Why juries work best22: 30 21/02/2010, Paul Mendell, comment, comment is free, criminal justice, law, politics, society, the guardian, the trial by ju

Why juries work best22: 30 21/02/2010, Paul Mendell, comment, comment is free, criminal justice, law, politics, society, the guardian, the trial by jury, news, UK Guardian Unlimited

Despite the evidence of each juror failures, the system is reliable - and again demonstrated

In the quarter century I have been practicing law, I have seen all kinds of juries, highly qualified workers who could not read the words of the oath, those who take note of plenty to which fought a battle for stay awake (often lost in my speech) of those who laughed just before condemn those who wept as acquitted. Long ago gave up trying to read or predict jury verdicts. So if a jury trial seems so casual, why remain a big fan of hers?

First, because despite the shortcomings of each jury, juries get it right most of the time. To make the right decisions on the evidence and reach verdicts on the right. Not always, of course, are not infallible - how could they be, are not human beings, even the judges, but they get it right most of the time.

Not only my word for it. The Justice Ministry report released last week, the culmination of 18 months of thorough investigation in more than half a million cases seen in England and Wales, shows the jurors are fair, efficient and effective. That sentence almost two thirds of those who try, convict more than acquit rape, which show no racial prejudice and not only reach a verdict in less than 1% of cases. So juries do a good job and now we have the facts and figures to prove it. It clearly needs to be the first requirement of a jury trial, whatever else may be its value.

Think back to all major miscarriages of justice in the last 50 years and would be difficult to find one where the blame lies with the jury. The vast majority of miscarriages are due to failures in other parts of the system - the police, experts, witnesses or lawyers. If the evidence is erroneous to the jury, because it is tainted with impropriety, misunderstood, inaccurate or incomplete and therefore receive a defective verdict.

But that juries work well is not the only reason to support the jury trial. Equally important is the fact that juries are one of the most democratic of the Constitution, are democracy in action every day of the week, not just once every four or five years. No other part of the Constitution that is so open to the public, where ordinary people participate in decisions of immediate importance such exercise real power. There jurors resolve the fate of their fellow citizens in the crown courts up and down the country every day of the week, determining their verdicts if the defendants are guilty of the most serious crimes of violence and dishonesty, as murder, rape, robbery and fraud.

Jurors bring freshness and ideas of those who are new to the system and have not become the case hardened or cynical. For anyone charged with an offense, the defense can not really be different than the lie - I was not there, I thought it was going to hit me, she agreed, I thought I was being honest, I did not know drugs were there. There is a limit to the ways that may be innocent. But if the jurors are not cynical, or are naive, and it is rare that a jury can not detect where the truth when confronted with conflicting accounts of witnesses.

Because that's the benefit of a jury of 12: it reduces the probability of a mistake of fact was made. Maybe one or two in the jury believe that the witness or the defendant, but the 12 will be bad is unlikely. Those who argue at trial by the judge will have to accept that judges make mistakes and are not infallible. But what if the judge makes a mistake of fact, prefers to believe that the witness wrong, that only a minority of jurors they think? There is no remedy for this type of error.


There is another compelling reason why the trial by jury is necessary. In this age of media, most people get their knowledge of what happens in a court of what I read in the newspapers and watch television. But no newspaper or TV element can possibly convey all the details and subtleties of the hours of the evidence presented in court. An editing process takes place: even the most impartial journalist has to filter the evidence. If all citizens to know the criminal justice system is what they read in newspapers and see on TV, they'll have a wrong impression of how the erroneous impression that can corrode your faith in the system.

You can ask to read the newspaper report of a case of how the jury could have reached its verdict, but only heard a part of the evidence that the jury heard. When Frances and Kay Inglis Gilderdale were tried for unlawful killing of children, had fierce public debate over the merits of the trials, but the only people who heard all the evidence were the jurors, and reflects the different verdicts in two cases different tests that were superficially similar.

How often I was asked in the aftermath of the trial of Munir Hussain if the law of self-defense was out of touch with public opinion, although 12 members of the public hearing on the jury heard all the evidence, including the facts of the robbery and the characters of the participants, and were sure that the accused had gone beyond the limits of self defense?

By bringing ordinary citizens into the system and its location in the heart of decision making, jury trial exposes the criminal justice system for its control while ensuring they gain firsthand experience of how that system. The jury trial helps the criminal justice system reflects the values and standards of the general public. It is vital to the health of the criminal justice system for citizens to participate in it and it is vital for democracy that they do, which might explain why politicians always try to limit their participation.

At the beginning of each criminal trial, jurors an oath to try the accused "and give a true verdict according to evidence." What last week's report shows beyond reasonable doubt is that is exactly what the jurors and, for the good of all, be allowed to continue doing so.

Law
Criminal justice
Jury Trial
Paul Mendell


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