelling.
- That the so-called “confession” of BJJB to the police was not credible and produced by coercion.
- And that therefore, BJJB is acquitted and found ‘not guilty’ of the crime.
Now, if the judge can overturn that finding because he believes the facts therein are incorrect, then the jury is no longer the “unquestioned judge of the facts.”
- Rick
Ah, sorry, my mind was in a few places. That “because” leads the reader to think what follows is a justification for rethinking the definition of a jury when it is plainly no such thing. Just consider it a seperate sentence floating on its own. The justification is, indirectly, seen at the end of the post:
Captain Amazing
I was actually thinking that the jury counsel was present during their deliberations. This would have the added benefit of simplifying determinations of misconduct. My (uneducated) guess would be that the savings from appeals would be enough to pay most of the tab. For example, say that in my point number 3 above, it was actually Tim Eyewitness saying he saw the murderer near the victim’s house. The jury, by saying that they didn’t use his testimony in the determination of the verdict eliminates any appeal using Tim Eyewitness’ later uncertainty/recant of testimony/impeachment.
Bricker
It seems to me that in your example, given the presence of the jury counsel, it would probably be pretty easy to show juror misconduct particularly in the assumption of facts not in evidence, ignoring of jury instructions, etc.
No facts not in evidence were assumed. The jury simply claims they chose to give no weight to the eyewitness testimony. That’s the function of the jury: to assign and weigh credibility of witnesses. They’re simply saying, “Hey, none of the thirteen eyewitnesses were compelling.”
If a judge or “jury counsel” overrules that finding, then you have eviscerated the function of the jury and their role as fact-finders is no longer unquestioned.
- Rick
That would do two things, though. First, it would mean that jury deliberations were no longer private. There’d be an outside observer…the jury counsel present. Second, it would mean that the jury is no longer the ultimate finder of fact…the jury counsel is, because he’s able to overrule the jury. If the jury thinks that Tim Eyewitness isn’t credible, and vote to acquit, do you really want the jury counsel to say, “It’s obvious Tim Eyewitness was credible. The jury is just trying to nulify.”?
erislover
Are you sure you want to inform all juries that they have the abilty to nullify any law? Sure, there are certain laws that a fair amount of people disagree with (statutory rape, drug laws etc) which may not have a victim. But there are a lot of other laws that few people, if any, really disagree with, which do have victims. How do you inform a jury that they have the “right” to acquit someone who possessed drugs because a juror disagrees with the drug law without informing another jury that they can acquit a murderer because the victim “needed killing”.
True story (although I still have some trouble believing it) Two weeks ago, I encountered a parole violator who was accused of trespassing in a university library. The judge in the parole violation found him not guilty of the charge, although he believed that the man was in the library, that he had no permission and that he knew he didn’t have permission. The reason for the finding of not guilty- because the judge had been “many places I wasn’t supposed to be” . He essentially denied the university its right to control who was on its property. Just because one person on a jury doesn’t want to convict someone doesn’t mean that the law is unjust or that most people don’t agree with it.
How are we picking juries that they’re apparently always going to be stacked with so many people that will use jury nullification, doreen? One person’s say so doesn’t make a person guilty or innocent, but when jurors were informed that they had the right, it is not clear to me that the entire trial system was a sham. Sometimes, the justice system fails. Sometimes innocent men are imprisoned, and guilty ones set free. Short of divine intervention, the limits of human knowledge guarantee this. The odd jury nullification will happen now only because the odd juror brings with him the knowledge of this ability, and the rest of the jurors agree with the reasoning, or because some clever juror realizes that the proceedings are secret and they can find whatever verdict for whatever reason and essentially create jury nullification of their own intuition. By informing jurors of this ability, this right, we guarantee that they are aware that they are the last stop before injustice is truly done at the hands of the legislators’ bidding. By failing to do so, we select for people of good conscience to make decisions they don’t like, and people of poor conscience to make decisions like the ones mentioned by Sua, et al in this thread. To me, that is unacceptable.
I recently (this Tuesday actually) was on a panel for jury selection. One of the lawyers asked me if I felt that I could convict someone for a law that I disagreed with. I told him that it would depend, but that, no, I couldn’t if I strongly disagreed with the law. Despite this, the lawyers kept me on the panel, and only later did they dismiss me for something unrelated. If they had kept me on, and it had come down to it, I would feel no guilt for using jury nullification to protest some outrageous law. I gave them fair warning.
I’m always amazed by the amount of paranoia as to the intentions of the government, that somehow the government is always out to get you by legislating terrible things.If you think the law is unjust, campaign against it. Vote the government that made the law out. Why on earth would you want to encourage practically random jury decisions?
The proportion of unjust laws to the number of possible unfair jury decisions based on prejudice is totally skewed. In every single case, a juror brings along their prejudices, but in only a few cases is the law truly unjust.
To add to that, jurors typically are those that for some reason can’t get out of jury duty. Although I’m sure that some of you out there serve jury duty well, and are perfectly intelligent people, most people do not want to spend the time on a jury. Jurors are not tested for comprehension, IQ, racial or sexual bias, all of which favour certain defendants, and a high percentage of them are unemployed. To top it off, in the US, lawyers can pick and choose jurors, when the pool of jurors already include such unsavoury characters such as KKK sympathisers, Fundies, hell, even Jack Chick. Put him on a jury against a fagget defendant, and see if you get your fair trial.
Personally, I hate juries. Why not just flip a damn coin and be done with it - the majority of slack jawed mouthbreathers aren’t much better. At least they won’t convict me because I have slitty eyes and buck teeth - damn chink must’ve faked the evidence.
Just to keep this clear: Jury nullification would not actually nullify a law, only block its application in the specific case before the jury. If it proves impossible to convict a given drug dealer because this particular jury has one or two zealous Libertarians on it, good for that drug dealer; but the police and the DA’s office remain free to prosecute other suspected drug dealers – or the same one, if they catch him at something later.
Precisely. If public opinion was relatively close to the legislation, the nullifying jury would be an exception–IMO, even if they were instructed they had this power.
Campaigning is great, but it won’t do a thing to help the guy who’s about to go to jail for violating an unjust law.
I’m afraid not. A good case can be made that most of the drug laws are unjust. (You don’t have to beleive this to understand my argument) Yet something like half of all of our prison population is there for noviolent drug offences (I think, I’m not certain of the percentage, but it is larger than 10% and so definately not “a few cases”). Now, you may think that the drug laws are perfectly just and always enforced fairly. However you cannot say that laws are unjust in only a few cases.
Which is only one of their three findings based on your example. Yes, if all twelve “spontaneously” agree that:
2. All eyewitnesses are not credible
3. DNA evidence is not credible.
4. A confession was coerced.
then the jury will acquit and nothing can be done about it. But how does that differ from now? Extreme circumstances will always present problems, but if they have to convince even one juror and if, in so doing, they commit misconduct, there’s a remedy.
First, so what? Even under our current system almost any accusation of misconduct involves revealing “private” jury discussions. Under my system, absent misconduct, the discussion remains private, only the conclusions must be made public. And no, the jury counsel is not able to overrule the jury, only to report misconduct and to assist when asked.
That works out pretty much okay when the nullifying jury is letting a drug dealer go- he’ll almost certainly get caught again and probably won’t be so lucky next time. It doesn’t work out so well when the nullifying jury is doing it because the assault victim was gay or the rape victim was a slut or the murder victim was just another drug dealer. There’s no way to control the reasons a jury might chose to nullify- maybe one juror believes that the “bitch had it coming because dinner wasn’t ready on time” and the rest, seeing that he won’t budge, just want to get back to their lives. It seems to me that if it really was either an outrageous law or an outrageous application of the law , the jury would either nullify without being instructed or it’s the sort of jury that wouldn’t nullify even with the instructions. There’s no way to stop jury nullification ( and I wouldn’t even want to), but that’s no reason to encourage it in the sorts of cases where the instruction would make a difference- where the law or its application is not outrageous and where most people do not believe the law or this application is unjust but some people are very strongly opposed to the law, or at least are very oppposed to this application of it.
Jury nullification only adds to the unjustness of how laws are enforced. How is it just for two different juries to come to the same conclusion- the defendant violated law X- and one defendant is convicted and another acquitted? That’s not justice, it’s luck.
But we can’t assume jury nullification when there is a not guilty verdict. How do really tell?
Is it not possible that the prosecutor did not have as strong a case as he/she thought? Or just presented it badly? Couldn’t the call of jury nullification be the excuse du jour of an incompetent attorney?
Injustice is injustice–I don’t think the drug dealer (if his crime was dealing drugs) should be in trouble for anything. Neither do I think a beating victim should be left without his aggressor found guilty. But I don’t care to pick and choose injustices. I don’t like gay bashing, straight up. I don’t like most violence (most). But the fact is, a conspiracy against homosexuals is going to happen, if it is going to happen, whether juries are instructed about their right to nullify or not. Honest citizens, though, wanting to comply with the law, with the judge, who take their position seriously… not hearing about this ability, and wanting to comply with the judge’s charge, well that’s a whole different kind of injustice being done.
Quite so. Which is why I am so for jury nullification. It’s a test laws must pass if they are to remain enforceable: people must want to convict with them.
And it seems to me, from testimony here, that without instructions the “bad guys” are already stacking the "not guilty"s on without instruction. So I guess it is another case where honest citizens are kept in the dark for… whose own good?
What are you worried about–that all the laws that have been passed all this time would come crumbling down or something? That the entire justice system would become arbitrary? Is that realistic?
It can, yes; additionally, it ensures that the only laws that are enforced are the laws people agree with.
Huh? Because there were different trials with different evidence?
I found this on the “Idiot Legal Arguments” site of attorney Bernard J. Sussman (http://www.militia-watchdog.org/suss1.htm[/url):
Sorry, that’s http://www.militia-watchdog.org/suss1.htm.