Supreme Court Ruling Allows Verdicts to Be Nullified if a Juror Is Found to Have Politically Incorrect Attitudes [More]So what the hell do they have voir dire for?
I guess if a "guilty" verdict can be challenged, so may a "not guilty" one...? If that's the case, so much for fully informed juries.
[Via Michael G]
3 comments:
I'm glad you caught on.
I was wondering if anyone else had considered the implications for jury nullification.
So, hypothetically you are a Mexican (brown) gun owner. The jury is composed of one or more racists who hate Mexicans, or are at least biased against them. The juror doesn't like those "dirty Mexicans" ("bad hombres"), so you want your conviction to stand, without challenge?
Further, the double jeopardy clause prohibits retrial if the defendant is acquitted, so it is an ignorant statement that a "not guilty" verdict can be challenged on appeal.
As for voir dire, it's possible that the racist juror "denied everything," and got on the jury anyway before he manifested his unconscionable bias.
Last, the complaint about defendants getting off is nonsense. It's more likely an innocent defendant is convicted than a guilty defendant gets off.
from the linked piece:
"Beyond that, it is a step toward reducing our legal system to a dysfunctional farce."
A "step"?
Actually, the "dysfunctional farce" stage was reached at least a century ago, once the practice began of regularly admitting government attorneys to grand jury proceedings...
Now, grand jurors can be likened to lawn furniture, to be arranged in whatever fashion pleases the government prosecutor.
I have regularly posted sarcastic (asking why have a grand jury panel in the first place if they merely operate as a rubber-stamp, and the like) comments to my small Ohio town newspaper's reportage of county grand jury goings-on, which never deviate from a list of indictments -only- the grand juries never issuing a no true bill.
Last time I did this was five months ago, when, once again the county grand jury issued indictments only, to which I posted:
Not one 'no true bill'?
Once again the Clinton County Grand Jury appears to be operating as a rubber stamp...rather than the independent investigatory body as designed by the Founding Fathers of the revolutionary generation.
It might not be of such immediate concern if the crimes of Hillary and Bill and Chelsea Clinton (the Clinton Crime Family Foundation) could be presented for consideration.
That may be the only way these particular criminals are brought to justice.
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Since then, the -news- paper has not seen fit to report county grand jury proceedings...a lie of omission.
So, now, via SCOTUS, a means to overturn trial jury verdicts in the rare instances of actual trials rather than the standard usual extorted plea bargains...
Rule of Law is dead, history, some may say ancient history...
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