What Really Happens On Juries

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IN THIS ISSUE

May 1, 2009

* The “J” Team
* Juror Experimentation
* Cell Phone Policies/Instructions for Jurors

Editor: Gregory S. Hurley

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http://365drawings.blogspot.com/2009/04/jury-duty.html

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http://accountingbum.com/wp/?p=1017

The prosecutor immediately requested my release for cause. The judge asked me about my opinion on drug laws. I replied that I didn’t have a problem convicting someone for breaking the law, but didn’t feel the law was currently right.

So the prosecutor asked that I be summarily released. The judge reminded her that it wasn’t her turn. So the defendent asked for another juror to be released, and they questioned the next juror. Upon which the prosecutor immediately asked for my release.

Which was funny, because looking around the room I figured I was probably the most conservative person in the room, including the prosecutor, judge, and bailiff. If not the most, easily in the top three.

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http://angeles-defense-attorney.blogspot.com/2009/04/angeles-attorney-case-jackson-trials.html

One such case is pending before an appellate court. A judge found that Hispanics were excluded because of the juries of how jurors are summoned for service.

For Jackson, the problem is compounded by the absence of blacks in Santa Maria, where his case will be judged. Census figures show blacks represent only 2.3 percent of the County of Santa Barbara population.

The question under consideration by the appellate court is a lack of monitoring by the jury summons from the Office of Jury Commissioner. The Commissioner sent questionnaires to potential panelists, but does not track if they are not returned, the attorney of Santa Barbara said James Herman, former president of the status bar.

“You end up with a self-selection of jurors,” he said.

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http://musingswithsam.wordpress.com/2009/04/24/day-1-juror-6-her-thoughts/

OBSERVATIONS (in all seriousness)

-it’s an odd thing, this process…
-the accused sits there while we bare all, intended to determine if our life stories will affect a fair and impartial hearing of the evidence.
-it was weird that I know nothing of the accused and he (and 60+ other people) now know a lot about my value system, my opinions, my tendencies … it’s a bizarre peel back of yourself… in real life you let all that info gradually unfold and you get used to each other at each new phase. Not in jury duty…we all have only loaded canon balls of info about each other…like the cliff notes of a book… it was actually convicting to wonder if short yes/no or one phrase answers about myself would testify to God’s work in me or if it would be a reflection of the world and its’ values.
-people’s stories/experiences/situations… just a reminder that you never know what people have been through/are going through …I was reminded that I need to continue cultivating automatic compassion for all people all the time, cuz you JUST NEVER KNOW.

-I always thought that people didn’t want to do jury duty and would therefore ’say anything’ to get out of it. HOWEVER, not the case. There’s a bizarre peer pressure to be appear unaffected by any testimony/info … meaning it was almost as if all our personal experiences/values (what shapes you) is easily cast aside for the benefit of this accused. To be honest with you, I didn’t believe most of the jurors answers. I think most were caving to that weird peer pressure to not seem ‘politically incorrect’ ie. ‘accept everyone all the time no matter what.’ I find it hiiighly unlikely that if I was having dinner with any of them that they would’ve given the same answers.
So, we shall see what happens.

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http://www.wvrecord.com/news/218646-all-things-jury-what-makes-a-good-alternative-research-venue

Even when these research protocols are followed, opposing counsel may attempt to position the efforts as “jury tampering”. Nothing could be further from the truth. Legitimate trial consultants work very hard to eliminate any potential bias in the research process. In particular, the participants in any research efforts should not be able to “know” which side the research is being conducted for. Besides following a professional code of conduct, researchers do not want to interject any bias into their trial research in order to prevent false findings.

So, what’s a legitimate jury research professional to do? The usual answer is to find an appropriate alternative, or “surrogate”, venue for research efforts. And, what is the criteria for determining a surrogate venue?

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IN THIS ISSUE

April 24, 2009

* Summoned to a Scarier LA
* Cell Phone Policies/Instructions for Jurors
* Federal Jury Management System
* Jurors Identify Factors in a Hung Jury
* ICM Jury Management Workshop on April 29-May 1, 2009 in Williamsburg, Virginia

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http://www.japanprobe.com/?p=9943

Since 1943, Japan has had no jury system for its trials. All of that will change in May, when a new law goes into effect on May 21st. Randomly selected citizens will be required to serve as lay judges on panels that will – together with professional judges – issue decisions on serious criminal cases.

Many Japanese are dreading the possibility of having to serve as a lay judge, and bookstores are making a lot of money selling new self-help books on what lay judges are supposed to do. Polls have found that a majority of Japanese people do not want to serve as lay judges, and it seems that some of them have formed groups dedicated to abolishing the new system. Here is a Fuji TV report about a group that recently held an anti-lay judge system rally in Tokyo:

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http://trialinsights.wordpress.com/2009/04/22/thinking-styles-and-your-jury/

More often than not, voir dire focuses on uncovering biases in jurors so that counsel can present their case to a jury that is willing to listen at a minimum. This is appropriate but leaves out an important consideration: thinking styles. Beyond the basic “visual or auditory” learning that has been addressed with using visual aids in the courtroom, how does each juror receive and process the information counsel gives them? How do they organize their thoughts? Are they even capable of working in groups or are they better at making decisions alone? Although voir dire is generally limited in scope, we don’t need to rely solely on voir dire to appeal to a wider audience at trial if we have a better understanding of the types of thinkers out there.

For the purposes of this article, I will focus on the three primary thinking styles and how they may affect how a juror receives information and applies that in the context of a small group setting. Later articles will address the other styles.

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http://sleeplessinstgeorge.blogspot.com/2009/04/guilty.html

…They gave him 3 different DUI tests and he failed all 3. We found him guilty. It was hard for me to decide someone had chosen to break the law. I felt good about my verdict, I thought he was guilty. I just felt bad being the one to say yes he was guilty. I felt bad that he had made the choices he did. If I could change anything I would change his decision to drive his car that night. After the trial the prosecutor talked to us for a minute and told us that there were things he couldn’t tell us in court. Like this is his 3rd DUI arrest (and perhaps conviction) in 10 years. On the scene the man took a breathalyzer test, and failed. It isn’t admissible in court like the one at the jail would have been. When he failed it on the side of the road, it was at a .167! The drinking limit is .08! I felt even better about the conviction after I heard that. It could have been me and my kids that he hit when he was driving, rather then almost killing himself when he drove off the road…

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http://www.thestandard.com.hk/news_detail.asp?pp_cat=11&art_id=81221&sid=23506419&con_type=1

A Law Reform Commission member is calling on the government to plug the loophole so that such potential jurors cannot avoid the civic duty regarded by many as tedious.

Although the Jury Ordinance does not specify an education requirement, it is a common practice to include only those aged between 21 and 65 with at least Secondary 7 or equivalent education in the jury pool.

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http://www.lawyerlowe.com/2009/04/21/opening-up-the-jury/

In jury trials, the threshold problem in obtaining a fair jury is to somehow get the jury to be open and candid in voir dire so that counsel and the Court can determine which ones have the ability to sit as fair and impartial jurors on that particular case.

While the problem in obtaining a fair jury does not end with that threshold, the problem is magnified ten-fold when that threshold problem is not solved.

It has been my experience in over 30 years of trying jury trials that it is rare that counsel or the Court are able to obtain complete candor from jurors during voir dire. The principal reason for this, based on my many debriefings of jurors after trials have been completed, is that the jurors perceive the jury selection process as a question of, “Are you a good enough person to sit as a juror?”

No one wants to be branded as not being “good enough” to sit on a jury. That becomes a judgment about the person’s character, integrity, family background, personal opinions, and a host of other factors, which are very sensitive and important to each juror.

To have those factors weighed by lawyers and a judge and found to be “so bad as not to be suitable for qualities in a juror” is something which most jurors dread. They envision their friends, neighbors and family members looking at them skeptically and asking, “So you weren’t good enough to sit on the jury?”.

Now anyone who looks at the purpose of voir dire and the mechanics of it realistically knows that such reactions are unfounded and do not reflect the purpose or result of jury selection. Nonetheless, it is that gut reaction of jurors during voir dire which causes them to be closed, secretive, and deceptive. Jurors simply do not want to be judged wanting when it comes to jury selection, and they will go to great lengths, consciously or unconsciously, to avoid being branded as “unfit”.

How, then, can counsel and the judge cause jurors to open up to them, to reveal their true feelings and to be candid?

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http://stellrr.livejournal.com/246128.html

I find it interesting that they ask you some pretty personal questions in front of all the other potential jurors when selecting the jury. I think that because they people in front of others, people probably don’t answer completely honestly. They asked people if they would hold the word of a policeman higher than the word of a civilian. Everybody said no. I can’t believe that all of them felt that way. People had to describe any felonies they went to court for. They also ask if you have a religious or personal belief against judging people. Seems like an easy out if you don’t want to serve on a jury, but nobody took it…

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http://www.wislawjournal.com/article.cfm/2009/04/20/The-move-to-silence-juror-Twittering

State officials are drafting an instruction aimed at keeping the World Wide Web out of the jury box.

No Wisconsin proceedings have been reported compromised by jurors’ growing use of text messaging and social networking Web sites, such as Facebook or Twitter, during trial, judges and trial attorneys said.

But state judges and trial lawyers have heard stories from around the country where jurors have posted online or sent text messages about trials. Such stories, and a growing awareness of incidents nationwide, have led state jurists to examine the issue in the hopes of preventing potential problems here, said Milwaukee County Circuit Chief Judge Jeffrey A. Kremers, who also sits on a statewide criminal jury instruction committee.

“We’re working on drafting an instruction that would incorporate this issue and warn jurors not only not to do it, but also give some information on why they shouldn’t do it,” Kremers said.
Some judges have already started adapting their instructions to address everything from searches on Google Earth to Twitter updates noting jurors’ trial experiences.

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http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-tobar21-2009apr21,0,2461506.column

Our job as a jury might on one level seem straightforward. We needed to determine if the defendant acted in lawful self-defense.

“I feel like we have one set of laws here that we’re being asked to enforce,” one of the jurors said. “And they, in that building, have a whole other set of laws.”

But some of us argued that the law should be applied the same way everywhere. Didn’t we have a duty to convict simply to protect the women, children and bystanders in the direction of all that gunfire?

There are neighborhoods where the law works efficiently, and others where it does not.

Our heads and hearts are needed in those jury boxes to sort it all out and hold the city together.

We took our duty seriously enough to deliberate for 11 hours. A few of us wept. Nearly everyone said they lost some sleep. We split 7 to 5 in favor of guilty on the first assault charge, and 8 to 3 on the second. Finally, the judge declared a mistrial.

Later, two other jurors and I talked to the prosecutor and public defender. We found out we were not the first jury to deadlock on the case. The defendant, we discovered, has been in jail for nearly a year, turning down various plea bargains to argue his innocence.

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http://texaspurlgurl.blogspot.com/2009/04/jury-duty-day-4.html

At the end of Day 3, the Plaintiff rested. One of the jurors, the assistant principal, did a fist pump at the end and said, “YES!” out loud. It was then that I realized she and I might be cell mates. We became really good friends by the end of it and her son will be a freshman in band next year where my oldest child goes to school. Small world.

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http://www.marylandinjurylawyerblog.com/2009/04/baltimore_residents_neglect_ju.html

The Maryland Bar Journal just published an article on an interview with retired Howard County Judge Dennis M. Sweeney, who talks about the jury trial system in Maryland.

One amazing fact Judge Sweeney offers is that the no-show juror rate in Baltimore City is approximately 60%…

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http://dianacorner.blogspot.com/2009/04/hmmm-good-question-about-what-box-to.html

On Bilerico there is a blog entry about jury duty, which box for gender to check off on the form. For most people that is an easy question, but when you are transsexual it becomes a legal nightmare, on the bottom of the form you have to swear that the information is correct.

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http://www.desalvo.org/blog/?p=100

What is the purpose of a jury? Most people think that they are there to determine the guilt or innocence of a defendant in a trial. This is not true.

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http://walkerszivak.blogspot.com/2009/04/jury-duty.html

1) I can see why it takes 3 years to get a case through the system – it’s insanely inefficient. At least from the perspective of the person called for jury duty. I’m certain that the attorneys who apparently knew they didn’t need to get there at 9:00am as we were instructed to do had a fine morning. However, it would have been nice if they had told me I didn’t really have to get there until 9:30 at the earliest because they were going to wait for all the late people anyway. Second, it would be ideal if instead of having each of us stand and say our name, our age, our occupation and our spouses occupation they would have just read all that information and more on the 9 page form I had to fill out and send back. But then why would we bother them with such silly things as actually using the information that I was requested to provide? After an entire day of people being asked questions (which by the way had they asked each person those questions personally rather than in a group of 150 people I could have been done in 10 minutes because I didnt have the need to explain how I was really busy, or that my husbands business does such and such, or that for this reason on that I should be excused) I was set free at 2:30. Not sure what was accomplished by my sitting there, but such is life.

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http://www.philly.com/philly/columnists/20090419_Monica_Yant_Kinney
__All_set_to_serve_on_a_jury__but_then______.html

Judging juries

Beth Bochnak is president of the National Jury Project/East and a veteran jury consultant.

When I described the other seven people in the jury box – a middle-age dentist, a maintenance man, a retired paralegal, an unemployed driver, a haiku poet/electrician, a college student, and a single mom with a master’s degree in social work – Bochnak knew in an instant why I had been cut.

“Why take a chance on a newspaper reporter?” she said. “Who knows whether you’d written about” cases like this before?

Bochnak agreed that I probably had come off as overeager.

“When I see someone dying to get on a jury, I think, ‘What on earth is the matter with that person?’ ”

Lawyers like leaders but don’t want one juror dominating the rest.

“You know too much,” Bochnak declared. And as a columnist, “you’re too opinionated.”

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http://www.law.com/jsp/ihc/PubArticleIHC.jsp?id=1202429969160

Americans are angry. That could be bad news for corporations because today’s angry citizen is tomorrow’s angry juror. Somehow or other, the lawyers who defend business need to reduce the fury in the courtroom before their clients get burned.

A recent CNN poll showed that 75 percent of Americans are upset about the way things are going in this country. They’re furious that Bernie Madoff made off with so much money, and that banks and other bailed-out corporations are still making lavish purchases. They’re mad that their good credit does not allow them to get a loan because banks made countless loans to people with bad credit. And they’re incensed that college savings and retirement funds are melting.

Politicians of both parties are mining this rich vein of rage, and the media are fanning the flames. A Tampa Tribune column says “Backlash to Corporate Greed Is Growing.” A Baltimore Sun article decries “A New Low for Corporate Greed.” The Washington Times describes “The Age of Corporate Greed.” Some op-eds urge that greedy executives be prosecuted and put away.

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http://completeoutrage.wordpress.com/2009/04/17/trial-by-jury-duty/

Frankly, it was heartbreaking. And what I couldn’t figure out was this: why are we all here? Why hadn’t the defense attorney managed to strike a plea bargain for her client? It was three misdemeanor charges and I didn’t get the impression that the prosecution was trying to throw the book at the defendant. In fact, he had originally been charged with a more serious felony related to his discharging the weapon and injuring someone. And there appeared to be no dispute as to the facts of the case. It remains a mystery to me as to why this case made it to trial…

During closing arguments, the prosecutor essentially restated both his case and the law as it pertained to the case. It really was an open-and-shut case, viewed through the lens of the law.

The defense closed by painting a picture of the tragic circumstances that had befallen the defendant – his shooting, the apparent bungling of that case by the SFPD, his difficult recovery. And all of it was true and sad and depressing – but none of it changed the facts of the case. She went on and on to the jurors, about their need to reach their own individual conclusions and to stick with them, no matter what. It was pretty clear she was hoping to elicit sufficient pity from at least one juror to result in a hung jury – or was she actually aiming for jury nullification on misdemeanor charges? Either way, it was fairly distasteful. Don’t get me wrong – I understand that it’s her job to keep her client from being convicted. But there was no disagreement as to facts of the case. As that old chestnut goes, “two wrongs don’t make a right” – but that seemed to me to be the crux of her defense.

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IN THIS ISSUE

April 17, 2009

* Juror Reductions in Philadelphia
* Maricopa County, Arizona Capital Jury Trial Backlog
* Judges as Jurors
* Partial Verdict Reached Against Race Car Driver
* ICM Jury Management Workshop on April 29 – May 1, 2009 in Williamsburg, Virginia

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IN THIS ISSUE

April 11, 2009

* Victim Argues for Jury Exemptions for Victims of Violent Crimes
* Hung Jury?
* Jury Duty: Burden or Blessing?
* Jury Selection Process in Anthony Marshall Trial
* ICM Jury Management Workshop on April 29 – May 1, 2009 in Williamsburg, Virginia

Editor: Gregory S. Hurley

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