The Jury System

[Zeno]

With the possibility of a trial for Kobe, The Adulterer; I have again been pondering the jury system. I have doubts about the jury system but perhaps I’m wrong. What do lawyers look for in a jury – complete stupidity, just plain ignorance, a collection of morons, credulous simpletons, people oblivious of everything around them, what exactly? Who needs to be weeded out and thrown to the dogs? And why? Lawyers hire firms to profile potential jurors? Why is this? Or am I laboring under the vile and gross delusion that a trial is to determine truth, based on evidence and facts, that will be presented to an impartial panel of “peers”. But perhaps I have forgotten that OJ is innocent. Can anyone clear this up for me?


“The jury system puts a ban upon intelligence and honesty, and a premium upon ignorance, stupidity and perjury.” – Mark Twain, in Roughing it .

“We have a criminal jury system which is superior to any in the world; and its efficiency is only marred by the difficulty of finding twelve men every day who don’t know anything and can’t read.”
– Mark Twain, Speech in London, July 4, 1873.

-Zeno,

[andyfox]

I posed simlar questions here, though not nearly as eloquently as Mr. Zeno and Mr. Clemens, when I was called for jury duty several years ago.

I cannot understand why the lawyers have a say in jury selection. They are not impartial, by definition. It would be as if we let Mr. Torre and Mr. Cox select the umpires for a Yankees-Braves game. Why not let an impartial party (theoretcially, at least), trained in the law, select the jury, i.e., the judge? He can decide who is capable and eligible.

[Ragnar]

To understand the way we pick jurors in this country you need to understand two main concepts. First as lawyers we don't select jurors when we exercise peremptory challenges we deselect jurors. Second we are looking for jurors who are favorable to our case, not "fair and impartial jurors."

Lawyers are allowed to do this so that the jury will not be unfair to their side, but this has gotten way out of control. The judge and lawyers first ask questions to reveal challenges for cause--people who can't be fair. I have seen proposals that do away with peremptory challenges and just allow challenges for cause. That could work if challenges for cause were more liberally granted. However, some jurors will lie and say they will be fair when they in fact have an agenda.

Lawyers use jury consultants to try to find the jurors who would be more favorable to their case, by removing those who wouldn't. A few years ago I saw a presentation by the jury consultant for OJ and the jury consultant for the prosecution in that case. They are now partners in a jury consulting firm. They basically said that OJ's lawyers listened to his consultant and that Marcia Clark ignored the advice of her consultant. She went with her own instincts and thought that black women were sympathetic to her, when in fact black women as a demographic were very favorable to OJ.

Jury consultants try to find a question that seems innocent, but actually is very revealing. In the OJ case the best question was whether the potential juror watched "Oprah" ! Potential jurors who watched "Oprah" were very likely to be predisposed to acquit OJ.

Usually one side would like ignorant jurors and one side wants intelligent ones. That can vary dependent upon the particular case. In a prosecution relying on substantial physical evidence which is favorable the prosecution wants educated people and the defense doesn't.

Some of the predispositions of jurors are counter-intuitive. One of the most important factors in Kobe's case will be which side wants women, and what kind of women on the jury. Women are generally harder on other women as victims or as defendants, especially attractive women. On the other hand very liberal women, would probably be favorable to the argument that there was no consent in the case.

The jury consultants will do surveys of people in the area where the trial will be conducted and ask a variety of questions including whether they think Kobe is guilty or not guilty. As trial approaches they will hire a variety of people to hear a mock trial of the case and test out various arguements by the lawyers.

Is this always a fair system? Definitely not. The problem is that any system using judges only may be subject to even more bias.

Ragnar

[HDPM]

Twain had it about right. /forums/images/icons/smirk.gif

Sometimes I am very surprised by how wise a jury can be actually. Other times I am surprised. Juries are strange beasts.

[adios]

"Or am I laboring under the vile and gross delusion that a trial is to determine truth, based on evidence and facts, that will be presented to an impartial panel of “peers”. But perhaps I have forgotten that OJ is innocent. Can anyone clear this up for me? "

Then DA of LA county, Gil Garcetti, called the OJ verdict jury nullification. I consider juries another check and balance on government. IMO god help us if we ever lose jury nullification.

[Zeno]

Thank you for such an excellence response. I take note of the last paragraph as kind of a - The jury system has obvious faults but the solution may be worse. Must be why the founding fathers hung the jury system on us all. But perhaps some modification could be made in the selection process to "clean up" some of the abuse. But perhaps this would only add to the mess. I suppose the system works well enough most of the time that we must live with the faults.

-Zeno

PS Thanks to everyone else that responded also.

[Ragnar]

I think the jury system worked better around the time of the founders. The jurors were taken from real communities where people knew each other. Knowing the people involved was not a reason to remove jurors. There was more jury nullification as well. It was accepted as part of the system. It is a very controversial topic now. There weren't the same tricks used to select the jury that are used now.

Ragnar

[Ray Zee]

if you are innocent you would tend to want a jury made of judges. if guilty you would want it made of stupid common people. so it would lend itself to having judges be our jury system. would work faster for sure.
except when you are innocent and the plantiff is a powerful person then your goose is cooked. thats why overall even with its bad side having common people or your so called piers is better than anything else.

nothing works better than having someone judge you that has nothing to gain by the outcome.

[David Steele]

"But perhaps I have forgotten that OJ is innocent. Can anyone clear this up for me? "

I keep hearing this over and over.

I watched a great deal of the criminal trial and was not
surprised he was aquited. The defence put on a great defence, the prosecution made some huge mistakes, and the
police surely bungled a lot of the investigation.

If it was as obvious as everyone seems to think that OJ was
guilty, then that is even more proof of all the mistakes made
by the prosecution.

A lot of everyones certainty about OJ's guilt comes from his
later loss of the civil trial, which we were not allowed to watch, and also from the media constantly assuming his guilt afterwards.

D.

[John Cole]

Ray,

When I see jurors get trotted out on various "news" programs for their post trial analysis and opinion, I'm not quite so sure these people have nothing to gain. Still, I believe somehow that most people take jury duty seriously.

John

[John Ho]

Good point. It is another example of the greatness of the constitution. 12 average people can do basically anything they want in a jury.

Now, the OJ case may not have been the greatest way to use jury nullification. Blacks get mistreated by police so a black man can kill 2 white people and get away with it. Pretty silly really.