Who should be on your Jury?

[Motokid]

This was brought up on a talk radio show yesterday.

What does a "jury of your peers" mean?

According to my dictionary a peer is "a person of the same civil rank or standing: an equal before the law."

Who should have been on MJ's jury? Should there have been any black people? How's about some multi-millionaires? What about a child star being on the jury? MJ's jury was mostly white with a few hispanic's. Was this really a jury of his peers? I'm pretty much the same age as MJ. Is a 70 year old one of my peers? What about a 20 year old? Would both a brain surgeon and a janitor be my peer if they are close to my age and live within a 10 mile radius of me?

I've been called for jury duty, but never specifically chosen to serve on a case. I've seen what society has to offer in terms of a jury. In many cases it's pretty frightening.

Should your average Joe Shmoe be given the power to decide life and death cases? Should people who have no legal knowledge be in charge of making such decisions? Can 12 people really decide who is telling the truth and who is not based on what some high priced attourney presents?

Is there a better way to decide guilty or innocent? Other than letting a slightly less than random segment of the population make that decision for you?

 

[jenn]

i think a jury of mj's peers would be pretty rare indeed. however if you did have a jury of just your peers, so in my case 30 year old white stay at home moms, how fair a trial would it be in the eyes of the law? those women would be more sympathetic to me and less likely to be objective. whereas a group like mj had, might be able to be objective as their own life is not so closely mirrored by mine.

 

[novella]

I agree with the dictionary definition and that would suffice for me, given voir dire to eliminate serious prejudices.

Peers should be people who accept and are subject to the same laws as the accused. Jury selection should eliminate those who don't regard the written law as binding. As long as whoever sits on the jury respects, in the context of the trial, the Consitution and the written law and is competent to understand the proceedings, they would be fine with me. I think that's what the law as written intends. It's not intended to pack the jury with people of your same race, income, social position, or religion. If it was, that would be unfair.

Do you really want 12 Donald Trumps sitting on Ken Lay's jury?

 

[Motokid]

I'm not suggesting that a jury for a black person should be made up of only black people, or other such like minded scenarios.

I guess in the eye's of the law, my jury should be no different than MJ's? By definition our peers represent the same people?

 

[Wabbit]

I think the whole idea is that 12 people picked at random should be a representation of our society. I do prefer our system to the American system ( as I understand it ). I think with the American system the lawyers get to pick and vet the curers don't they? With out system you are simply picked to sit on the Jury. The lawyers have the right to reject you if they don't like the look of you but they don't get the chance to vet you. Apologies if I have the American system wrong

I served Jury Service and found it really very interesting. The group of people that I was thrown in with were quite a mixed bunch.

PS: Deleting my silly comment. Sorry for the hijack before Mr Moto! Hight spirits, but I shouldn't have

 

[novella]

I think the whole idea is that 12 people picked at random should be a representation of our society. I do prefer our system to the American system ( as I understand it ). I think with the American system the lawyers get to pick and vet the curers don't they? With out system you are simply picked to sit on the Jury. The lawyers have the right to reject you if they don't like the look of you but they don't get the chance to vet you. Apologies if I have the American system wrong

I served Jury Service and found it really very interesting. The group of people that I was thrown in with were quite a mixed bunch.

PS: Deleting my silly comment. Sorry for the hijack before Mr Moto! Hight spirits, but I shouldn't have

Lawyers in America have a very limited ability to reject jurors. They have something like three rejections that they don't have to explain. To reject other jurors, they have to present a valid reason to the judge. This is much stricter than it used to be. In the 70s and 80s, a juror who didn't want to serve merely had to say they had a relative who was a lawyer, a victim of a crime, or a cop, which is about 95% of the country. Now you can be disqualified only if you show unreasonable prejudice or were the victim of a similar crime (and some other valid reasons). The lawyers don't just get to pick and choose these days.

Voir dire used to take weeks sometimes. Now it's much quicker, even for high-profile cases. Also, because both sides can exercise voir dire equally, the result is usually a balance of perceived interests.

 

[Stewart]

Should your average Joe Shmoe be given the power to decide life and death cases?

Joe pays his taxes, doesn't he?

Is there a better way to decide guilty or innocent?

Phone vote. Or text GUILTY to 82400 at $2 per vote.

As far as I'm concerned, a jury of my peers is fifteen Brits. Unless, of course, I'm tried elsewhere in the UK where there would be twelve.

 

[mehastings]

Lawyers in America have a very limited ability to reject jurors. They have something like three rejections that they don't have to explain. To reject other jurors, they have to present a valid reason to the judge. This is much stricter than it used to be. In the 70s and 80s, a juror who didn't want to serve merely had to say they had a relative who was a lawyer, a victim of a crime, or a cop, which is about 95% of the country. Now you can be disqualified only if you show unreasonable prejudice or were the victim of a similar crime (and some other valid reasons). The lawyers don't just get to pick and choose these days.

This is true, you used to be able to get out of jury duty just be being public safety personnel. These days you have to come up with something better.

As far as a jury of my peers goes... I'm happy with 12 people who think they can make an impartial decision. I don't care what they look like, what education they have, how much money they have, etc. I suppose though that my view (and probably those of the other members here) is a bit skewed. I haven't commited a crime that I now need to get out of and I can't imagine ever doing so. In fact, I think my worst crimes would be speeding and bending the truth a bit to get out of jury duty . I guess if I had committed a crime I might want people whose demographics suggest they would sympathize with me.

 

[Sar]

In theory, I believe a jury should be 12 people who are open minded enough to base their decisions on the fact of the case and nothing else. Things such as income, gender, age, career race etc should not be an issue.

Back in the real world, how would anyone even go about amassing these 12 people, it's is human nature to initially spot differences - that's how our brains our programmed and those differences tend to made into a far bigger issue then they truly are.

Trickier still is the issue regarding belief systems & attitudes, for example, some things which are considered perfectly ok in certain religions are considered crimes elsewhere, female castration being a good example, do you specifically have people of the same background who also see nothing wrong with such a practice, do you ensure that the opposite is true or a mixture of both?

In my opinion, I cannot see a way that any trial can be truly fair due to personal interpretations of what is & isn't acceptable & those who will always have a bias no matter how hard they try to cover it.

 

[novella]

Trickier still is the issue regarding belief systems & attitudes, for example, some things which are considered perfectly ok in certain religions are considered crimes elsewhere, female castration being a good example, do you specifically have people of the same background who also see nothing wrong with such a practice, do you ensure that the opposite is true or a mixture of both?

In my opinion, I cannot see a way that any trial can be truly fair due to personal interpretations of what is & isn't acceptable & those who will always have a bias no matter how hard they try to cover it.

That's particularly true in capital punishment cases. It's very hard to screen for jurors who will actually apply capital punishment because so many people don't believe that it's right even in the face of a law allowing for it.

So then the court is in a position to only select jurors who believe that capital punishment is sometimes justified. That's one loaded jury, if you ask me. Very problemmatic.

 

[Kookamoor]

That's particularly true in capital punishment cases. It's very hard to screen for jurors who will actually apply capital punishment because so many people don't believe that it's right even in the face of a law allowing for it.

So then the court is in a position to only select jurors who believe that capital punishment is sometimes justified. That's one loaded jury, if you ask me. Very problemmatic.

So can people be excused from jury duty if they don't believe in capital punishment? What's the process? Surely it's not really a jury of 'peers' if they only choose people who believe it is a valid punishment.

Interestingly, I used to be in favour of this kind of punishment for particularly heinous crimes, but over the past few years I've changed my mind. I should point out that there is no capital punishment in Australia. Back in 1996 there was a terrible massacre in Tasmania where some 26 people died. They caught the fellow who did it the next day, and he hasn't been heard from since. I have never heard his name mentioned again, and I don't intend to mention it now - he has basically vanished. In my opinion it is a far worse punishment to lock someone up and 'throw away the key' than it is to kill them. But we must also consider what the 'punishment' is for - is it a deterent, or removal from society? In his case, it is removal from society as he is never going to be let out again.

Sorry, Moto, I think this probably belongs in another thread...

 

[novella]

So can people be excused from jury duty if they don't believe in capital punishment? What's the process? Surely it's not really a jury of 'peers' if they only choose people who believe it is a valid punishment.

In theory all the jurors have to believe in the laws that they are meant to apply, and in some states that includes capital punishment. If a jury is instructed to apply capital punishment if the circumstances of the case are met, then that is their duty. Of course, that's hard to ensure in practice.

The application of capital punishment in the US is truly unjust, meted out disproportionately to poor uneducated black offenders and it's far from error free. It's expensive, barbaric, and irreversible.

BTW, do you think Moto is concerned that we've derailed a little here?

 

[Motokid]

absolutely and totally,
beyond a reasonable doubt,
without question, and undeniably,
outraged and hurt...

I'm thinking of pm'ing every single current member of TBF to announce my displeasure and alert them to the feelings of hatred that I get from you two specifically....


...now...carry on please

 

[Stewart]

When I did jury duty years ago there was 60 of us called up (aged 18 to 65, i think) and it was then a lottery who was picked - fair, too - and, after pulling fifteen numbers out of a hat (we were each given a number, like Bingo ) we were led through to the court.

After three "gruelling" days of listening to some bitch whine and some guy saying "I didn't stab him; he jumped onto the knife" I knew which of my three options I would be using. Hmmm, Not guilty? No! Not proven? No. Guilty? Sounds good.

 

[Kookamoor]

Sorry, Moto, for derailing somewhat. I'm not in the mental state to actually start a thread of my own on the matter of captial punishment today, though it would be interesting. Although I can see it wandering into religion already. I wondered who'd accuse me (quite validly!) of derailing... always a pleasure, Novella .

Back on topic... who else has served jury duty? Do you consider yourself to have been 'peers' of the accused?

 

[mehastings]

When I did jury duty years ago there was 60 of us called up (aged 18 to 65, i think) and it was then a lottery who was picked - fair, too - and, after pulling fifteen numbers out of a hat (we were each given a number, like Bingo ) we were led through to the court.

Wow. What an interesting way to choose a jury. Numbers in a hat. I've never heard of that around here. I've also never gotten far in the selection process either. Maybe that does happen here. Anyone else from the states know??

"I didn't stab him; he jumped onto the knife"

I'm sorry. I just think this is really funny. He didn't seriously say something like that, did he?

 

[Stewart]

Wow. What an interesting way to choose a jury. Numbers in a hat.

Obviously, it wasn't a literal hat but it was a lottery. The numbers were in a bag.

I just think this is really funny. He didn't seriously say something like that, did he?

It's what he based his whole defence on.