Re: Re: Re: Re: British Justice
Cleopatra said:
Ok Who will defend the juries?
I won't defend juries as the best possible finder of fact, but I will say that I'd rather have a jury than an elected judge as finder of fact in an unpopular case. Judges tend to take the testimony of police officers as gospel absent glaring evidence to the contrary.
An example:
A drug case against a young black man in a rather rednecky county. There is a pattern where cops are stopping a certain black SUV as they believe it belongs to person X, a strongly suspected crack dealer. One time when X is driving he is stopped for a defective taillight, and the city cops search the heck out of him, finding nothing. X then takes the SUV to a shop, where the tailight is (suprisingly) found to be defective after all. X has it fixed, and he and the auto guy test it and make sure the thing works. Not good to be a (suspected) crack dealer with a reason for cops to pull you over...
One fateful night later, my client is at a club with some other people including X. My client decides he wants some pot. X lets him borrow the SUV and my client goes and buys 3 "dime bags." On the way back from the club he is pulled over by the same cop. He is searched and the bags found. Since he has 3 bags he is charged with "possession with intent", a felony rather than simple possession, a misdemeanor. Later, when pressed as to why he pulled the SUV over, besides it being driven by a black man at 1 A.M. near a college, the cop cited the defective taillight.
At the suppression hearing I put on the guy that fixed the taillight, X, two other people that saw the taillight, and an "expert" (another mechanic) that examined the tailight and said the officer's accoount of the malfunction was virtually impossible given the condition of the car. This against the simple statement of the officer and his admitting that the reason he even paid attention to the car was because of his suspicion of X.
The judge rejected the motion to suppress, simply asserting that the officer had no reason to lie.
So, we went to trial in front of an all white jury, where I intended to try to convince them that the pot was for personal use. I'd love to tell you that I won, as I was usually successful in these types of cases, except that my client jumped bail during lunch and wasn't found until 9 months later, and at that point the prosecutor offered the plea to possession and time served, which my client took. The plea was offered because by that time I was pretty much unbeatable in pot cases (crack was a whole different story).
Anyway, I think 90% of the dissatisfaction with the outcome of jury trials comes from uniformed opinion as to the merits of a particular case rather than inherent defects in the jury system. Two popular areas of complaint are 1) excessive jury verdicts and 2) the O.J. verdict.
In both cases most people complaining of these verdicts are basing opinion on the media's presentation of the case, which can be quite distorted. The "McDonald's Coffee Case" which has been discussed several times on this forum is a good example. The media tersely described it as "woman gets millions for spilling hot coffee on herself." In reality, there was much more to it, third degree burns requiring surgery and repeated warnings to McDonalds of the dangers of their policy.
Likewise, as to the O.J. case, most knowlegeable people I have encountered that studied the evidence closely conclude that the not guiltu verdict was correct, that the state did not carry their burden in that case. This doesn't mean they think OJ didn't do it, rather that given severe defects in the DNA collection and other items such as racist cops led to a reasonable possiblilty that much of the crucial evidence was planted. Thus, reasonable doubt.
The problems we see in nasty cases where juries convict on sparse evidence can be blamed more on the failures of the defense attorney to communicate with the jury the real issues at bar, or more likely the trial judge's refusal to keep the prosecutor from pandering to the emotions of the jury with inflammatory remarks and evidence. The latter is the real problem, IMO. Prosecutors usually get away with focusing on nothing but the harm to the victim and the lack of remorse by the accused, factors that can inflame a jury, and that are completely irrelevant to the question of guilt. There are other techniques that I have witnessed or read in transcripts, such as simply attacking the defense lawyer as trying to decieve the jury. Most appellate courts seem reluctant to reverse on these grounds.
Most bizzaro-world verdicts I have seen can be traced to these factors, a crappy attorney or a judge not keeping one side from pandering to the emotions of a jury. These techniques are effective to the point that I'd guess that multiple juries wouldn't make a bit of difference, except that with more people you have a greater chance of finding that one person who can (or will) cut through the B.S. and see the issues rather than the bombast.
In my opinion it is much more a question of the quality of information that gets to the jury rather than a question of the decision process of the jury itself. Not that the present system in perfect in that regard, but in my opinion that aspect of the system causes a much smaller portion of the error than does crappy attorneys and judges that abandon their role as gatekeepers.
Of course, all of my practice is in one of the more backward jurisdictions in the U.S., so others may see it differently.
Sez you. My experience with people who question the verdict differs.